Relief Factor? More Like Rip-Off Factory
Rip-Off Factor: Turmeric and Omega-3 oils mixed with unproven, untested ingredients marked up 1500%
Yesterday we exposed the diabolical, greedy bastards at Balance of Nature for selling snake oil capsules that are hyped as having the nutritional equivalent of ten fruits and vegetables per serving, but their own label shows there’s not a single milligram of any vitamin or mineral in the entire bottle.
Today we are going to examine another predatory company selling a subscription-based supplement through radio and television ads targeting America’s senior citizens.
Relief Factor.
The main difference between Balance of Nature and Relief Factor is that Rip-Off Factor does contain two ingredients (Tumeric and Omega-3 oils) that can relieve joint pain.
However, Rip-Off factor is more aggressive with their subscription and shipping model, and they also use celebrity spokesmen like Olympic swimming great Mark Spitz, country singer Pat Boone, former SNL cast member Joe Piscopo, conservative talk radio host Larry Elder, and former White House assistant Sebastian Gorka.
After getting fired by Trump in 2017, then losing his news gig with Fox in March 2019, Gorka is now cashing fat royalty checks from Relief Factor.
Gorka goes by “Dr. Sebastian Gorka” in these ads for a health supplement. But he has no medical background whatsoever.
Gorka received his Ph.D. degree in political science from Corvinus University of Budapest, which might as well be Coronavirus University of Phoenix as far as the scam artists at Relief Factor are concerned.
Your first order of Relief Factor is the 3-Week Quickstart, which includes 49 packets of Relief Factor and a 147-page Anti-Inflammation Diet guide for $19.95 plus $6.95 for shipping.
The 3-Week Quickstart automatically enrolls you in their sinister mail-order subscription service. We will elaborate on the “sinister” part shortly.
Their ads say that Relief Factor takes “two to three weeks to kick in”. But customers don’t get two full weeks to see if it works.
Considering that it will take a couple days for your order to arrive, and customers have to cancel within 15 days of their initial purchase, there’s no way anyone will have enough time to try Relief Factor for two full weeks to see if it works!
“Ordering the discounted three-week supply of pain pills automatically enrolls consumers in a “Preferred Customer” plan that charges consumers’ credit cards $79.95 (plus $6.95 S&H) unless they cancel within 15 days of their initial purchase date.”
If you order Relief Factor QuickStart for $26.50 and don’t cancel within 15 days, it means you are getting billed $113.40 for two orders in your first 15 days.
Once these sons-of-bitches get your locked into a subscription, good luck reaching a human with a heartbeat to cancel.
There’s a reason why Relief Factor has a 1.49/5 rating with the Better Business Bureau.
Customer Complaints Filed with BBB about Relief Factor:
“Will not cancel my subscription. Their automated phone system told me it was cancelled but they continue to autodraft my account. Impossible to actually speak to a real person. I am fed up with these scammers.”
“I called to make sure they were not sending me any more product on an AutoShip basis and they told me that they just shipped out a package and charged my card. They said to refuse the package and they would refund me the money. I refuse the package over a month ago and still no refund. They are not responsive to my emails and I am really upset.”
“The only live reps you can talk to solely take orders. I was told by 3 reps on 3 different attempts I'd have to call and leave a voice mail, at which time a ticket would be assigned to my account and resolution usually took 1-2 business days, at which time I should receive an email or a phone call.....neither has happened! With further attempts to speak with someone live I've been hung upon 3xs.
If you don’t want to sign up for the monthly subscription and just want to make a one-time purchase, Relief Factor sets the price so high ($100.90) that it’s easy to understand why 95% of their customers go with the 3-Week Quickstart for $19.95 instead.
So what the hell is in Relief Factor?
Unlike Balance of Nature’s powdered capsules, Relief Factor packets actually contain milligrams of things that might be beneficial for your health.
But you could buy two bottles of Turmeric and Omega-3 capsules for $10 a month instead of getting raped by Relief Factor for $1000 a year.
Relief Factor ingredients:
Epimedium (20% Icariin) – 200mg
Turmeric phospholipid (18% curcuminoids) – 667mg
Japanese fleeceflower (96% resveratrol) – 70mg
EPA – 647mg
DHA – 253mg
Each packet of Relief Factor contains 2 capsules and 2 softgels with those ingredients.
Tumeric is a popular ingredient in health supplements. But every legit Tumeric supplement also contains BioPerine, which comes from black pepper and increases the potency of Tumeric by 2000% (not a typo).
It’s only $15 for a bottle of 90 capsules, so $5 a month for the Tumeric.
Epimedium is also known as Horny Goat Weed.
Horny Goat Weed is a popular ingredient in OTC boner pills. Since it makes goats horny, imagine what it would do for you.
There are no scientific studies that show Horny Goat Weed provides relief for joint and muscle pain.
Japanese fleeceflower, which is more commonly known as Japanese knotweed, is a total filler ingredient that offers no health benefits whatsoever.
Japanese knotweed is listed as one of the world's worst invasive species by the World Conservation Union. The only reason why Relief Factor would put Japanese knotweed in their product is because they needed to add some weight and people will pay them to take it off their hands.
Things I didn’t know about Japanese knotweed until today:
Some home owners in the United Kingdom are unable to sell their homes if there is any evidence of Japanese knotweed on the property. It’s very difficult and very expensive to get rid of it.
Several UK mortgage lenders have refused mortgage applications on the basis of Japanese knotweed being discovered in the garden or neighboring gardens
According to the UK government, the cost of controlling Japanese knotweed had hit £1.25 billion in 2014
Why the hell would you put Japanese knotweed in your body?
The last two ingredients listed are EPA and DHA. These two are two omega-3 fatty acidsare found in fish oils. Relief Factor says they make their product from fish oil from Chile and Norway.
But Relief Factor only contains 900mg of fish oil (EPA and DHA combined).
You can purchase a bottle of 90 capsules with 1250mg of Omega-3 fish oil from wild caught Alaskan pollock for only $20 bucks.
So the Omega-3 Fish Oil capsules will cost you $7 per month, and the Tumeric will run you $5 a month.
Not only are you getting a much higher quality product for only $12 a month, you avoid getting ripped off by Relief Factor for $86 every 30 days.
You can tell Relief Factor is shady just based on the FAQ section of their website.
Q: Hey Relief Factor, are there any harmful pesticides in your product?
A: These are not organically grown herbs, so there is a possibility of pesticides/herbicides, but this doesn’t mean that any were used. The herbs may technically be organic but the supplier may not have decided to go through the costly process of obtaining true organic certification.
Q: Hey Relief Factor, is your product vegan-friendly?
A: The dry capsules are botanical, and contain no animal products, so they should fit anybody’s definition of vegan. On the other hand, the Omega-3 acids are extracted from fish oil and placed inside a soft gel made of beef gelatin, which would disqualify the supplements from vegan diets.
Sebastian Gorka, Larry Elder, Mark Spitz, Pat Boone and Joe Piscopo should be ashamed to attach their names to such a shady company.
Their product is vastly inferior and dramatically overpriced compared to other supplements on the market with these ingredients.
I also blame Fox News and other conservative news networks for allowing these ads on their stations. These products are bogus and dramatically overpriced and they are doing a disservice to their audience by accepting money to run these ads.
