Let me add my voice to the complaints about Bernard Haldane Associates.
I went for my second interview with my wife on November 15. At that point, we met with Ron Arcara (who stated he was in charge of the Chicago office).
As I explained my situation to him (not having a job and very little money) he assured me that Haldane was just the right place for me. They had contacts all over the US and Canada that could get me right in. He stated both to me and my wife that I would be employed by the end of December, no problem. If I wanted to work in Chicago, I would be working within 2 weeks. He told me that I was severly underpaid, and I should be making at least twice what I was when I got laid off.
He showed me a job board from across the room that showed over 37000 open job slots. I could not see that the majority of them were over a month old, and that very few of them were in my speciality.
Based on the wonderful SALES job, I signed up and left them a check for $3000. Both my wife and I left feeling on top of the world.
So began my sessions with Chuck Sterbis, my "Career Adviser". I did all my "homework" and began to build my "marketing brochure" to their specifications. I was kept out of their online job site during this period. Finally, on 12/3/01, I gave them my second payment of $2100. At that point, I was allowed to visit the site.
When I visited the site, I discovered the age of their jobs. They even put a disclaimer on it now telling you to make sure you check the dates, as the job postings may be old.
On my next visit with my "Career Advisor" I mentioned the fact that the listings were old, and that few (if any) were in my career. (Most of them were nursing positions.) He responded with "I should use the board to find out the recruiters that have open positions."
Then, I attempted to use their Dun and Bradstreet listing of companies and CEO's, as it became appearant that the promise of "many contacts" was also a pipe dream. I diligently extracted 52 companies in my target market to mail my package to. I noticed that their data was over 2 years old to boot. After encountering over a 25% failure rate due to old information, I gave up on that path as well.
Like it has been said several times, DO NOT use Bernard Haldane Associates, unless you have plenty of time and money to burn.
Samuel
Gary Indiana
Click here to all the others who have been victimized by Bernard Haldane Associates
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