Why can a scam company raise $40 Million Series C + $76 Million Series B?

No, actually, that never holds in court.

Given that you've taken the time to explain all of this to the HN community, I can't help but wonder why you don't encourage JustFab to use this as a good PR opportunity. If, as you claim, the majority of users are happy the subscription-based model, surely the best way to nip this in the bud is to simply refund the money to the OP's girlfriend.

The only reason why I would think that you don't want to extend that olive branch is because you are afraid that it will set a precedence for other JustFab users, and that JustFab will be engulfed with refund requests. This however flies in the face of your firm believe that the majority of JustFab users are extremely happy with the services provided.

So, in a nutshell, instead of disputing whether or not the VIP subscription requirement is "scammy" or not, I would think that you would advocate the shortest route to conclusion in this case: refund the money.

In my eyes, anything less is simply vindication of the concerns outlined in this discussion thread.

Interesting that I don't see these kind of complaints at this level about book clubs.

The most popular book clubs all use a negative response model, where when you sign up you get a certain number of books at a great price, and agree to buy a certain number of additional books at the regular club price.

They send you a monthly list of books available that month, with one marked as that month's featured selection.

If you do nothing, you automatically receive the featured selection and are charged for it at the regular club price. If you do not want the featured selection, you tell them via a return card or their website.

An example is the Science Fiction Book Club [1]. The front page has a link to a "how it works" page [2]. Note that the "how it works" page doesn't actually tell you about the negative response aspect. It tells you to read the membership agreement for complete details and links to the agreement [3]. It is in there that you get the details of automatically receiving the featured selection.

(Things are similar for the Book of the Month Club, the Scientific American Book Club, and a whole bunch of others--because they are all actually run by the same company, and are using the same template for their web sites. The Columbia House DVD Club too).

Compare this to the JustFab page. That too has a "how it works" page [4], which is linked to from the front page. That page tells you about the negative response part.

The front page of the book club does say, when touting the initial book offer, that it is "with membership", so it is clear on the front page that you are going to probably have to sign up for some kind of membership to get that deal. The JustFab page does not make it clear that you must become a member to purchase.

With the book club, if you fail to make your negative response, you get a book not of your choosing. With JustFab, you get a credit that you can use on an item of your choosing. My guess is that the vast majority of JustFab's customers buy several times a year, and so they are able to fairly quickly put the credit to use.

So why does JustFab draw so much more fire, when the seem ostensibly quite similar to the book club? I wonder if the fact that their subscription if for credits makes a big difference? The book club pushes a featured selection each month, presumably something they have made a volume deal for in order to get a good price. For this to work, they really need their featured selections to sell well. With JustFab, the credit is generic. If they need to push some specific item in order to support a good price for it, selling credits does not help. Would people find JustFab more acceptable if instead of a credit, they actually sent you an item once a month?

[1] http://www.sfbc.com

[2] http://www.sfbc.com/howitworks

[3] http://www.sfbc.com/membership-agreement

[4] http://www.justfab.com/how-justfab-works.htm

Totally not the case that you get your money back, at least with WellsFargo Visa, they will investigate to determine whether your card was used by some other party.

Saying, "I didn't read the terms of the agreement" is not grounds for a chargeback.

What's worse is when you've signed up for a One year recurring payment and you have to jump through hoops to cancel such as a registered letter to cancel.

Wells fargo will refuse to cancel for you, saying it is between you and the vendor. Further to that, you can't even cancel your credit card, as Wells Fargo will transfer the recurring charge to a new card.

About the only way I could figure out how to get out of that type of recurring scam is to just cancel my bank account.

> voted for it with their money.

That is "voted for its likelihood to generate profits or be acquired at a high valuation". That's not exactly equivalent to my definition of "legitimacy".