Complaint Review: Influent Aka Interactive Teleservices

I worked for Influent as a verifier from mid 2004 through mid 2006.  Verifiers listen to recordings of completed sales calls and cancel sales that are invalid.  Influent telemarketing representatives were in the regular habit of intentionally garbling words in their scripts to the point of being completely unintelligible, omitting important words, lying about the product or service offered, or simply slamming customers who had no clue how badly they’d just been scammed.

When a verifier there cancels a sale, it’s called a “bounce.”  I bounced several sales daily because of the methods mentioned above.  It was indicated to me by management that I was bouncing a far greater number of sales than any other verifier.  After I’d been with Influent for about a year, I came under intense, continual harassing and menacing pressure from management including an attempt to falsely portray me in a bad light with the goal of manufacturing grounds for termination.   Also, I am forced to suspect that a woman who was an executive assistant who approached me romantically accused me of some kind of wrongdoing after our single date during which very little happened and she acted quite strange.  Shortly after that, finally, in the summer of ’06, they successfully harassed me into quitting. 

Since then, my life has been a nightmare of covert harassment and menacing in public nearly everywhere I go.  It followed me to California and back across the country to New York.  I’d never had a speeding ticket in my life, but starting while I worked for Influent and ending in 2007, I received no less than four speeding tickets, all in the state of Ohio.  I nearly had my license suspended.  I’ve been harassed and menaced, including with death threats, by people who make overtures indicating they are with authorities.  In one of the more direct threats, one of them said, “I’m a cop.  Part of my job is to make sure commerce runs smoothly.”

Influent/Interactive Teleservices is in the business off ripping off hundreds of people daily.  I have no choice but to conclude that they are a major force behind the continual harassment and menacing I’ve experienced since working there.

John Paul Francis Zoccali

Wow, reading this really blows my mind. I have been with this company for 4 years. I've been everything from a TSR to an insurance agent and now a supervisor. Check this out, for the ex insurance agent, I know how you are. You are a spoiled bunch that think they are better than everyone else, because you can verify some sales? As far as the agent pay I don't think it's unfair to ask that you DO YOUR JOB to get the extra money. If you go to work as you're supposed to, you wouldn't have had an issue with your pay, I'm sure. So stop with the pity party.
As far as all the other "ex-employees" there's a reason you don't work there and to be honest if I were fired from something as easy as telemarketing I would be embarrased to, but there are other ways of going about it.
And for the "current employee" grow up. I don't know nor do I care what you're issue is but I know for a fact having done this for yearS now that we abide by every FTC, FCC, and Federal DNC law. Do employees mess up? Yes however they are human and are held accountable. So before any of you go "spouting off at the mouth" maybe you should think about the things you put out there and accusations you make before you make them.
I have NEVER been "screwed" out of ANY pay and the ONE time my check was short the company corrected it right away. I make sure (as do all other members of management) that every employee is treated fairly and equally and get paid for EVERY MINUTE they work and every bonus they EARN.
Thanks!

I don't have time to share as there is so much to report about this big-time ripoff outfit.....but here is their latest scam: They get you to sign up as an 'Agent' so that you can validate calls and make the so-called 'Big Money' and also be paid $10/hr as opposed to the $7.30 minimum wage that all the TSR's are making. But guess what? They never get you fully approved in most states to validate as an agent and force you to sell as a TSR.....and then guess what???......you don't get any bonuses or commisssions because agents aren't allowed to get paid commissions on products when they sell as TSRs......but they can get the $10.00 per hour rate ONLY if they work the full schedule that the computer calls for......BUT AGAIN.....GUESS WHAT???.....The agents never, ever, ever, ever, ever get the $10.00 rate.....because the CRIMINAL supervisors and so-called Sales Managers force you to log out of the system just hours and even minutes shy of making it to the FULL SCHEDULE, thus you only get paid minimum wage. This is just a scheme to get their employees to work for nothing. This company is clearly in violation of the RICO ACT. I worked their for a year and have never seen such criminal activity by adminstrative people in an organization such as this.

J. D.

WHILE I CAN'T SAY I ENJOYED MY EMPLOYMENT WITH INFLUENT, I HAVE TO SAY THEY PUT A HIGH PREMIUM ON LEGAL AND ETHICAL BEHAVIOR ON THE PART OF THEIR EMPLOYEES. THE INDUSTRY ON THE WHOLE IS SHADY AT BEST, BUT INFLUENT WORKS HARD TO AT LEAST FOLLOW THE LAW.

Most of what I have read above is stuff that I can verify being a current employee of the company. No code (at least in Lincoln) is a "verbatim" code. Yes we have certain times where we record call "verbatim" for the clients to listen to when they come but, for the rest of it we lie our [bodypart of choice] off.

DNC or Do Not Call Requests are for the most part followed but not because it's enforced. You could easily send every call as a call back and get away with it as most of our "highly trained" Quality Assurance people have gotten chewed out for enforcing the rules and laws. In fact, in Lincoln only one QA supervisor actually enforces the rules.

Every code (on the Lincoln Sales Floor) lies to their customers. When there are not "enough" sales you can actually get written up for not lying to the customers (it hasn't happened to me but, it happened to a friend of mine).

As for power scripts, they are used and they are hidden and put away when customers come. Infact I have a powerscript at my house for the 'CSI' code at my place.

The list goes on but, the fact is that Influent breaks so many laws that I really hope the FCC starts a probe there. It's just pathetic what they are willing to do there.

With Honesty
X

P.S. For any companies thinking about contracting with Influent I would consider not doing so. Apart from repeately calling you customers and making them really mad, their servers are quite insecure. Honestly who leaves ftp access on and broadcast the kernel and patch level of the operating system they are using (2.4 by the way, you think they would upgrade).

For more than 3 years I was employed by Influent Inc. I was Not only an insurance agent for this company and verified litterally thousands of sales (some legit.....others far from it), I was also a sales manager in one of there biggest call centers. I know Crystal somewhat personally and although she is a nice girl...she's fell victim to the "hype machine" that comes from corp. every day. This place is truly a performance oriented company with no real regard for quality. I've been told to log people into the system that were not even in the building to bill fake hours to clients, written "power scripts" (BTW no program should have to be designated as a "Verbatim" program for people to follow state required scripting!! crazy!!), been asked to lie to employees about everything from hours worked to commision, and so on and so on. As an insurance agent I was told by my supervisor how to put a lead on hold without the system being able to track it, so that after I got a yes to billing, I could basicly cut them off so they couldn't back out while i read them the rest of the agreement. Truly dirty. While you're doing it, it doesn't feel like it's that big of a deal because EVERYONE is doing it!
Billing fake hours has been happening for YEARS!!! I'm 100% sure that hundreds of thousands of $'s have been billed to clients with fake hours. I've seen it. Clients like HSBC, Greentree bank, Wells Fargo, Metlife and even Pitney bowes. (pitney was even a pay per sale program, not per hour, but we were asked to have 5-10 fake agents logged in daily to make the hours report look better!! Again..Crazy!!
While you are employed with this company things sound great, the money's good, bonuses are ok, and the people I worked with were usually truly good people......good people that were brainwashed into doing VERY VERY bad things for a little extra on there paycheck. Me included.
-KM

This compnay was the worst i ever worked for. I would have rather scooped poop than work there, The violated so many ethical practices for employees that you felt like you were a drone while there. you also were made to feel less human by being cussed out even by the so called ceo!
I know for a fact from being there for 16 months that they do not enforece the dnc properly. they do not enforce state guildines one bit. I am so happy now that i am not there. I feel less stress and less of a burden on society since we did rip off and lie to people. We were told to. We were demanded too.

Aside from the "shady" business practices, and yes the illegal scripts. I was there.

Influent does not treat their employees well. And I am not sure why other rebuttals spoke of "highly trained" staff... the majority of the senior staff in the location where I worked was under the age of 18.

The working conditions are also extremely hostile. Never before in my life have I seen management staff curse out employees or threaten employees. That is day to day life at Influent.

Influent routinely hands out paychecks that bounce. And sometimes they simply don't pay their employees at all. I am still waiting for my 3rd to last paycheck, because they never paid me.

Everything that has been said on this board is 100% true. Influent is currently under investigation by the FCC, although nothing is likely to come from it since the regulations are relatively weak. They will likely be fined, which they will use as an excuse to not come through on some bonus money, or maybe bounce some payroll checks. As someone who has spent the last 11 years in this industry I will say this, Influent while being the worst I've dealt with isn't all that much different than any other telemarketing company. They put offices in places like Salyersville, Tiffin, and New Philly because the people there have few other alternative employment opportunities therefore will work cheap.

I worked at the corporate office for nearly 5 years. Every morning I sat in on the operations meeting with Andy, client services and the center managers. On an almost daily basis things were done in violation of both FCC regulations and client agreements. Power scripts were developed and used with the caveat that they must not be found out by the client. The only thing that was important to senior management was billing hours and I can say on multiple occasions that clients were lied to when the truth would have served better. People at the call center level only know about the front line violations, at corporate it was done at an entirely different level. They placed no value what so ever on moral and for those of you defending the company, if you knew how they actually felt about you would likely not be so quick to defend.

Now before anyone goes running off at the mouth accusing me of being a bitter ex employee thats not the case. I was compensated very well while I was employed there and when I moved on to my next job it was largely due to the experience I gained at Influent.

Look I wrote a rebuttal before and Im writing again ,I Work at Influent obviously. Are people so desperate to discredit Influent? Yes illegal power scripts are made all over the world in peoples heads and such... but no one is lying at my work. I remember the FUSA deal..I was the head trainer to happen to go on vacation at the time "How messed up is that."

I feel Semi responsible because if I didnt,the whole ordeal would of never happened. The Gal who took my place wasnt knowledgable enough to know that it was a "Verbatim" program first off, so she took it among herself to write out a script( not even lieing in it just so it sounded good) so it would help the new hires through the computers and script since its not that easy at our employment.

Anyways needless to say the Mon or Tues on Vacation there was a client visit and one of the clients was walking in the row and asked the see one of their scripts..and we were fired,that is the only time that anyone read it like that,oh well,right she was fired to for being ignorant. I am called by telemarketers daily at my house and they straight are scantless and some arent and I know people agree with me there. I am a supervisor and I could sell ice to an eskimo by being real and seeing if the benefit or service suits their needs and people I help do just as well.

My center is successful because of me and some others, believe it, we dont lie. We have guidelines about lieing and such. And cussing\ly ing at a client is wrong I agree with you Kevin and if they were hired back that is crazy,my center dont do that.. but we have many centers unless you making that up because you were fired.

For example I had a surprise client visit last month and it was great. I am #1 in the country.. my shift. .my center, great news.. on top of that my client pays my center a nice bonus for me to give to the reps so we play games,have fun and work hard as a team towards our goal.. Read the Book Fish by Stephen C Lundin its about work and then you will change your attitude its a Workplace Bible and i hope you enjoy it.

I worked at Influent for two years from 2003-2005. During that time I was specifically told by supervisors to violate fcc regulations and client obligations. We were led to mislead people on the phone as well as rush them thru our "power scripts". I was even promoted to supervisor during my time there. I was told to show the workers how to sell the products anyway necessary. I do have to say, that if someone was officially caught lieing, everything would be ok, because even if they were fired, in two weeks they were back again. This place is a joke, I personally fired people for lieing and cussing at a client on the phone and he was back in the very next training class the following week.

I worked for ITC AKA Influent.

The old sales person told me that Providian showed up at ITC's call center and they got fired on the spot for illegal power scripts!

I did not believe this until I worked there and the owner told me that the only way they can compete with the big call ceneters such as APAC etc...is that they use power scripts. The owner was amazed at my ignorrance that I was not aware of that?

Power scripts are illegal scripts that are used to get better than average results for OB!

I also had a deal in hand and ITC got caught for illegal scripts by FUSA!FUSA fired them on the spot and it killed my other OB FUSA deal!

ITC HAD to change their name because of the reputation they had built in the industry. I personally shared this information with the consulting company that the owner hired!

I GOTTA SAY THAT I AM WITH
Crystal - Uhrichsville, Ohio... FROM OUR NEW PHILADELPHIA CENTER ON THIS ONE.

I HAVE BEEN A FLOOR SUPERVISOR AT THE INFLUENT CENTER IN TIFFIN,OH FOR ABOUT 4 MONTHS NOW AND CRYSTAL HIT THE NAIL RIGHT ON THE HEAD WITH THIS ONE. WE CONSTANTLY HAVE THE CLIENTS MONITORING EACH AND EVERY ONE OF OUR TELEMARKETING REPS FROM THEIR PERSONAL OFFICES ALL OVER THE WORLD EVERYDAY. I WORK PERSONALLY WITH SOME PEOPLE THAT WERE STILL THERE WHEN MIKE (THE INDIVIDUAL THAT STARTED THIS PAGE WITH HIS OBSCENE LIES) AND CAN TELL YOU THAT NONE OF IT IS CORRECT.

WE FILE ALL PAPERWORK VERY PROPERLY INCLUDING THE "DO NOT CALL" SHEETS, AND I NOR ANY OF MY FELLOW SUPERVISORS HAVE EVER CHEATED ANYONE OUT OF INCENTIVES IN ANYWAY. JUST FELT THE NEED TO CHIME IN ON THIS ONE AND MAKE MY EFFORT TO SET THINGS STRAIGHT. KEEP ROCKIN' IN NEW PHILLY CRYSTAL!!

STEVE... TIFFIN, OH

I have worked for Influent aka Interative Teleservies for over 6 years. I have never lied to anyone, nor does anyone at my location. We follow the DNC tcpa requirements accordingly.No one gets scammed. In fact if anyone was to lie or not follow the TCPA requirements,they would lose their job. We have a highly trained staff from Trainers, Supervisors,Sales Managers, Quality Assurance,Center Managers, Verification Dept,Taped sales confirmations,Corporate,Seed Calls(trained client monitoring of onsite calls) Client Remotes,and etc...etc...The list doesn't stop there as well.Im sure you did something "You" werent suppose to and lost your job. New Philadelphia