Iowa State officials helped put an end to a misleading solicitation sent to incoming freshmen across the nation.

The National College Registration Board (NCRB), a New Jersey company, sent about 1.8 million solicitations in April for a “Campus Card” to high school seniors and their parents across the United States.

The mailing said the card was required of incoming freshmen as identification and also claimed that the card gave college students purchasing privileges, said Bob Brammer, spokesman for the office of Attorney General Tom Miller.

“We got word of it early on from some parents and high school counselors,” said Steve Sullivan, manager of ISU News Service.

ISU Treasurer Joan Thompson said she received a call from the University Book Store in the Memorial Union about the card. She said the bookstore had been contacted by a high school counselor who received the letter and thought it might be a scam.

ISU officials investigated the solicitation and then contacted Miller. It was one of the first calls the attorney general’s office received with concerns about the mailings.

Miller announced in mid-July that the NCRB would be issuing refunds to everyone who sent money, and that the company also had ceased operations.

“It was a joint effort by a lot of people that closed this down,” Thompson said.

Of the 36 Iowans who sent money for the $25 card, 23 would receive cash refunds and 13 would have their uncashed checks returned.

“The thing that troubled us about it was that it said these cards were required at colleges and universities all over the country,” Brammer said. “It was a completely optional solicitation.”

Miller’s office also was alerted to the misleading solicitations by University of Northern Iowa officials.

“We think we noticed the very first mailings that arrived in Iowa,” Brammer said.

About a day later, the office investigated the solicitations enough to stop the scam from going any further, he said.

The attorney general’s office immediately faxed a letter to the company ordering them to stop sending the mailings into Iowa and to issue refunds to those Iowans who sent money. Miller also issued a warning to Iowans about the mailings through news releases.

He said Iowa was the first state to issue such an order and the first to warn people. He added that 35 other states followed Iowa’s lead. He said the results of the actions will pertain to all states.

“Any victim anywhere is going to be able to get their money back,” Brammer said.

Brammer said the people behind it were fairly recent college graduates.

“It wasn’t the hard-core fraud we often see,” Brammer said. “There will be a very severe penalty if they dabble in this again.”