New York Attorney General Finds Atlantic Auto Group Guilty Of False Advertising

Twenty-two dealerships across Long Island have been ordered to pay $310,000 in restitution and penalties to resolve false advertising claims based on allegations that the Atlantic Auto Group defrauded its customers with misleading promotions and fraudulent sales tactics.

New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman announced the settlement, requiring 22 Long Island car dealerships to pay $310,000 to resolve the claims. The dealerships are all affiliated with West Islip-based Atlantic Auto Group, and Schneiderman alleges that they persistently misled customers. In total, the Attorney General’s Nassau and Suffolk regional offices received more than 250 complaints regarding the advertising and sales practices of the dealerships.

Authorities say Atlantic used direct mail to send approximately 500,000 promotional items to residents across Long Island. The advertisements contained a scratch-off game card, a pull-tab game card, or a “Triple Diamond” game card, where potential customers were told that they could win a cash prize, a free car, a flat-screen TV or an Apple iPad. The winning tickets contained three similar symbols, but didn’t explain what the person won, if anything. Instead, the tickets instructed the person to bring the game card into the dealership during event times in order to claim their prize.

Schneiderman said that these game cards were deceptive and had the capacity to mislead consumers into believing that they were guaranteed winners of valuable prizes, even though the majority of the people didn’t actually win a prize at all.

“Purchasing a car is one of the biggest financial decisions many families will make,” said Schneiderman. “New Yorkers have a right to navigate the car buying process without being targeted by false and misleading promotions and sales practices.”

According to Newsday, Atlantic says that it’s not admitting to any wrongdoing in agreeing to the settlement. Regarding the potentially misleading promotions, an Atlantic co-owner told Newsday that, “It was a vendor of ours that apparently did not do business the right way. We no longer use that company.”

Schneiderman said Atlantic also misled consumers through various other deceptive practices by:

• Publishing print advertisements which contained misleading or illegal features in violation of the Attorney General’s Auto Advertising Guidelines and a previous Assurance of Discontinuance entered into with two dealerships in the Atlantic Automotive Group.

• Obtaining signatures on contracts of sale and financing agreements from consumers who mistakenly believed they were filling out paperwork for vehicles they had won as part of the “Triple Diamond,” “scratch-off game card,” or “pull-tab game card” promotions.

• Offering false monetary discounts off the sales price of a vehicle, by selling the vehicle at a high retail sales price which had the effect of nullifying the value of the discount offered.

• Charging consumers for extended warranties, vehicle maintenance contracts, and administrative fees related to the purchase of vehicles that consumers did not want, had no knowledge of, or were told there was no charge for these products.

• Providing consumers with blank documents or partially blank documents for their signatures and later filling out the documents with figures and terms other than what was agreed upon by the consumers.

• Failing to give all necessary documents to consumers at the time of purchase.

• Making various false or misleading statements to consumers during high-pressure sales transactions.

• Encouraging consumers to apply for loans that they could not afford.

• Refusing to refund deposits that had been made by consumers.