DANIEL A.

EHRING
ATTORNEY AT LAW
20 CORPORATE WOODS BLVD.
ALBANY, NEW YORK 12211

TELEPHONE (518) 439-9999

FACSIMILE (518) 439-9253

November 27, 2009

Via US Express Mail Via US Express Mail Via US Express Mail

US US US

Mr. Kevin J. Weller Mr. MacAllister Smith
President CEO
Northern Merchants Services, Inc. Pipeline Data, Inc.
3 West Main Street 4400 N. Point Parkway
Brasher Falls, NY 13613-7700 Suite 260
Alpharetta, GA 30022-2429
Mr. Stuart C. Harvey, Jr.
CEO
Elavon, Inc.
One Concourse Parkway
Suite 300
Atlanta, GA 30328-5346

Re: Doug Hoffman For Congress, Inc.

SecurePay.com, Inc. - Northern Merchants Services, Inc.
Merchant No.: 8016003934

Dear Gentlemen:

I have been retained by the Doug Hoffman For Congress campaign (hereinafter the
“Campaign”) with regard to the above-referenced matter. In or about October, 2009 my client’s
campaign engaged the services of SecurePay.com, Inc. for the express purpose of utilizing its services
to collect and process internet campaign donations made by those individuals who desired to
contribute to his campaign for Congress. Moreover, and as I am sure you are fully aware, all
candidates for Congress must comply with exceptionally strict and rigid reporting guidelines set forth
in the U.S. Code and enforced by the Federal Election Commission. Violations of these statutes and
rules may result in both criminal and civil penalties. It is as a result of the confluence of these two
points/issues that has caused me to write this letter, seeking to put you on notice that your companies
have: failed to provide that which your companies promised; as a result of your companies
overcharging the accounts of the contributors to the Campaign your companies have overcharged the
Campaign; have failed to provide the necessary and, in many instances, the correct information upon
which my client may make accurate disclosures to the Federal Election Commission, as required by
the appropriate statutes; and have completely ignored the pleas of the treasurer and staff of the
Campaign to provide the ‘batch’ information such that it can verify and correct your companies’
errors.
Mr. Kevin J. Weller
Mr. MacAllister Smith
Mr. Stuart C. Harvey, Jr.
November 27, 2009
Page - 2 -

Let me provide you with a brief history of what has transpired so that you may have the context
in which to understand my client’s frustration, concern and anger with your companies’: failure to
accurately account for the campaign contribution transactions; overcharging of campaign contributors
(whom have threatened to report this issue to both the press and the police solely as a result of your
companies’ failure to accurately charge or debit their accounts for their actual contributions);
overcharging the campaign for ‘phantom’ contributions that were actually errors made by your
companies; intentionally misleading the Campaign in October and early November when it advised
that all contributions had been accounted for and were deposited in the Campaign’s bank account and
then, in November, your staff came in and pushed through an additional $175,000.00 in contributions
that had been made in October but had not been credited to the Campaign’s bank account within the
two or three days as your companies promised; and, the most recent incredible indiscretion, you have
failed to return the calls of the Campaign who are seeking assistance to resolve the above-referenced
issues (mostly resulting from your inaccurate batch reports) so that it can comply with the U.S. Code
statutes and regulations regarding campaign contribution disclosures and the requirements of the
Federal Election Commission. As a result of your companies errors, the Campaign still has not fully
rectified your companies mistakes and has incurred thousands of dollars in ‘extra’ costs in order to
review and correct your companies errors.

Hereafter is a brief summary of the issues:

! On or about October 20th, 2009 the Campaign observed that the morning Batch
Settlements reports provided to it by Secure Pay were considerably lower than the
transaction dollar amounts actually posted online for the previous day by Secure Pay.
It appears from the record that Secure Pay utilized Northern Merchants Services, Inc.
(I am aware that both companies are wholly-owned subsidiaries of Pipeline Data, Inc.)
to conduct their business and that Northern Merchant Services, Inc. utilized Elavon to
‘batch’ these transactions;

! On October 21st, 2009 the Campaign notified Secure Pay (I believe the campaign has
dealt exclusively with a Ms. Jolene LaSiege, who advised the campaign that she is the
Senior Manager-Technical Support) of the large difference in the two reports.
Campaign was advised by Ms. Jolene LaSiege and Ms. Kerry Planty, Technical
Support Specialist, that all the contributions were being reported and that the
discrepancy resulted merely from a ‘timing’ issue and breaking the batches into
batches of “950” for processing ease. As a result of the strict and rigid campaign
contribution finance laws, the Campaign requested a copy of the batch reports in order
to ensure that the records provided by your companies were indeed accurate and to
ensure that it would accurately report the campaign contributions on its Federal
Election reports;
Mr. Kevin J. Weller
Mr. MacAllister Smith
Mr. Stuart C. Harvey, Jr.
November 27, 2009
Page - 3 -

! On October 22nd, 2009, Campaign again notifies Secure Pay that the batch reports
differ from the online reports. Secure Pay again advises that it was merely from a
‘timing’ issue and breaking the batches into batches of “950” for processing ease;

! On October 23rd, 2009, Campaign forwards to Ms. Jolene LaSiege a spreadsheet

demonstrating the dollar differences between the website contributions and the amount
Secure Pay is processing for Campaign;

! On October 23rd, 2009, Ms. Jolene LaSiege response to the Campaign is that there are
so many transactions that the batch is settling twice per day and that is where the
discrepancy arises, without providing the Campaign with any actual support for her
assertions;

! Between October 24th, 2009 thru November 2nd, 2009, Campaign spent massive
amount of time responding to irate campaign contributors who have advised that:
Secure Pay has doubled and tripled billed their credit card accounts and their debit card
accounts; and have made hundreds of mistakes in the amount charged to the campaign
contributors credit card accounts and their debit card accounts. For example, a
campaign contribution of $100.00 was incorrectly credited/debited for $1,000.00. The
Campaign had to email and/or phone each of these contributors to prevent them from
going to the police and the press;

! On November 3rd, 2009, the day of the election, Ms. Jolene LaSiege contacts the
campaign and requests that the Campaign ‘stay off’ the system for a few hours. Ms.
LaSiege advised that Secure Pay needed to ‘take over’ the system to FORCE through
some transactions because it appears that the Campaign was correct and Secure Pay
had dropped some campaign contribution transactions. She explained that Secure Pay
would have to manually input these ‘dropped’ transactions. They also alleged that they
would be inputting ‘credits’ for those campaign contributors who were double or triple
charged/debited;

! The few hours requested by Ms. Jolene LaSiege turned into more than five (5) days
(Sunday, November 8th, 2009) and $175,000.00 in transactions, which again many
were incorrect. In many or most of the situations where Secure Pay was supposed to
credit the campaign contributor for Secure Pay’s mistake of double or triple
charge/debit, Secure Pay actually charged their accounts again, causing another flurry
of calls to the Campaign;
Mr. Kevin J. Weller
Mr. MacAllister Smith
Mr. Stuart C. Harvey, Jr.
November 27, 2009
Page - 4 -

! On November 9th, 2009 Campaign calls Secure Pay and requests to speak with Ms.
Kerry Planty and is advised she is out of office. Campaign leaves a message and never
receives a return call. Campaign calls Secure Pay and requests to speak with Ms.
Jolene LaSiege. Campaign is advised that she is unavailable. Ms. Jolene LaSiege
never returns telephone call. Operator advises that the ‘owner’ of the company, Kevin
Weller, is out of the office but would return call when he returned. Campaign advises
that she has a campaign contributor on the telephone from California and that Secure
Pay had again mistakenly debited his bank account for $10,000.00 (Campaign had
reversed the earlier error made by Secure Pay) and that he (the campaign contributor
from California) was going to go to the U.S. Attorney and report the fraud unless the
mistake was immediately rectified. Campaign advised the Secure Pay operator that she
would hold for Mr. Weller. Several minutes later Mr. Weller spoke with the
Campaign and advises that he was not aware of the problem and that he would make
the situation ‘right’ and would in fact personally contact each contributor who was
adversely affected and advise it was Secure Pay’s mistake. Well, the situation has not
been rectified and he did not personally contact any of the campaign contributors;

! On November 13th, 2009, Ms. Jolene LaSiege emails the Campaign and advises that
Secure Pay has identified the problem with the transactions. Again, Campaign
reiterates that the Campaign needs to file an accurate report with the FEC by December
3rd, 2009, so time is of the essence. The Campaign cannot receive an extension in
which to file the campaign contribution beyond December 3rd, 2009;

! On November 18th, 2009, Ms. Jolene LaSiege emails the Campaign and advises that
Secure Pay has completed the transactions and requests what information the
Campaign needs to complete its reports. Campaign advises and provides Ms. Jolene
LaSiege with the exact information that it required for the FEC reports. For example,
the Campaign required the campaign contributors last name, first name, employer, and
occupation. Apparently this is where Pipeline Data, Inc. gets involved. Pipeline Data
advises that it cannot print such a report. However, the website where the
contributions were made required such information to be provided in order to make the
online contribution and such information was on the report information possessed by
Secure Pay. Pipeline Data’s next excuse was that it couldn’t prepare the reports
because of the drops made by Secure Pay and the manual inputs made by Secure Pay
and then turned everything back to Secure Pay;

! On November 20th, 2009, Ms. Jolene LaSiege emails the Campaign and advises that
Secure Pay will prepare the reports but that she will only accept issues, questions and
the like by email. Secure Pay provides a report that is fraught with errors and
incompleteness. Campaign emails Ms. Jolene LaSiege regarding the errors and
Mr. Kevin J. Weller
Mr. MacAllister Smith
Mr. Stuart C. Harvey, Jr.
November 27, 2009
Page - 5 -

incompleteness of the reports provided by Secure Pay. Campaign doesn’t receive any
satisfaction, corrected reports, return emails or the like. Campaign calls Secure Pay
and does not receive any return calls. It appears that Secure Pay will no longer provide
any support for its services.

Each of your companies profess to deliver reliable and secure payment solutions to help
businesses succeed in an increasingly complex global marketplace, or something to that affect. The
Campaign has not experienced this type service, actually quite the opposite. Moreover, the Campaign
has incurred enormous expenses correcting the errors as a result of your companies failures, mistakes
and/or general incompetence.

Notwithstanding the above issues, it also appears that the Campaign has incurred fraudulent
charges as a result of your companies’ errors. In addition, your companies’ failures, mistakes and/or
general incompetence causes the Campaign issues with accurately and timely filing their FEC reports.
The fines that can be issued by the FEC can exceed hundreds of thousands of dollars. This of course
does not include any loss of reputation damages that would result if any of these campaign
contributors went to the press with your mistakes, blaming them on the Campaign, or any criminal
investigations that may occur as a result of your companies’ mistakes or fraudulent practices.

Since Secure Pay has decided not to return the Campaign’s cry for help with the issues Secure
Pay has created, I have been asked to intervene. My question to each of you is “How are you going
to address these issues/problems and correct them so that accurate information can be provided to the
Campaign and it can provide same to the FEC?” Without a prompt response which addresses and
corrects these problems, I have been directed by the Campaign to take whatever steps necessary to
protect its interest and reputation.

I await your response.

Very truly yours,

LAW OFFICE OF DANIEL A. EHRING

Daniel A. Ehring

cc: Doug Hoffman For Congress campaign

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