My son, who is the field manager of our company, received a cold call from a representative of International Profit Associates while on the job. He referred the caller to me as owner of the company. The caller presented his "sell" in his most logical and practiced manner and this was early on Monday morning so I agreed to meet with him. I informed him that my weekly calendar was full and would not be able to meet with his associates until much later in the week. On Tuesday his associate rang my door bell on Tuesday morning and presented herself as the person who would be conducting the analysis of our business practices and make the necessary recommendations. I was assured that Only IF their company agreed to take us on as a client would there be any costs involved. She did a telephone interview with my son in law (our estimator) and we met on the job site with my son and one of our drivers, whom she also interviewed. Then on Wednesday she arrived to go over the results of her study. She began her presentation and I stopped her immediately. I told her she would have to schedule a meeting with all the parnters of the company and that would not be possible on such short notice. I requested she leave her reports and supporting documentation and if she could not schedule her oral presentation when it was convenient to my staff. We would then make our study of her findings and get back with her. Her brow furrowed and she said we have a problem. I replied I did not have a problem but she might since I was not going to listen to her oral presentation and make an immediate decision without first consulting with my staff. She merely said a decision was needed immediately that is was her experience that when people say they want to sleep on it they usually do not follow through. I bulked at that indicating to her that for my part evaluating her analysis was to me making an informed decision. The impact on me was that she was actively placing me in a stressful situation by attempting to pressure me into making decision immediately. There were some red flags along the way some of which I had not given much consideration until after the fact. I have yet to figure out why when making notes in an interview situation the sales representative wrote all around the margin of the Profit Engineering sheet and the business analyst in her interview with our estimator wrote her note on her pocket calendar. Had I gone to the Better Business Bureau website and checked this company out I would never have allow anyone from this company into my office. It reinforced my philosophy that the "Don't call me I will call you" mentality is the best first defense to letting companies such as International Profit Associates, Inc.in the front door. The tactics used by this company aligns itself to play on the lack of business acumen by small business owners who are in the start of phase. There are a lot of resources in the market that are reputable and willing to assist, not attempt to bleed the business owner.
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