I am a senior citizen and believe that SMC (Specialty Merchandise Corp.) has swindled, bilked, and conned me out of $4,000. On January 6, I enrolled with SMC in an online business. On March 3, a man identifying himself as Andrew Jackson phoned me at my home, without appointment, and said he was with SMC, and my trainer. It was my first call from an SMC trainer. I am certain he understood I did not want any more gift cards because I told him I had more than I could use.
Mr. Jackson talked about an E Mail campaign and urged me in the strongest terms to sign up. He said he had an E Mail template that would be sent to more than a million people and should net me around 3,000 orders. He talked for a long time about this E Mail campaign, extolling its virtues and promised it would help me get my business off the ground. During this conversation, he sent me an E Mail. The templates pictured SMC products; one of which had its SMC catalog number. He said the cost of the package, with "bundles" would be $4,000. I did not know what bundles were but assumed it was a list of names and E mail addresses. I finally agreed to the package, only after reviewing the templates he had E mailed.
I later received a box from SMC and all it contained was SMC gift cards which I neither needed nor wanted. I waited for some result of the E Mail and there were no orders, no E Mails to me from Mr. Jackson or prospective customers - nothing. I tried to call Mr. Jackson, but was told he was no longer my trainer and I would have to communicate with the new trainer. I asked my new trainer repeatedly if my E Mail campaign had been sent out and he said he thought so but did not know. Finally, he referred me to Technical Assistance. I called them and the person I talked to expressed incredulity that anyone from SMC would endorse an E Mail campaign, as SMC did not have such a campaign and stated, "We know who Andrew Jackson is". I forwarded Mr. Jackson's E Mail to him and he promised to look into it. He later contacted me and said that Mr. Jackson worked for SMC, the E Mail campaign had gone out, and I should sign up for yet another expensive program with a search engine. I did not know what to do since I had already lost $4,000. I decided to try the program and see if that would help my business. I questioned whether the E Mail campaign had gone out, as I had never received a copy nor any confirmation and that there were blanks in the template I should have been allowed to fill out, but he said repeatedly the E Mail had gone out and that was the end of it.
My business still did not receive any orders and I decided to cancel my SMC membership. When I called SMC to cancel my membership, two different employees said they checked the records and Andrew Jackson was not on the roll of employees at SMC and there had never been an E Mail campaign sent out on my behalf. I knew then for certain I had been lied to. From Jan 6 until July 3, I paid $8,256.16 and have nothing to show for it.
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