I was approached by FFUSA via email to participate in a conference call for potential new sales reps. I attended one on Thursday January 29 at 11 am central time. The meeting was very promotional in nature and was obviously well scripted. There appeared to be others on the line, but I could not confirm if they were real or plants. The opportunity sounded interesting, but I needed more information.
Over the next couple days, I tried to research FFUSA by searching the internet. I could not find a lot of information about First Financial, so on Monday, Feb 1, I called the number of the Human Resources Department 1-800-678-7610.
I asked for some additional information about the financial strength of the company, a name of a reference at JP Morgan or Paymentech, the name of a reference of a company that uses their services, who the owners are, etc. I told her I had been trying to research the company on line and that the only thing I could find was a B - rating on the Minnesota Better Business Bureau site.
I also asked her about where FFUSA ranks against other CC processors like Heartland so that I could understand how much of the market they had.
I explained to her the companies that I would potentially bring to them would also be my clients for other services, so I need to know all about any companies to which I take my clients.
The HR person really didn't want to share any information and attempted to send me to their web site www.ffusa.com and she said I could find that information there. When I explained to her that I had a ready reserched the site and that the information was not there, she started to get a little defensive. She finally asked me to hold while she talked to someone.
After about 2 minutes, she came back and said that the information I was asking for was unavailable and that I would have to go find this information on my own. I pressed further and said I thought it was unusual that she couldn't give me a name at JP Morgan or Paymentech or that she couldn't give me any company references. She said I could call them myself and try to find out, but she refused to offer me any contact name or phone number again stating it was my responsiblity to do my own research. The bottom line is, without a contact name, it would have been impossible to find anyone that knew about them. Can you imagine going to a job interview, and when you ask questions about the companies financial viability and client refereneces, you are told to do your own research?
Then it happened, she hung up on me. No "I need to go" or "goodbye, just a hang up.
The questions I was asking are basic information you should know about any company you are going to do significant business with. I asked all of the questions in a very calm and businesslike manner. Their refusal to answer basic questions about their financial position, to provide verifiable references, and a general inability to provide any substantive answers to questions about their organization should raise significant red flags to anyone looking to doing business with them.
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