Topic: [MUST READ] Butterfly Labs FTC complaint (Read 9809 times)

In this reality, people that get unwillingly screwed have options other than being bent over and taking it.

You miss the point entirely. BFL have behaved illegally. Are you telling us that BFL should be above the law just because they are "innovating" in a risky market space? The law says, they must provide refunds and they cannot remove that right in a contract.

BFL appear to be being greedy, because they want to keep all their pre-order swag and avoid their responsibility. They also lied again and again to con people into waiting and waiting. Oh, we're fools for believing them, but now after all this..... remember the multiple times Josh said they'd have ALL orders shipped by end of Sept? How on earth will that happen - they publish their order queues and clearly they are not going to even meet that target.

They are just greedy. That greed will get them into trouble in the end.

There's no conspiracy, it's just BFL's greed and dishonourable and illegal conduct. If people have had enough of the abuse, they are within their rights to appeal to the laws which are made to protect against this. If you are seriously telling us that we have no rights because it's a risky new business, that it somehow makes it OK for BFL to stamp over the rules set down for fair trade and consumer protection, that somehow it is unreasonable to expect fair, decent and honourable legal trade then I dont know what else to say.

Yes, and the BFL are completely innocent in all this, right? There is no reason to be mad at them - they don't lie, they are not incompetent, and they are not breaking any laws.

But seriously - the government is there for their protection too. Any "happy" customer might be knocking at BFL door with a molotow by now, if there wasn't the government instituted persecute machinery.

There are many, many folks who would love to see BFL and their customers removed from the bitcoin mining scene. These folks are joined by those who just realized that a 4.5GH/S miner is not a ticket to a private jet and finally, there are those drama queens who simply love being in a state of high dungeon.

These are the folks who cut a path of havoc and destruction through anything and everything involving risk and innovation.  These risk-taking would-be ‘financial investors’ turn to ‘idiot protection’ programs such as the FTC and state AGs when they discovered risk was spelled RISK and actually had a meaning in the dictionary.

Well these proud little losers, bragging all day and all night on these forums about how badly they have been mistreated, want their money back before their product ships. Those who already have their miners are trying now to shutdown BFL before the other customers get their miners and then there are the drama queens who simply love to moan out loud how much they have been hurt by this mean old world.

Well, you perpetual children who have always used the power of government to intervene when losing your bets will probably be successful in damaging the rest of us. You’ll continue to reduce the GDP of your nations, you’ll continue to see jobs disappear and you’ll continue to see the government involved in your underwear, toothpaste and career choices.

It’s your own damn fault you ‘I’m so stupid I need somebody to protect me from my own dumb decisions’ scum-bag losers. Pull your damn pants up, buy dinner instead of a tattoo, and eat your failures like a real human being.

I am filing a complaint now:

I bought a BFL single 50 GH bitcoin miner from them.  I used a site called www.bitcoinx.comprofit that shows a banner where they tout a 50 GH miner for a mere 2499.99.  In english that would have translated to what appeared to be 4600 USD per month at the time when I purchased it.  On their site there was a little disclaimer that said it could take two weeks or more to receive my ordered equipment.  I wanted to jump in on the miner because these things are extremely time sensitive and getting it one two or three months later would have a significant impact on my overall profit and ROI.  I got cold feet after waiting over two months and decided to request a refund.  They denied a refund so I went on to initiate a chargeback.  Now they contacted my company with the payment information but never delivered the merchandise nor much anyone elses either.  so at this point, they have recently now announced a new item and they want people to upgrade their past orders.  Now I have no hope of making any money with the device but I wanted my refund already a long time ago!  Please please expose these guys for what they are... pure evil and a new wave of ponzi scheme.  Im still trying to work with Amex to get my money back.

I have also emailed [email protected] [email protected] and [email protected] I have not received a bounce reply which leads me on to believe that those could be valid emails.  I suggest you submit your claim to the FTC here: 

https://www.ftccomplaintassistant.gov Click the brown box on the right.

Scary they can continue to do business given that they seem to be a very easy target for an AG looking to win points.

They are living on borrowed time.

BFL = Shady.

you need to read this guys. http://bflfraud.com/

I upgraded my July 2012 Jala order to a Single. I specifically asked if this would affect my place in line or date of delivery and BFL told me in no uncertain terms that it wouldn't. Then they went right ahead and sent out orders to people who were months behind me in line. They lied to me and they robbed me. I will be pursuing this matter with the FTC and the Kansas and New York DA's. BFL is running an investment lottery and a pyramid scheme, it's pretty clear now.

Sir, your thinking is quite idiotic. The only way for you to see your money back (especially if you are waiting for SC and Singles) is a refund. I am sorry if you are so desperate and greedy that you can only see your own distress, but BFL have conned millions out of us all and this action is necessary for the greater good.

As someone said above it's like realising you are in a ponzi scheme, but you dont want the feds to shut it down until you get your money out... the problem with that thinking is for you to get your money out, countless others must take the bait and lose their money. It has to be shut down.

FTC action will not close down Butterfly Labs, unless they are actually running a scheme - in which case they should and MUST be closed down.

FTC action is more likely going to strong arm BFL into following the law - like issuing refunds for undelivered goods and not trying to get customers to sign away statutory rights (which you cannot sign away anyway).

If I am a c*sucker for bringing this action to the table (and for having their Paypal account frozen), for the greater good of Bitcoin community, then I am happy to be one. Selfishness just breeds more suffering. You are being selfish by basically supporting these scam artists. You are stuck in a complete logical fallacy - a bit like the "too big to fail bank" con that allows them to rob you over and over with impunity.

We are going to get FTC action against BFL, with or without you.

I've pondered this situation a lot.  Yes, BFL are dicks. They've had my money, interest-free for over a year, and I will be damned if I use the discount coupons they sent me. (Like I will spend more of my money with these shysters, right?)

I guess I'm kind of new on the scene... I purchased a couple of FGPAs in the spring of 2012. They arrived in July. I was happy with their performance, and I decided to purchase some more. I understand that a mining operation needs to continually invest in hardware to remain profitable.

When I went to buy some more FGPAs, BFL had their ASICs on their web-site. I was ready to drop a good chunk of change on hardware, and I did. The expected delivery date was October 2012, which was acceptable to me. Here we sit, nearly a year later, and I loathe these as**holes.

There is nothing that BFL can do to redeem themselves. They are a prime example of a poorly-run business (I shall refrain from calling it a ponzi scheme). I have suffered extensive financial distress because I entered into a business agreement with these mofos.  Just the same, the hardware that I ordered is 225x faster than what I have now, and BFL has informed me that it is ready to ship.

I want my hardware, and don't you c**suckers ruin it for those of us who are willing to wait for our hardware. I believe that we're all in agreement that BFL sucks. Filing a complaint with the FTC while your orders are in limbo is insane. Period.

http://allthingsbitcoin.org

Petition time!: https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/poll-petition-to-have-the-ftc-investigate-bf-labs-inc-in-kansas-poll-280290

thanks god i dont waste my money in this SHIT, KncMiner looks much more professional i hope the delivery start in sept/oct

I think the jalapeno uses 2 chips.  But someone in another thread was waiting to get his hands on his jalapeno to be able to add 6 more chips and turn it into a little single.  Good luck with that -- there's a reason why the LS uses the same board as the single.

That's part of the long ponzi like con. They can claim to be shipping to lots of customers by sending out lots of Jalis since they only use a single chip. I'm not saying they are a ponzi scheme, but it's just part of their deceptive practices. Surely the better way would be to ship all orders in the order they were received/paid - but doing so would mean the order dates would not move so fast, therefor it would further hurt their already bad reputation. So they choose to further build the illusion of productivity but focusing on Jalis.

They had to instigate a no-refund policy because people had lost patience and they feared going bust. Fact is, that is illegal. Some honesty would have gone a long way, but they have chosen delay and stall tactics at every stage.

If they sold far more Singles, they should f-ing focus on making them and delivering them. As far as I see it, they shit on the Singles and make other products, thus rendering Singles not profitable when they finally arrive. It is unfair to the customers.

So so true. It's amazing and really sad. They just dont want to face the truth... it will hit eventually. When they get their equipment when the diff is 500m reality might strike and it'll happen sooner than later specially with Avalons 800k chips now shipping, we ain't seen nothing yet with difficulty levels and all the rest of it. BFL equipment will soon be like mining BTC using your CPU, lol: 0.0000001 per day

Thank you for contacting Butterfly Labs. According to the terms you agreed to on checkout, all sales are final. Now that shipping of orders has begun, refunds will not be processed. Your order will be shipped per your position in the order queue.

For more information on our refund policy please visit our FAQ: www.butterflylabs.com/faq

We are no longer able to make exceptions.

Thank you for your patience and understanding.

Sincerely,
Abbey
BF Labs, Inc.

For Jody's Customer Service Blog, and more, please visit our new BFL Forums at



Got this gem today after two weeks. I feel sorry for the battered wives that keep making excuses for their abusive husbands. They honestly believe that he beats them because he loves them.

Battered_Wife: "...But the law says I can have a divorce..."

BFL_Josh:
-"There you go with your lying again. Stop lying! There will be no divorce!"
-"Oh... And send me more money, or you'll never ever see your money again!"
-"Oh... And just try contacting the authorithies. See how much they care. Nobody cares."
-"If I were abusing you, don't you think I would be in jail by now?"

etc. etc. etc...

Excellent analogy, except that now you can't file for divorce, and the beatings continue daily.

Or your husband is asking you to pay him 10% of your value so he can find new ways to beat and abuse you.

I meant 2012. If you had actually bothered to read the rest of my post you would have realized that was a typo.

The mentality of the BFL apologists here reminds of the battered women who stick with their husbands.

"Oh no, I can't file for divorce because he would get angry and beat me even more! Best to stay with my man and pray the abuse stops."

Lol shipping July 4 2013??? What are you smoking? They're back locked to 2012. I have 2 July 15 2012 SC Single orders. I've been waiting over a year now! This is getting ridiculous!

Get the date right knuckle head. They are shipping Singles from 2012, NOT 2013. Their is far to many pre-odered devices already, don't need any more fools placing orders.

The simple fact that they sold far more Singles than anything else has absolutely nothing to do with it I suppose?  I've seen so many "Man... if I hadn't upgraded my Jala to Singles I'd be hashing now!" posts I can't count them.

Oh, and mini's are ahead of Singles when for the most part only 1/3 have shipped?

Really genius the only exception is Minirigs??  Minirigs are farther along than Singles, do the math.

Allow me to do it for you:

Jalapenos:January 10, 2013
Little Singles: Oct. 11, 2012 pay date

Singles: July 4, 2012 pay date

MiniRigs: MiniRigs for June 23 (2nd 500gh/s unit) and July 22 for 1st 500 gh/s

If you bought a Minirig between June 23rd and July 22 you have something in hand

The score is:
Jalapenos
Little Singles
Minirigs
THEN Singles

They have only shipped 11 days of Singles.

And here is What Thursday Night is going to look like:

Jalapenos:January 20, 2013
Little Singles: Oct. 12, 2012 pay date

Singles: July 4, 2012 pay date

MiniRigs: MiniRigs for June 23 (2nd 500gh/s unit) and July 22 for 1st 500 gh/s

Come back here and see if I am not right.

They are running out of parts to build this crap DAILY

They have 5000 units to get out the door in the next 5 weeks NEVER GOING TO HAPPEN!!

How soon they forget... PG.

https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/m.2982884

If only the above would have been brought to light last year. Oh, wait...

Fast forward to this year--YESTERDAY--I had a fellow Bitcoiner bring up why I'm bringing up ancient history. Answer: I can't see into the future, thus due diligence must currently be relied upon past events, regards of its age, i.e. Mr Ponzi.

I just received my Little Single (Oct 2012 order) today. What has occurred is they used us as investors when they should have been treating us like customers. They essentially took in preorders based on peoples trust in them on their FPGA equipment, and essentially used that money to make these products. That would explain why it took so long for them to actually start shipping products...

Sometimes I wonder if people read their own posts. It seems most of the people posting here make BFL look like saints in comparison.

More anger and more FUD helps clear the queue so that later orders arrive sooner. Keep bawling and stomping your feet. Someone somewhere will appreciate the tantrums.

 

As the last guy trying to get out of Pirate's Ponzi Scheme once said. In essence, "Let's shut this Pirate fucker down as soon as I get MY money out."

They are shipping singles from JULY 4, 2013 right now. That's only about 2 WEEKS into their backlog. How is that not "terribly far behind".

2 weeks out of roughly 60 weeks of pre-orders seems terribly far behind to me.

They seem to be shipping a days worth of singles every two days. That means they will be shipping a single ordered today in a little over 2 years from now at the rate they are currently going. And this is their new, improved, faster rate.

Unless you ordered last July, it makes sense to get a refund NOW, before they run out of money and can no longer process refunds.

FTC is one way to go, but I think a better solution is to contact a lawyer located near them and organize a class action lawsuit. Post the details of the lawsuit here and let people join in.
No, we won't all get refunds back that way, but will should all get at least something. And since there are potentially criminal charges in addition to civil ones we would be able to go after the assets of not just BFL itself but also their employees who have defrauded us.

BFL's ASIC sales have been a colossal disaster.  Tighten the screws on those insufferable bastards.

Meanwhile, Jeff Ownby is selling the Costa Rican properties once owned by Laissez Faire City of which nobody was able to locate till I found them. Johann Gevers never listed those assets in the audit, nor ever mentioned Sonny Vleisides' name, always referring to him as James Ray Houston's son.

Then again, I'm just a monumental asshole. Pay me no mind.

Fair enough, I stand corrected on that point.

Singles are on day 11 of 425. They're almost done with the backlog!!!

They are processing refunds? Says who?

If they process refunds, they have nothing to fear from the FTC. If they are honest, they have nothing to fear from the FTC. If they are engaging in dishonest business activity, they have everything to fear and anyone supporting them is just being greedy selfish idiot and their greed will consume them and many others around them. How can you support such a dishonest company? If they are honest, they have nothing to fear from the FTC.

Example: If you evade your taxes, you should fear the IRS. If you are above board, you have no problem with an IRS audit. What are you afraid of? You know deep down BFL is dishonest and you are afraid that the FTC will ruin your chances of getting a mega profit - but face facts, it ain't gonna happen. By next month possibly, their units will not ROI at all, ever. Have you seen how far behind they are with their Singles and Little SCs (and now monarchs)?

Whether you like it or not, dozens of people have already filed an FTC complaint and many many more are doing it today as we speak.

Since they are now processing refunds, all you need to do is ask again.  Or you can be a monumental asshole and continue the FTC pursuit.

if you invest in an "upcoming" (had not as of yet been released) technology you should only invest what you're comfortable losing. Research and diversification could have helped you avoid this situation as it was well known that they missed deadlines on their fpga's as well.  As far as ROI you speculated on things that cannot be guaranteed there are just too many variables to accurately calculate anything.  No believe me I'm just as ticked about them not shipping on time and I do believe that their business practices should be avoided but as with any other business, if you don't like them buy somewhere else.  I'm sorry you wrapped up so much money with them but it was stated that the devices had not been test nor proven when I ordered mine and its been as long or longer than most of the people complaining.

Just make sure in the future to do your due diligence and make sure that you don't put yourself into this situation again in the future.  You're complaints and demands just take up time that they could be using to address the real issues, such as legitimate support requests, which get lost in the flood of emails.

You have to remember that BFL is run by people who know how to lie and scam. If they smell big trouble coming, they will (probably) defraud all the money, and close the business. There will be absolutely NO refunds and NO hardware.

Disclaimer: I have many thousand dollars in undelivered 2012 order, and I am also pissed. But I do not see any good way out for the moment...

I will enjoy, thanks very much for your concern! A side note though.. if your plan is to have BFL hit with 16k in fines per incident, exactly where do you think your refund will be coming from?

It wasn't "launched" a few days ago, it was ANNOUNCED a few days ago. And it was clear from the beginning (to those of us who bothered to do a bit of cursory research) that it wouldn't be shipping until the current backlog of USB devices was shipped.

And this is why BFL make millions. Do you think you will even break even by the time you get your miner? LOL Enjoy. for the rest of us, it's called a refund.

Oh for FUCKS sake. Just let it go already. Product is shipping. The Jaly's have already moved into 2013 (finally!) and the others aren't terribly far behind, (exception: Minirigs)

You jackass's that are still dead set on taking down BFL are just going to piss off the rest of us who are finally beginning to see the light at the end of the tunnel.

No, I'm not a shill. I've got hardware on order, and I'm just as annoyed as the rest of you at the delays.

DON'T FUCK IT UP FOR THE REST OF US!

No point getting delivery now - refunds are the important thing.

And why do you mo**** think this will get your miners delivered faster...

No kidding - you can't even make this stuff up. The new BFL Monarch 600GH miner? - well it's already been delayed until February - see https://forums.butterflylabs.com/monarch-discussion/4420-what-monarch-group-order.html (BFL_Josh himself).  It was only launched a few days ago with claims it was going to be delivered in December! How many people have they now scammed into converting their existing BFL orders into a Monarch order (which cancels the previous order I might add).

The outcome of the FTC would be that they step in and force-run BFL in a responsible way. Not everyone can win here, but the FTC would be your best chance.

The VAST majority of their customers are never going to see their money back now, even if they get delivery and now there is no way out since there are no refunds. Little SC and Singles are still miles behind in the order queue. BFL wont go down but FTC pressure will make BFL behave as a responsible company from here on in.

Complaints are already being filed, looking through the forums recently, many people have taken to this last resort - because the fact is, there is no other way out now.

 I get what you're trying to accomplish, but if they go under and can't deliver a vast majority of orders they have already taken money for, and no one ever sees their thousands of dollars again, you will have way more pissed off people than we currently do now. I am patiently waiting for my Jala, and when I get it, I am going to turn it into a FrankenJala with some more chips once obtained, look to the brighter side of things. I'm not saying I support deceptive business practice, but they are pumping out more ASICs than any company currently. Crying out loud and getting a mob to follow may not be the smartest thing to do YET. Yeah they were delayed, but hell, at least they haven't ran away to Costa Rica to start Butterfly Liberty Reserves yet ^_^

not sure i want the government to help, but those BFL guys sure have been dicks.

[RESERVED]

It's clear now that BFL are engaging in dishonest business practices.

If they were not, they would be happy to refund customers who are no longer willing to wait. We get they had manufacture/design issues, but this is no excuse for not refunding customers as required by the law.

It turns out anyone can file a complaint with the FTC, not just US based customers.  BFL could be liable for a fine of $16,000 for each violation (see https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/bfl-could-be-fined-16000-for-each-product-the-fail-to-ship-279330)

File a complaint right now at https://www.ftccomplaintassistant.gov/ - Many people have filed complaints over the last few days.

The FTC use statistical analysis to detect fraud and helps them decide who to devote time prosecuting. We already got BFL's paypal account frozen. Now let's pull out the big guns. This will either turn BFL into an honest company and provide remedy to their customers, or make them face the consequences. We need complaints in numbers, so if you have been ripped off or treated badly, we need you.

Butterfly Labs are sullying the reputation of Bitcoin. We must all stick together and help clean this mess up. Report your dissatisfaction to the the US Federal Trade Commission today at https://www.ftccomplaintassistant.gov/ and help the entire bitcoin community.