I was deceived into becoming part of a pyramid scheme. I was told that it was a marketing position but it was really a sales position. This was a door to door sales job.
First day, (third interview) they use a "interview" day as a full day training expedition on selling home improvements. They ask you if you have the whole day clear so that you can be there but they do not tell you where you are going or what you are going to be doing. I was going door to door in the dead of winter in my suit and good shoes.
With the promise of great pay and easy promotion they sell themselves to you. They are very friendly, outgoing people who are easy to like. They accept you and promise a promotion on or before a month of your start date.
I worked two weeks, mostly by myself, canvassing neighborhoods without selling many of their products. When I asked about my pay at the end of the first week, the "owner" explained to me that it takes about three weeks for the first check to be validated and then I would receive a check every week. It was explained to me at this point that my pay would be 100% based on my sells.
I stuck it out for another week before I pulled the plug and decided that it wasn't the job for me. A week after I quit I received a phone call from one of the account managers who said that he had a check for me. I asked him to mail my check to me and he told me that that would be fine.
A week later I still hadn't received my first check. I called the account manager that had called me the week before. I ended up giving him my address again and he said that he would stick my check in the mail the next day.
Half a week later, I still hadn't received my first check so I went back to the office. Upon getting to the office, I was informed that they had moved to their main office in Atlanta, Ga. A sister company (the retail side) had taken over the office and was clueless as to what happened to the Home Improvement part that I had been an employee of.
I did find that there was a check at the office waiting for me but it was not made out for even the base pay that they had originally told me that I would make. The check was not even made out for the amount which the "owner" told me I would receive for my second week of work, back when I had confronted him concerning my pay at the end of the first week. I still have not received my paycheck for my first week of work which was supposed to come in the mail a week and a half ago.
They do not say that the job is 100% commission. They describe it as being 100% performance based... Which they then relate to your sells. I thought performance based was based upon the my ability to increase my "law of averages" by making more rounds then the others, by talking to more people, by increasing my percentage of people that I talked to.
These businesses sell products door to door, sell themselves through the interviews and the morning pep talks, and they sell you by deceiving you with the possibility of great outcomes and early retirement.
Nate
Nashville, Tennessee
U.S.A.
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