R H.

This company's business ethics are morally bankrupt. Yes I had the same experience detailed by other people in these comments. After choosing the six month price I clicked in my credit card number and advanced to the next page where I was informed there was an additional fee of $25, "activation fee"... nice one Zoosk. Of course there is no "back" button, or "cancel" button so you don't know if you are going to be charged if you disagree to their tacky, tacky way of roping their customers into paying a charge that was NOT explained beforehand. Is that legal? The next day I received an email from Zoosk saying they would waive the activation fee if I registered and paid within 24 hours. If you do sign up, I recommend you do what I did (begin to register and then exit the page) and then register the next day to avoid the BS fee. The deal is, I don't mind if there is a fee but it is ethically wrong for Zoosk to keep it hidden until after your credit card number has been entered. As consumers, are we going to put up with this crap? Businesses that do this are slime and as consumers we should not stand for it.

A week or so later I said to myself, "OK dude get over your hissy-fit and just join. If it's a good service don't let your bad attitude about their ethics get in the way." So I did join and have been a member for almost six months. I have not received a message back from anyone I have tried to contact. That's OK. Maybe the people who are not members don't get the messages delivered to them. I don't know how Zoosk works. I'm not upset about that so much, but what bugs me is that they ask you to pay more to see if the person you contacted actually read the message. Or they want you to pay more to send it quicker…gee…I guess I shouldn't assume that once I've paid to be a member that I'd have full use of the service. No, they nickel and dime you for more. Very understandable in our business-before-ethics culture.

Also you can boost your "popularity" by allowing Zoosk to validate your phone number or photo but to do that they want to phish into your Facebook data. Maybe that's not such a bad thing but it's a turn off. Do they mean I'll be more popular, sexy or desirable if I share my Facebook data and friends list with them?

Oh…. I almost forgot, Zoosk automatically puts it's members in "automatic renewal" status. You get what that means, right? Zoosk automatically renews and charges your credit card when your subscription runs out. Lots of web based businesses do this. Zoosk does not give it's customers the option to approve or disapprove "automatic renewal." A business operating in good faith sends it's customers a message asking the customer to approve payment for renewal. Not Zoosk, as well as plenty of other businesses these days. Building customer "good will" means nothing to them. They figure, "well, if our customers forget to renew, we'll just charge them for the next pay duration…heh, heh." In order to quit, you have to go into your settings and "unsubscribe" before your subscription duration is over.

As to the actual functioning of the Zoosk website, I have really no idea. I didn't get a date or even make contact with anyone in the five and a half months I've been a member. So maybe it works fine, I don't really know. I'm not going to say the site doesn't work, but I will say strongly that for me Zoosk's business ethics are a real turn off to anyone who gives a damn about how they are treated. I was a member of Chemistry.com for awhile and I would say they are better at least in their business dealings.