Gino de Paz, Grace de Paz and Shabana Khublal permanently banned after running the same credit card rate-reduction pitch a decade after the FTC first warned about it
The FTC and Florida's Attorney General sued Gino de Paz, Grace de Paz, Shabana Khublal, and their companies GDP Network LLC, G & G Success LLC (doing business as YF Solution) and G & N Squared LLC in July 2020, alleging a sham credit card interest rate reduction operation that charged financially distressed consumers and older adults $995 to $4,995 upfront. The individual defendants settled in February 2022, agreeing to permanent bans from the debt relief industry and a $5.3 million judgment suspended to $425,000 in surrendered assets; the FTC mailed more than $557,000 in refunds to 611 consumers in May 2023.
- Year
- 2020
- Where
- United States
- Outcome
- Settled
- Victims
- Not stated in the sources
- Schemes
- Credit card interest rate reduction scams
- Last reviewed
- 2026-10-19
The facts, as recorded
- The FTC and the Florida Office of the Attorney General filed the complaint on July 16, 2020 in the US District Court for the Middle District of Florida, Orlando Division (Case No. 6:20-cv-1192-Orl-78DCI), with a temporary restraining order entered the same day halting the operation.
- Named defendants were GDP Network LLC; G & G Success LLC, doing business as YF Solution LLC, QSC Professionals and G.C.D. Management LLC; G & N Squared LLC, doing business as Dynamic Solution Group; and individuals Gino de Paz, Grace de Paz and Shabana Khublal.
- The FTC alleged the defendants, based in Orlando, made telemarketing calls nationwide falsely posing as representatives or affiliates of consumers' own credit card companies, claimed they could permanently and substantially cut interest rates and save thousands of dollars, and charged upfront fees of $995 to $4,995 plus balance-transfer fees; at most, the FTC said, the company opened a new card with a temporary low introductory rate and transferred an existing balance onto it, and some consumers had new credit cards opened in their names without their knowledge.
- On February 28, 2022, the court entered stipulated final orders against Gino de Paz, Grace de Paz and Shabana Khublal (the Commission voted 5-0 to approve them) permanently banning them from advertising or selling debt relief products and services and from deceptive telemarketing, alongside a default judgment and permanent injunction against the corporate defendants GDP Network LLC and G & G Success LLC, which had not contested the suit.
- Total monetary judgments across the settling defendants were $5.3 million, suspended on payment of $225,000 by the de Pazes and $200,000 by Khublal, becoming due in full if any defendant misrepresented their finances.
- In May 2023, the FTC announced it was sending more than $557,000 in refunds to 611 consumers through administrator JND Legal Administration.
Why this case matters
It shows the scheme running the identical pitch a decade after the FTC’s first consumer alert about it, from the same city as the largest case on this page, with a near-identical pattern of interchangeable company names: GDP Network, YF Solution, QSC Professionals, G.C.D. Management and Dynamic Solution Group were all, per the FTC, the same small operation.
The pitch and the unauthorised cards
The FTC’s complaint describes callers posing as representatives of the consumer’s own credit card company, promising a permanent, substantial rate cut and savings of thousands of dollars. According to the agency, the most the operation actually did for some consumers was open a new card carrying a temporary promotional rate and move an existing balance onto it, something available directly from most issuers at no cost. The FTC also alleged that in some instances, new credit cards were opened in consumers’ names without their knowledge, after they had given account information over the phone.
A judgment, not an admission
The individual defendants settled by stipulated order rather than going to trial; the orders are not an admission of liability. The $5.3 million in total judgments was suspended down to $425,000 in actual cash and assets the defendants surrendered, the mechanism the FTC commonly uses when a defendant’s financial disclosures show they cannot pay the full amount, with the judgment becoming due in full only if those disclosures are later found to be false. The corporate defendants, GDP Network LLC and G & G Success LLC, did not respond to the lawsuit and had a default judgment entered against them instead.
The caveat
This is a civil settlement, not a criminal case, and the complaint’s allegations were not tested at trial. The FTC’s public materials do not state a total dollar figure for how much the operation collected before the 2020 shutdown, only the per-consumer fee range alleged in the complaint and the $557,000 later refunded to 611 identified victims, so the total number of people affected and the full scale of the scheme beyond those 611 refund recipients is not established by the sources reviewed for this page.
Sources
- GDP Network LLC (YF Solution). US Federal Trade Commission. Accessed 2026-10-19. Supports: The docket number, the full list of named defendants and dba entities, the July 2020 complaint and TRO, and the February 2022 settlement and default-judgment orders.
- FTC Sends Checks to Consumers Harmed by Credit Card Interest Rate Reduction Scam. US Federal Trade Commission. Accessed 2026-10-19. Supports: The May 2023 refund of more than $557,000 to 611 consumers, the $995 to $4,995 fee range, the false affiliation claims, and the unauthorised new-card allegation.