ShadowBoxing
Avenger
- Joined
- Sep 10, 2004
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"Okay these folks are just asking to be pooped on"
I decided to stay quiet about this for a while, simply out of a mix of paranoia and really being ashamed to be in the situation at all, no matter how well I handled it.
However this story, while personal, is good for any hypsters who may soon be entering the workforce or are looking for a job.
To give you a bit of background, I work currently in "North _________" (for those wondering, I'm purposefully with holding information). This particular area serves two purposes: as a place to build industrial/business parks and as a slum for all the poor of the metropolitan area. In fact the city itself often is found in the top ten or top twenty most crime ridden areas. Consequently it is poor and people there are desperate. It is also a very black neighborhood, black typically being synonomous with poor for the residents.
After hosting my resume' at Monster.com, I received a phone call from Liberty National Life requesting an 'interview'.
I really shouldn't have been there to start with. Even though I hadn't gotten the odd e-mail most speak of, the phone call I got was rushed. So much so I could barely make out the name of the business, only the address (guess that's all they felt was important). Now I had applied to at least 50 businesses by that point, some I wasn't even interested in. So, while the call was suspicious, and she wouldn't answer any of my questions...I felt the need to follow up, at the very least to find out if indeed I did apply there, and to tell them I wasn't interested.
I should have guessed when the woman said it's in "_________" not "North _______" despite giving me the "North ________" area code that this was total bunk. I mean who's in a city long enough to start up a business without finding out the real name of the city they are working in?
When I got there I was treated to a very quiet and secretive staff who worked in a barren office. They ushered me into a group interview which was conducted more like a sales pitch than an actual interview. They were attempting to sell licensing, basically. I'm not sure how stupid they thought I was, perhaps that college education on my resume meant nothing to them, but there I was sitting through a mockery of the people invited.
They promised jobs, trips, and earning potential, all under the guise of what sounded exactly like a pryamid scheme. Basically they wanted to take these people's money, as much as possible, and run.
There were several lies in the video, such as their company being a top pick by Warren Buffet. Even one of the members in the group "interview" was obviously a plant, giving an oh so entertaining story on selling Kirby vaccuum cleaners as a child. Perhaps the presenter shouldn't have made an obvious turn towards him right as he was about to speak.
There were two people across from me, however, entranced by the stories and false promises made by the presenter, James Lanier. I felt sorry for them, because even though I had never been to one of these things before I knew what it was and they obviously didn't.
I reported them to the Better Business bureau. Enhanced my spam blockers and filed with the FTC for both the "do not call" list on my cell and spam reports for e-mail. Right now I still watch my bank account statements and credit cards very closely, hoping to catch that one unknown expedature I can nail them with.
If I can thank them for anything it's that I now have a more personal relationship with my bank statements than I ever thought I would.
t: )
