Utah woman says supplement advertised for $22 cost her nearly $200. Now she can't get a refund.

Karen Gray reviews documents related to a knee pain supplement she ordered after seeing a Facebook ad.

Karen Gray reviews documents related to a knee pain supplement she ordered after seeing a Facebook ad. (Mark Wetzel, KSL)


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Estimated read time: 2-3 minutes

KEY TAKEAWAYS
  • A Utah woman was charged $200 for a $22 supplement.
  • She claims Glyconex falsely advertised using deepfake videos of Elon Musk.
  • The FTC advises checking company reputations to avoid scams like this one.

MURRAY — Karen Grey was pitched a health supplement called Glyconex. And it came highly recommended, or so she thought.

"Elon Musk was advertising in a way that he can fix any problems," she said. "And I'm going, 'Oh, I've got knee problems. And I've had four surgeries on this knee.'"

The supplement, Grey said, was just $22 bucks, or at least that's what the website said.

Instead, she was charged close to $200.

"I'm kinda going, 'I can't afford this,'" she said.

Grey said the company wouldn't let her cancel the order. So when the pills arrived, she sent them back.

Since then, both on the phone and in writing, she said she has repeatedly been told she's getting a refund. One written promise dates back to mid-July. She still doesn't have her money. And now, when she calls, she said she's getting disconnected.

In hindsight, this one had several red flags.

For one thing, no, Elon Musk does not actually endorse Glyconex. Con artists are using artificial intelligence to create deepfake videos that put words in celebrities' mouths, making it appear they are endorsing products they have nothing to do with.

And Grey is hardly alone.

BBB Scam Tracker has multiple Glyconex complaints from people who also say they saw ads featuring Musk.

The Better Business Bureau has also logged several complaints from consumers who said they were lured in with one low advertised price and ultimately faced a much bigger charge.

Others report being unable to get their money back.

KSL attempted to reach the company for an explanation.

Emails bounced back. When Get Gephardt called, we were told there was no one we could speak to about Grey's complaint. Then, the call was disconnected.

As for Grey, she said she has little hope of ever getting that promised refund.

"They're not sending me the money," she said.

Now, she hopes others will learn from her experience.

"There's other people that have had the same problem," she said.

The Federal Trade Commission stated nearly 30% of people who reported losing money to a scam last year said it started on social media.

The FTC recommends that before buying anything from a social media ad, consumers search the company's name along with words like "scam" or "complaint."

It's a simple step that could help shoppers spot the same red flags Karen wishes she had seen before placing her order.

The Key Takeaways for this article were generated with the assistance of large language models and reviewed by our editorial team. The article, itself, is solely human-written.

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