Consumers Say Scammers, Cons Use Popular Dating Service

BOSTON -- Mary Mullowney said it took a lot of time and effort to complete eHarmony's intensive personality profile. But she thought it was worth it. They promised , according to their advertising, that "matches would be carefully selected from millions of candidates."

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"They match me up by 29 dimensions, and this will be the man for me," Mullowney said.

"There were questions and questions and questions. It was like taking the Love SAT's!"

But once Mullowney joined, she heard only from men on different continents.

"The people they matched me with were from India and England," said Mullowney.

One profile really seemed questionable. She said a clearly caucasian gentleman from the United Kingdom listed his ethnicity as African American.

Then Mullowney was introduced online to Charles, who she said seemed like a good match. But after one e-mail, he became unusually romantic.

Soon after she found multiple listings of Charles, residing in multiple states. They all had the same pictures and profile. Mullowney wondered if Charles really existed.

"I would really like to find out why he lives in five different states," she said.

Team 5 Investigates asked eHarmony how, with their emphasis on scientific matching, Charles could get through, when it was clear something was amiss.

In a letter to Team 5 Investigates, eHarmony said that it "did find some suspicious match activity." The company added "this type of unsatisfactory account experience is atypical."

But Team 5 Investigates found thousands of complaints about eHarmony on web sites like "Consumer Complaints.com" and "Online Personals Watch."

Many of them had similar stories about members with multiple identities. Some were worse. Consumers complained they were taken by scammers who quickly professed love, then asked for, and sometimes received, money.

eHarmony did not respond to our inquiries about Charles' real identity. But in their statement they said they were ""continually seeking to improve," and added they "identify and remove anyone whose intentions do not appear to be consistent with our members' goals."

eHarmony said Charles is no longer a member. But at the time of publication we could still see him on the site, along with many other inactive members.

A few months ago, Mullowney asked eHarmony for her money back. They offered her a two month extension on her membership instead.

After Team 5 Investigages' inquiries, the company gave her a full refund.