This thread is a summary of our findings and experiences with Clear Start Tax Inc., also known as ClearStart Tax, Clear Start Tax Relief, https://clearstarttax.com.
In January 2024, we received an email by Clear Start Tax’ “Online presence coordinator” John Ramos, asking us to remove a forum thread about them by OfclyGoodenough because, according to them, it was based on factually incorrect information. We investigated the issue and removed it at first because of some misunderstanding with a similarly named company. But when in May 2024 another user reported about them (and again Clear Start Tax asked us to remove it) we figured there is substance to the allegations and we hence restored all the forum posts and thread about them and I’m issuing this statement as a summary of what all happened.
OVERALL SUMMARY OF OUR FINDINGS:
- Both forum users Goodenough and Quadx2 received unsolicited cold calls regarding the IRS Fresh Start Program on July 5, 2023 and May 7, 2024 respectively, using (585) 513-5427 and (365) 544-3983 respectively. Salonga confirmed the numbers were operated by the transfer team and Clear Start Tax respectively.
- Calls to either number between the time of our reports and the time of our further investigation were answered by a likely-overseas third party operating as “Tax Relief Support” hired to screen and transfer calls to employees of Clear Start Tax. The numbers have since been taken out of service.
- Both scammer.info posts were taken down on January 15, 2024 and May 13, 2024 respectively, as we were falsely inclined to believe that the company wasn’t directly engaged in fraudulent activity and that Quadx2 was attempting to scam the company with fraudulent ACH payments.
- Throughout the course of our investigations, we have determined that these claims were deliberately false and that Clear Start Tax was actively violating the Telephone Consumer Protection Act for making unsolicited cold calls to recipients who were knowingly or unknowingly opted into receiving them, and the Truth in Caller ID Act by making these calls from numbers with the same area codes as the recipients (neighbor spoofing).
- The company is actively being tried for violating the TCPA in the Western District of Texas and the Central District of California. The Texas lawsuit was settled on July 10, which is a common thing to do for TCPA violators to avoid any admission of guilt and a costly trial. A third case from 2022 was also found.
#1 https://www.pacermonitor.com/public/case/53839171/Jessica_Matos_v_Clear_Start_Tax_Inc
#2 https://www.pacermonitor.com/public/case/53284190/Silva_v_Clear_Start_Inc
#3 SHELTON v. CLEAR START TAX INC et al :: Justia Dockets & Filings
What was also interesting, the Online Presence Coordinator John Ramos was in touch with us on Discord, where we would try to “investigate” our findings, yet made a lot of nonsensical statements, e.g. that Clear Start Tax would not call people outside of the US, yet, Quadx2’s number was a Canadian one and still got called. In OfclyGoodenough’s case, he could not verify the source of the number. The most ridiculous moment was though when he revealed that the outbound calling wasn’t done by Clear Start Tax Inc (the American company) but by transfer team, a different legal entity he did not want to disclose. Based on John Ramos’ background of being a Filipino and the Phillippines being famous for being a call center / BPO hub, it’s a plausible guess that Clear Start Tax lets a call center there handle the illegal outbound calls. It’s a common thing in the industry, to outsource the crimes to another country to try to avoid any prosecution with the main company in the US.
Later on, he claimed the numbers were opt-in leads, meaning the numbers were submitted by the persons themselves - which doesn’t make sense since they didn’t request any calls from Clear Start Tax to begin with, especially not Quadx2 which as a Canadian wouldn’t be even eligible for the services offered by ClearStartTax. When asked about IP addresses, time and date, and other information related to the entry of the number, he said they didn’t have this information. We tried to get to the bottom of this but they would not provide any further information.
Links to the previous forum threads relevant to this case:
- @Quadx2’s thread about the unsolicited calls: Clear Start Tax, fraudulent tax consultants SUED for TCPA violations in Texas
- @OfclyGoodenough’s thread about the unsolicited call he received: ClearStart Tax Relief, TCPA-violating IRS Tax Relief SCAMMERS
Information about the company:
CLEAR START TAX INC
5 PARK PLAZA, SUITE 800
IRVINE, 92614, CA
United States
CEO/Director: Vivian Yip
(source: https://opencorporates.com/companies/us_ca/4658959)
More info in the other threads. Thanks and shoutout to Goodenough also for the investigation and help!