I signed up to be an In Sports "manager" a little over 3 years ago. I like sports and was looking for a part time job to help me familiarize myself with my new city. I answered a Monster posting for a "Sports Manager" which seemed to fit my criteria well.
I recieved a call from the In-Sports HR dept. And had an on the spot interview... I'll never forget but at the end of the interview, the guy on the line (I forget his name) smuggly said, "I'm pretty sure I know the answer to this question, but... Would you like to become a sports manager with In-Sports. It seemed like a decent gig at the time so I said yes... Boy do I wish I hadn't.
A few hours later, I get another call from the "president" of In Sports, Nick. We talked for a few minutes and he told me that I'd have to pay a deposit of $25.35 on the flyers that he will ship me. I thought, sure that's no problem... Until after I go through the recording of the agreement, in which he still ambigiously represents the dollar figure at $25.35 and not $2535.00 which is what it actually was.
The next day, I see my bank balance online and nearly crapped myself. I called Nick demanding to refund the amount (which was from some wierd bank "laguna" something. He refused, siting the recording and promising that all I have to do is earn $900 over the next 3 months and I'll get it back.
Here's where it gets bad... After getting the flyers (which were shipped to the wrong address) I had to get my own stamp and ink pad and spend an hour or more per day stamping my freaking code on a tiny area on the back of these flyers. During the days, I would go around to local establishments to get them to put a stack of flyers in their business... I underestimated just how bad the website was (I just looked at today, and it hasn't changed in 3 years) because after a month of hard work everyday I got my first check in the mail after a month and it was all of 200 dollars. Having almost exhausted my flyer inventory, I called nick who was more than happy to allow me to "deposit" more flyers but speechless when asking for tips to get better results.
For some reason (I must have been hammered) I called nick a few weeks later to get more flyers but not the same way I did before... This time he said he had talked to the owner who agreed to charge me half of the original price... Which I agreed was OK... When it came to recording the agreement, it got shady again. This time he represented in the recording (and recording only) that he would charge my credit card half of the amount (I forget what it was, about $800 I think) and they would take the other half from future commissions. Ouch... So now I was working for free.
I realize I'm getting really long winded and I can go on and on and on but here's my whole point.
Nick, who never gave me his last name is the "president" of this company who claims to have 50 or more employees, yet he is the guy working with the front line schmoes like I was. He misrepresented his intentions on multiple occasions and always hid behind the "owner" who he never provided any detail about. From a business standpoint, its my opinion that Nick is not out for the enjoyment of paying customers but to take advantage of their field employees. I'm not convinced its a full blown scam... But a poorly run and borderline criminal operation. As it is, I'm out almost $3500 which are still unpaid on my credit cards. If you include the interest, its probably close to 5000-6000 that this will cost me. I now have 2 kids and this debt is a constant burden on me and my family. Every month when I get teh credit card statement, I cringe in agony and embarassment at the balance that haunts my every financial decision.
I'm embarressed and angry and wondering if there's anything that can be done to make this right.
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