My husband and I are both disabled. We can not go to a regular 9 to 5 job like most people.in October we Began working for Tara after speaking with a woman in Georgia who identified herself as "Nyla."
We signed a contract which stated: that we would recieve 50% of whatever Tara made by us working taking phone sex calls for them; that payday was on the 10th of the following month by check; that Ohio would be the venue for any legal claims; that employment was at will; and that Tara could hold the final paycheck for two months without reason (Nyla verbally told me this was to prove that she could be a b*tch).
Two types of phone sex services were paid to us by Tara. The first was called dispatch calls. Dispatch calls were placed directly to Tara via an 800 # and a Tara employee would write down the client's credit card information and approve the transaction, then transfer the call to a phone sex operator. As the operators, my husband and I timed the calls and filled out extensive reports concerning these calls and income earned on them.
The second type of call was through a third-party service. On these calls, the customer called an 800 number and then an extension number that ran directly to our home. The length of the calls could not accurately be tracked nor could the income, because of the complexity of the interface between Tara and the third party provider's site, leaving the phone sex operator to trust Tara to pay what was acctually earned. Our income also fluctuated due to "bidding" on the sites (each time our character was clicked 2 cents was deducted), and the fact that we had to use 800 numbers costing 7 cents a minutes to receive these calls.
In October, my husband and I earned $260.18. On November 10, we began looking for a check because Tara management claimed they had mailed them, and on November 15 we were told by another employee the only way to get paid was to track down Scott (the Ohio Owner) and harrass him to pay us via Pay Pal. He did, and and Pay Pal deducted $7.18 from our paycheck for using their services. On November 15th I asked Scott if Tara was having financial difficulties and he said yes but it was a short-term problem. During the month of November my husband and I were both in the hospital with pnumonia and missed a lot of work. We stayed in contact with Tara and they were patient with us and as soon as we were able we continued working for them.
We had pneumonia at the begining of November and we felt a real debt of gratitude for Tara not cancelling our contract, so towards the end of November and on Thanksgiving especially, I was the only one working. Nyla was sick from November until January and rarly available. Scott was busy and away. My team leader was sick and from December to at least January, and the "manager" was sick every holiday. Needless to say there were very few employees and very few managers around and I worked 12 hours a day from Thanksgiving until January 8, sometimes more.
In November my husband and I earned $318.00. Management again said checks had been mailed on the 10th, and Pay Pal was again sent on the 15th with $9.01 being deducted. On December 15th we knew we were going to have a much bigger paycheck than in previous months. We sent an emial to Tara respectfully requesting that that in January we be paid on the 10th via check. We explained that we were moving January 16 and would not have access to Pay Pal amounts if they were deposited on the 15th, and that the Pay Pal deduction would be too great. On December 31st my husband and I sent in our monthly reports and respectfully requested again that we be paid according to Tara's contract.
In Decemeber we earned $1,330.00 in dispatch calls alone. The closest estimate we can put on third party income was when Scott told us on the 20th of December that we had $1,400.00 in that income category. That means we at least earned $2,730.00 and probably more. When you add in Scott and Nyla's half that is $5,460.00 we made for them in December.
Well, needless to say on January 10 my husband and I were fired because the contract said we could be fired without cause and Tara had chosen to exercise that right. We hoped in earnest they would pay us for December but they did not. When I tried to call them they either hung up on me or I got voicemail which they left unanswered. So we patiently waited until March 15 and still no pay after the two-month waiting period. I called Nyla again and she hung up on me. I left Scott a voice mail which he never returned.
I even hired a lawyer in Ohio to write a collection letter to them and he did. They did not respond. The lawyer noyed that Tara uses PO Boxes and cell phones for their business and Nyla (aka Lisa) never gives out her real name. The lawyer said the were a rip-off company.
So if you are reading this report as a potential employee of Tara I advise you to take what I have said here into consideration. Also you can go to PSOBoards.com and do a search on Tara and get more stories of how fair and upright these people are.
If you are reading this report as a potential customer of Tara's let me tell you that in the three months I worked for TWO ex-employees took cutomer's credit card number's and went on shopping sprees. Nyla lets anybody do dispatch and thise people write down your Credit Card numbers and keep them forever along with your billing address and cvc codes.
Finally, I wonder if any of the $5,460.00 we earned for Tara in December was reported to the IRS? We did not get anything from Tara to indicate they had. Can you imagine how many employees are out there without 1099's that might suffer if Tara got audited?
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