 | |
| Company type | Private |
|---|---|
| Industry | Retail |
| Founded | 1978 |
| Headquarters | , USA |
Number of locations | 13 |
| Website | http://www.icuracao.com |
Curacao (pronounced Koo-ra-sao), formerly La Curacao, is a large-format retail store chain and finance company with export, travel and money transfer services. [1] Founded in 1978, Curacao is headquartered in Los Angeles with retail locations in California, Arizona and Nevada. [2] The company operates under the legal name Adir International, LLC. [3]
Curacao sells most of its merchandise on credit, and has opened accounts for over two million private label cardholders. [4] [5] The company's services also include Curacao Travel, Curacao Money Transfer, and Curacao Export.
Curacao began as a consumer-product door-to-door sales company, in Burbank, California. [6] It became popular among the Latino community who did not have access to credit. [4] Salesmen allowed customers to buy their goods by placing a down payment and then returning to the customer's residence to collect payments on a regular basis. [7] This service eventually evolved into Curacao's proprietary credit business. [2]
In 1983, La Curacao moved to the Pico-Union district in Los Angeles. [6] In 1995, La Curacao opened its second store, in the Panorama City district of the San Fernando Valley. Inside the Panorama Mall, the store featured Mesoamerican style decor and child care. In 2012, La Curacao was renamed Curacao, undergoing complete rebranding. [8]
Curacao currently has locations in Los Angeles, [9] Panorama City, [9] South Gate, [9] Huntington Park, [9] San Bernardino, [9] Lynwood, [9] Santa Ana, [9] Chino, [9] Phoenix, Anaheim, [9] Tucson, [10] [11] Las Vegas [12] [13] and Northridge. [14]
In October 2017, The People of California sued Adir International, Inc. (Curacao) and CEO Ron Azarkman for deceptive practices, particularly selling unnecessary insurance products bundled with high-interest financing, targeting low-income and non-English-speaking customers. [3] The lawsuit exposed how Curacao misled consumers about the nature and necessity of these insurance products, often without providing proper documentation, making it difficult for customers to file claims or even realize they had purchased insurance. [3]
In April 2023, the court found Curacao guilty of 318,807 violations of the California Insurance Code, imposing a $7.97 million penalty and issuing a permanent injunction to prevent further deceptive practices. [15] The court cited a deeply entrenched pattern of unethical behavior, designed to maximize profits at the expense of unsuspecting consumers, dating back to January 2014. Attempts by the defendants to argue that many violations fell outside the statute of limitations were rejected due to a pre-trial stipulation that extended the relevant period for claims. [15]
Internal documents and numerous consumer complaints revealed that Curacao's upper management, including Ron Azarkman, were fully aware of and encouraged these deceptive practices. "The internal documents and complaints showcased a deliberate strategy to defraud customers through predatory practices," as noted in the amended complaint. [3] This calculated scheme prioritized profit over consumer rights and well-being, reflecting a blatant disregard for ethical business conduct. [15]
Further complicating their defense, the California Attorney General blocked Curacao from using their insurance from Starr Indemnity to cover legal expenses, citing California Insurance Code § 533.5(b) which forbids coverage in certain consumer protection cases brought by the state. [16] This decision was challenged by Adir in the U.S. Supreme Court, but the case was not heard. The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the district court’s decision, affirming that Starr Indemnity had no duty to defend or indemnify Adir under the explicit language of the insurance policy. [16]
Northridge is a neighborhood in the San Fernando Valley region of the City of Los Angeles. The community is home to California State University, Northridge, and the Northridge Fashion Center.
Panorama City is a neighborhood in the city of Los Angeles, California, in the San Fernando Valley. It has a generally young age range as well as the highest population density in the Valley. More than half of the neighborhood's population was born abroad, the majority being from Mexico. Known as the Valley's first planned community after a transition from agriculture to a post-World War II housing boom, it has been home to several notable residents. It is now a mixture of single-family homes and low-rise apartment buildings.
The Better Business Bureau (BBB) is an American private, 501(c)(6) nonprofit organization founded in 1912. BBB's self-described mission is to focus on advancing marketplace trust, consisting of 92 independently incorporated local BBB organizations in the United States and Canada, coordinated under the International Association of Better Business Bureaus (IABBB) in Arlington, Virginia.
Predatory lending refers to unethical practices conducted by lending organizations during a loan origination process that are unfair, deceptive, or fraudulent. While there are no internationally agreed legal definitions for predatory lending, a 2006 audit report from the office of inspector general of the US Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) broadly defines predatory lending as "imposing unfair and abusive loan terms on borrowers", though "unfair" and "abusive" were not specifically defined. Though there are laws against some of the specific practices commonly identified as predatory, various federal agencies use the phrase as a catch-all term for many specific illegal activities in the loan industry. Predatory lending should not be confused with predatory mortgage servicing which is mortgage practices described by critics as unfair, deceptive, or fraudulent practices during the loan or mortgage servicing process, post loan origination.
Vector Marketing is a direct selling subsidiary company and the marketing arm of Cutco Corporation, an Olean, New York–based cutlery manufacturer.
The term replacement cost or replacement value refers to the amount that an entity would have to pay to replace an asset at the present time, according to its current worth.
BlueHippo Funding, LLC was an installment credit company operating in the USA founded by Joseph Rensin that claimed to offer personal computers, flat-screen televisions and other high-tech items for sale to customers with poor credit. In an article published November 25, 2009 titled BlueHippo files for bankruptcy: Company blames its bank; was accused of violating settlement with FTC, Eileen Ambrose reported that the company "was forced to file for protection under Chapter 11." On Wednesday December 9, 2009, the company filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy after having its funds frozen by their payment processor. A petition to a Delaware bankruptcy judge to release the funds was denied. The company's advertised toll-free phone number and website are no longer functioning.
Rainbow Computing was an Apple II retailer and video game software publisher that was established in 1976 by Gene Sprouse and Glenn Dollar in the San Fernando Valley of Los Angeles, California. The original store was located in Granada Hills but was eventually relocated to Northridge. The company opened a second location in Woodland Hills, where it operated for nine years until the sale of the company to the Torrance-based Pathfinder Computer Centers retail chain in 1985.
Farmers Insurance Group is an American insurer group of vehicles, homes and small businesses and also provides other insurance and financial services products. Farmers Insurance has more than 48,000 exclusive and independent agents and approximately 21,000 employees. Farmers is the trade name for three reciprocal exchanges, Farmers, Fire, and Truck, each a managed by Farmers Group, Inc. as attorney-in-fact on behalf of their respective policyholders. Farmers Group, Inc. is a wholly owned subsidiary of Swiss-based Zurich Insurance Group.
Northridge Fashion Center is a large shopping mall located in Northridge, Los Angeles, California. It opened in 1971. It was severely damaged during the Northridge earthquake in 1994, but renovated extensively in 1995, 1998, and 2003. The mall features J. C. Penney, Macy's, and Macy's Furniture Gallery, Dick's Sporting Goods, in addition to an AMC Theatres.
Intelius, Inc. is an American public records business headquartered in Seattle, Washington. It provides information services, including people and property search, background checks and reverse phone lookup. Users also have the ability to perform reverse address lookups to find people using Intelius’ services and an address. Intelius, founded by former InfoSpace executives, was started in 2003. It is owned and operated by PeopleConnect, Inc.
Consumer protection is the practice of safeguarding buyers of goods and services, and the public, against unfair practices in the marketplace. Consumer protection measures are often established by law. Such laws are intended to prevent businesses from engaging in fraud or specified unfair practices to gain an advantage over competitors or to mislead consumers. They may also provide additional protection for the general public which may be impacted by a product even when they are not the direct purchaser or consumer of that product. For example, government regulations may require businesses to disclose detailed information about their products—particularly in areas where public health or safety is an issue, such as with food or automobiles.
Lewis Roca Rothgerber Christie is a U.S. law firm with approximately 300 attorneys across ten offices in Arizona, California, Colorado, Nevada, and New Mexico. Its administrative offices are located in Phoenix, where it was founded in 1950 as Lewis & Roca.
Consumer Watchdog is a non-profit, progressive organization which advocates for taxpayer and consumer interests, with a focus on insurance, health care, political reform, privacy and energy.
MyLife is an American information brokerage firm. Founded by Jeffrey Tinsley in 2002 as Reunion.com, it changed names following a 2008 merger with Wink.com. MyLife gathers personal information through public records and other sources to automatically generate a "MyLife Public Page" for each person. These pages can list a variety of personal information, including an individual's age, past and current home addresses, phone numbers, email addresses, employers, education, photographs, relatives, political affiliations, a mini-biography.
Nationwide Asset Services was a US-based privately owned debt settlement company based both Phoenix, Arizona and Sacramento, California. The company was also affiliated with several other firms that provide nearly identical services and their own separate websites including American Debt Arbitration, Universal Nationwide and Universal Debt Reduction. The company faced law suites in a number of states which resulted in it being barred from providing debt settlement services in those states. It was shut down in 2015.
Elevance Health, Inc. is an American health insurance provider. Prior to June 2022, Elevance Health was named Anthem, Inc. The company's services include medical, pharmaceutical, dental, behavioral health, long-term care, and disability plans through affiliated companies such as Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield, Anthem Blue Cross in California, Wellpoint, and Carelon. It is the largest for-profit managed health care company in the Blue Cross Blue Shield Association. As of 2022, the company had 46.8 million members within its affiliated companies' health plans.
Brake Masters is a privately held automotive repair chain based in Tucson, Arizona. The company has over 100 stores throughout the Southwestern United States, including multiple stores in Arizona, California, Nevada, New Mexico and Texas. The company was founded by two Israeli immigrants, Eric and Shalom Laytin, who in their early twenties came to the United States. The two brothers formed Auto Brakes, Inc. in February 1982. In October 1983, the name of the store was changed to Brake Masters, and in May 1984, the company opened a second store. The company has been accredited with the Better Business Bureau since 1986. A third store opened in March 1989, and the company decided to expand into other markets. Its first franchise store opened in Sierra Vista in August 1994.
FTC v. Balls of Kryptonite is an enforcement action brought in 2009 by the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) in United States District Court for the Central District of California. The defendant was Jaivin Karnani, a Southern California man, his company Balls of Kryptonite LLC, and several other corporate names they did business as. In 2011 the FTC secured a court order barring Karnani and Balls of Kryptonite from engaging in many of the deceptive business practices that had brought him to the agency's attention.
Panorama Mall is a mall in Panorama City, San Fernando Valley, Los Angeles, California. It is an enclosed mall anchored by two large discount stores, Walmart and Curacao, aimed primarily at a Hispanic customer base.