My husband and I found ourselves in the same situation millions of Americans are in right now. We lost an income and could no maintain our monthly bills. I was considering bankruptcy when I began to see on television and hear on the radio advertisments about debt settlement companies that can help people settle their debts by negotiating their debts down 50% or more and paying them off in 3 - 4 years. This sounded alot better to me than filing bankruptcy. So I jumped on the internet and began to explore this option. I had barely typed the word debt before a million settlement companies popped up. I clicked on this website called debtconsolidatiocare.com. There is a form on this website that you fill out and then someone calls you for a consultation. So I filled it out. The very next day at least 6 settlement companies called me. The next day a few more called. This continued for about a week. After listing to all of them pretty much tell me the same thing and not really being pleased with most of what I heard, I was about ready to give up when this Indian guy called me and said his name was Victor. He said he was calling regarding the request I'd submitted. I immediately told him I wasn't interested because I'd spoken to so many companies and wasn't satisfied with the numbers they were quoting me. He said to me "oh well mam we can settle your debts absolutely free at no cost to you, the creditiors pay everything". Well of couse when he said "free" I didn't want to hang up so quickly. So I said, free? He said yes mam. I said how are you going to settle my debts for free? He said "hold on mam and let me have one of our debt specialist speak with you, he can explain everything". He then switched me to a gentleman who said his name was Walt. Walt began to go into his drill about how many people have lost and income and are not able to pay their debts right now and what he could do to help negotiate my debts and pay them off much sooner. I didn't let him go far because I'd heard it all before and I quickly let him know that the only reason I agreed to talk to him was because I was told by Victor that they would settle my debts for free. He immediately said "no mam that's not true". I said well that's what Victor told me. He said he didn't know why I was told that because it wasn't true and he apologized and said he would speak with him about it. I said well evidentally you all are woring together, he transferred me to you. But he assure me he had no knowledge of why Victor would tell me such and thing and would take care of it. So evidentally this is a scam they use to keep people on the phone at least long enough to listen to them. I guess alot of people do exactly what I was going to do, hang up! So they devised this scheme to keep them on the phone. That was the first red flag, but Walt was so nice and so apologetic that I decided to listen to him. Big mistake! I let him know that I was familiar with how debt settlements work already, so I didn't want to sit through that whole drilll again. I told him all I needed to know from him was how much he could negotiate my debts down, how long it will take him to pay them off and what was the fee. He told me he could settle my debts in 36-48 months. He could get them down as much as 60% or more and his fee was 15% of the total debt amount. I then asked what my monthly deposit amount would be, based on my total debts of $50,000. When he gave me a monthly figure of $535, I was pleased because it was actually lower than anyone elses. This made me want to listen a little more. I told him I like the figures he'd given me so far, but I had a problem with the 15%. He told me that was no problem, he would be willing to negotiate the fee lower than 15% if I decided to do business with him. This really sounded good. I told him I'd talk it over with my husband and get back to him. I talked it over with my husband, and Walt and I went back and forth for almost two weeks with me asking him a million questions. After almost two weeks and Walt satisfactorily answering my questions, and making me a million promises (that I later found out were lies), we decided Mach 3 was the best company for us. However, IMMEDIATELY after I decided to do business with him, Walt switched up on me. He initially quoted me a monthly payment of $535 for $50,000 worth of debt. But my husband and I figured, if it's $535 a month for 50,000 worth of debt, if we lower it to $32,000, it should be even lower, considerably lower. So I lowered the total debt to 32,000 and asked Walt to give me a new figure. The new figure was $472. I said Walt you initially quoted me $535 for 50,000 of debt. Now you mean to tell me after having reduced my total debt down from 50,000 to 32,000, which is an 18,000 difference, the lowest you're willing to go is $472? That's not even a $100 a month difference. He said well mam, the reason I was able to give you such a low price before was because we were working with another company (he called the name, but I don't remember it), however we are not working with that company anymore because we found out they're not reliable so we let them go. He said they were giving people low monthly payments but the debts weren't being paid off in the specified time frame. He said the new figure is much more realistic and assures your debt will be paid off in the specified time frame of 36-48months. I said but Walt you just gave me that price last week. He said yes I know but it just wasn't realistic. I then asked him about lowering the 15% as he agreed. He said he would but only after I sent back the application because the attorney wouldn't agree to it unless they knew for sure I was going to do business with them.in other words after you sign the contract, we'll neogitate the 15%, what sense does that make? After I sign the contract, they're not obligated to negotiate. But I listened on just to see what else he would change. I then asked him how long it would take after the money had accumulated in my account for each debt to be paid off. He said he couldn't possibley tell me that. I said why not? I said you told me last week that you all let my money sit in my account until I've accumuated enough to pay off a debt. Once there's enough in the account to pay off a debt, you pay them off one by one, starting with the smaller one. Now you're tellimg me you don't know when the debt will be paid even after the money is in my account? Isn't that what the program is designed to do? He said, well sometimes we don't pay the debts off right away even if there's enough money in the account because sometimes we try to negoitiate the debt down even more and that could take more time and it's just hard to say exactly when each debt will be paid off. So in otherwords even after I've accumuated money in my account to pay off my debts they may or may not actually pay it off.in the meantime, they're still collecting their money each month and I'm still be charged fees by the credit card company. He said the only date I can absolutely guarantee you is the 48 months. I said so you're guaranteeing me all of my debts will be paid off in 48 months. He said "oh absolutely mam, and maybe even sooner". I said ok Walt email me the contract and let me take a look at it. But if I don't like it, I won't sign it. He emailed the contract to me. When I clicked on the link to open it, before you're allowed to even look at the contract, the first page makes you agree to receive all of your documents electronically and makes you "adopt a signature". Since the documents are electronic you can't actually sign them by hand so they show you an image of your signature. It's not acutally your signature, it's your name written in signature form. There are several fonts you can pick from, when you see one you like, you click the adopt box, and that image becomes your signature and it is as legally binding as if you'd written it in your own hand writing. Not only that, there's a disclosure that states this is the official signature that you OR YOUR AGENT use when signing your electronic documents. Me or my agent? Well would my agent be applying my signature to documents. Well I wasn't about to click any such box. Once I agree to use that image as my signature, anyone can click on it and apply it to a document. I immediately called Walt back and told him to fax the contract to me instead. However when he faxed it to me (15 pages) my fax ink ran out and I only got the first 5 pages. But believe me that was enough! By the time I got to page four I was ready to tear it up. On page four it stated that the 48 months I was told it would take to complete the program was just a good faith estimate of the amount of time the attorneys believe it will take to pay off my debts. This time frame was not guaranteed and could go actually go beyond 48 months. Furthermore, it stated that if the time did go beyond 48 months I was still obligated to keep making my monthly deposits of $472 into my account. Well there goes the 48 month guarantee Walt assured me of! And isn't this why he said they got rid of that other company, because the figures they were using weren't reasonable and clients' debts weren't being paid off in the specified time frame? Hummm, sounds like this company isn't the only one not keeing committments. If there ever was such a company. So not only can't they tell me when my debts would be paid off after the money had accumulated in my account, now I find out they can't even guarantee it will paid off in the 48 months! But that's not all. As I read further it also stated that their fees were payment for services provided EVEN IF SETTLEMENTS ARE NOT ACHIEVED! So this means I pay whether they settle my debts or not! So, let me make sense of this. This is a debt settlement company that I'm hiring to settle my debts. But even if they don't settle my debts I still pay? If they can't settle my debts, what am I paying for? And the straw that broke the camels back was when I read further down the page that my debts would only be settled for 45% and could be settled higher than this or LOWER! So what are we talking here, 40%, 30%? Not the 60% or higher that Walt assured me of a week ago taht's for sure. And and not even the 50% he said was an absolute guarantee! When I asked him about it he said the 50% agreement was beyond page 5. Of course, since I only had pages 1-5! At that point I made it clear I had no desire to review the rest of the contract anyway. If the first 4 pages were a sham, I can only imagine what the rest looked like. This company is a sham just like all the rest. They lure their clients in by boasting that they're an attorney based company. This is the one thing that all his competitors couldn't offer. But it's interesting that they're an attorney based company yet no where on their website does it state this. You would think this would be the first thing they would advertise since most people feel safer with an attorney handling their financial affairs. I also found out they are not licensed as is required in California. California law requires bill paying services, and pro-raters accepting money from clients to be disbursed to creditors on behalf of the debtor, to be licensed by the California Commissioner of Corporations and file a $25,000 bond. They are not licensed and they have an F rating on the better business website. See for youself! Go to this link http://www.la. BBB.org/Business-Report/Mach-3-Debt-Solutions-100085821. Stay away from this company and others like them and sweet talkers like Walt!!!
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