International Profit Associates - IPA Integrated Business Analysis Unscrupulous Business Practices Must Be Stopped - Join the Class Action Lawsuit Buffalo Grove, Illinois
The following is an account of my recent experience as a new employee with IPA. I have since found the following website regarding a class action lawsuit against IPA....... and I am encouraging everyone who has had a bad experience with IPA to visit and register at http://www.ipalawsuit.com.
I completed the training course as a Senior Business Analyst with IPA on August 10, 2007. After completing my first week "in the field" it was evident to me that the boasting we were filled with during training, about the ethical standards of the company and of IPA's ability to help small business, was so far flung from the actual business practices that it hardly seemed like the same company.
Unfortunately, I did not complete my own due diligence prior to attending the training --- I relied heavily upon their website and in-house propaganda....
IPA "hired" me on Thursday and I left for training on Sunday. I was busy completing projects at home so I could attend training and they Fed Ex an overnight package to the future employee..... and it's very impressive.... it includes all the benefits you receive as a W-2 employee, info about health care insurance, literature about ex President's and Henry Kissinger speaking at the annual party..... and there are a lot of forms that need to be filled out before arriving in Chicago...... it certainly kept me from finding this site prior to being "whisked away" to Chicago for what sounded like "my dream job.".... and it gives the future employee the impression that this is truly a class organization.
The first class treatment continues through the week of training with IPA paying for the trainee's airfare, hotel, training materials, limousine ride to and from the airport, and food for the week..... including two very lavish dinners offering steak, lobster tails, and an open bar.
They are very good at duping the future "potential" employee into believing that if we can make it through the rigors of training, we will be working with small businesses who have asked for our help --- and the consulting division is best in the world in turning around businesses in trouble.
I discovered after my first job how unscrupulous IPA actually is. Thankfully, the client had my cell phone number and called me after "consulting services" went into his business after my departure from the jobsite.
The business owner was very appreciative of my analysis, and ultimately trusted me enough to agree to bring in two consultants who according to the business owner essentially did nothing all day except to reiterate what I had spent the previous three days teaching him..... then they demanded payment for their services at the end of the day - almost $5,000 for nothing!!
IPA representatives assured me during my analysis of the business through Nancy Howard (my "SSD" - Senior Survey Director) and Steve Dew (the "Project Manager" for the consulting division), and it was further documented by me in the "Project Manager's Notes" in my report on the business, that the consultants would be collecting payment from the business owner through improved management of cash flow, improved expense and inventory controls, and collection of outstanding receivables..... a seemingly win/win situation for both the business owner and IPA.
I left my first jobsite feeling like I'd really helped a small business owner --- and the business owner really believed it too..... and now I understand why IPA prefers their Analyst's not give out their phone number...... they only print the company's main number on the business cards and they do not use e-mail..... both business practices I found very odd from the onset....
Ultimately, the client put a stop payment on the check and is understandably fearful that IPA will come after him aggressively for payment --- and I'm afraid he's probably right..... and I am saddened at the knowledge that I played any part in this fraud..... I'm just thankful I found out quickly.....
I completed the training course with several other very professional and well educated individuals..... I certainly hope they've figured out the real situation their first week "in the field".....
Hopefully the class action lawsuit will put this fraudulent corporation out of business very soon.
http://www.ipalawsuit.com
Mary
Winter Park, Florida
U.S.A.
4 Updates & Rebuttals
Disillusioned
Parma Heights,Ohio,
U.S.A.
You are not alone
#5UPDATE EX-employee responds
Mon, September 03, 2007
Your experience with IPA sounds very similar to mine. The company wows you with a lot of PR and has you believing that you are really helping small businesses. I was in their training class from May and within three months all but one person from our class had left IPA, many after one month or less. I posted my report under disillusioned.
Right now I am awaiting to find out whether I will be paid on a sale I made and the project ran when I was still employed with IPA. For a company that promises "to bring a small business to the cutting edge of technology", their own systems are still stuck in the 1980s. I have heard from other former IPA sales people that the company does not pay sales reps for sales made when they were employed, yet they terminated before the payroll cycle could pay the commission. I don't think that is legal. If you earned the commission, then you have to be paid it.
As far as their record with businesses, I can share with you a few comments from "experienced" IPA reps I had worked with during my period with IPA. I was working with a trainer and we were close to a restaurant I had sold a few months earlier that was a "go" for consulting. I suggested to this trainer that we could stop there for lunch and give them some business. His comments were "maybe not, perhaps he may do something to our lunches". I thought he was kidding, but he was dead serious. That had me wondering about the quality of IPA's consulting.
My "terrotory" was located about an hour from my home so running the "appointments" they set for me got to be rather expensive. Then I met the IPA rep who had the terrotory where I live. He lived just outside my territory and an hour away from his territory. He said that he liked it that way since he would not have to be doing business on a regular basis with the small businesses he sold with IPA.
He had been working with IPA for a couple of years so that gave me more cause for concern. I have been working for thirty years in outside sales and in my experience, I would want to be welcomed into any business where I had sold a product or service. I would want the business owner to be happy to see me and even offer a referral or two.
Since IPA is a privately held company, they can say anything they want regarding their revenues since there are no discosure requirements like a publically traded company. Knowing what I know now about IPA's modus operandi, I suspect that their books are as cooked as a thanksgiving turkey. I wonder how some of those people that have been with IPA any length of time could look at themselves in the mirror.
Disillusioned
Parma Heights,Ohio,
U.S.A.
You are not alone
#5UPDATE EX-employee responds
Mon, September 03, 2007
Your experience with IPA sounds very similar to mine. The company wows you with a lot of PR and has you believing that you are really helping small businesses. I was in their training class from May and within three months all but one person from our class had left IPA, many after one month or less. I posted my report under disillusioned.
Right now I am awaiting to find out whether I will be paid on a sale I made and the project ran when I was still employed with IPA. For a company that promises "to bring a small business to the cutting edge of technology", their own systems are still stuck in the 1980s. I have heard from other former IPA sales people that the company does not pay sales reps for sales made when they were employed, yet they terminated before the payroll cycle could pay the commission. I don't think that is legal. If you earned the commission, then you have to be paid it.
As far as their record with businesses, I can share with you a few comments from "experienced" IPA reps I had worked with during my period with IPA. I was working with a trainer and we were close to a restaurant I had sold a few months earlier that was a "go" for consulting. I suggested to this trainer that we could stop there for lunch and give them some business. His comments were "maybe not, perhaps he may do something to our lunches". I thought he was kidding, but he was dead serious. That had me wondering about the quality of IPA's consulting.
My "terrotory" was located about an hour from my home so running the "appointments" they set for me got to be rather expensive. Then I met the IPA rep who had the terrotory where I live. He lived just outside my territory and an hour away from his territory. He said that he liked it that way since he would not have to be doing business on a regular basis with the small businesses he sold with IPA.
He had been working with IPA for a couple of years so that gave me more cause for concern. I have been working for thirty years in outside sales and in my experience, I would want to be welcomed into any business where I had sold a product or service. I would want the business owner to be happy to see me and even offer a referral or two.
Since IPA is a privately held company, they can say anything they want regarding their revenues since there are no discosure requirements like a publically traded company. Knowing what I know now about IPA's modus operandi, I suspect that their books are as cooked as a thanksgiving turkey. I wonder how some of those people that have been with IPA any length of time could look at themselves in the mirror.
Disillusioned
Parma Heights,Ohio,
U.S.A.
You are not alone
#5UPDATE EX-employee responds
Mon, September 03, 2007
Your experience with IPA sounds very similar to mine. The company wows you with a lot of PR and has you believing that you are really helping small businesses. I was in their training class from May and within three months all but one person from our class had left IPA, many after one month or less. I posted my report under disillusioned.
Right now I am awaiting to find out whether I will be paid on a sale I made and the project ran when I was still employed with IPA. For a company that promises "to bring a small business to the cutting edge of technology", their own systems are still stuck in the 1980s. I have heard from other former IPA sales people that the company does not pay sales reps for sales made when they were employed, yet they terminated before the payroll cycle could pay the commission. I don't think that is legal. If you earned the commission, then you have to be paid it.
As far as their record with businesses, I can share with you a few comments from "experienced" IPA reps I had worked with during my period with IPA. I was working with a trainer and we were close to a restaurant I had sold a few months earlier that was a "go" for consulting. I suggested to this trainer that we could stop there for lunch and give them some business. His comments were "maybe not, perhaps he may do something to our lunches". I thought he was kidding, but he was dead serious. That had me wondering about the quality of IPA's consulting.
My "terrotory" was located about an hour from my home so running the "appointments" they set for me got to be rather expensive. Then I met the IPA rep who had the terrotory where I live. He lived just outside my territory and an hour away from his territory. He said that he liked it that way since he would not have to be doing business on a regular basis with the small businesses he sold with IPA.
He had been working with IPA for a couple of years so that gave me more cause for concern. I have been working for thirty years in outside sales and in my experience, I would want to be welcomed into any business where I had sold a product or service. I would want the business owner to be happy to see me and even offer a referral or two.
Since IPA is a privately held company, they can say anything they want regarding their revenues since there are no discosure requirements like a publically traded company. Knowing what I know now about IPA's modus operandi, I suspect that their books are as cooked as a thanksgiving turkey. I wonder how some of those people that have been with IPA any length of time could look at themselves in the mirror.
Disillusioned
Parma Heights,Ohio,
U.S.A.
You are not alone
#5UPDATE EX-employee responds
Mon, September 03, 2007
Your experience with IPA sounds very similar to mine. The company wows you with a lot of PR and has you believing that you are really helping small businesses. I was in their training class from May and within three months all but one person from our class had left IPA, many after one month or less. I posted my report under disillusioned.
Right now I am awaiting to find out whether I will be paid on a sale I made and the project ran when I was still employed with IPA. For a company that promises "to bring a small business to the cutting edge of technology", their own systems are still stuck in the 1980s. I have heard from other former IPA sales people that the company does not pay sales reps for sales made when they were employed, yet they terminated before the payroll cycle could pay the commission. I don't think that is legal. If you earned the commission, then you have to be paid it.
As far as their record with businesses, I can share with you a few comments from "experienced" IPA reps I had worked with during my period with IPA. I was working with a trainer and we were close to a restaurant I had sold a few months earlier that was a "go" for consulting. I suggested to this trainer that we could stop there for lunch and give them some business. His comments were "maybe not, perhaps he may do something to our lunches". I thought he was kidding, but he was dead serious. That had me wondering about the quality of IPA's consulting.
My "terrotory" was located about an hour from my home so running the "appointments" they set for me got to be rather expensive. Then I met the IPA rep who had the terrotory where I live. He lived just outside my territory and an hour away from his territory. He said that he liked it that way since he would not have to be doing business on a regular basis with the small businesses he sold with IPA.
He had been working with IPA for a couple of years so that gave me more cause for concern. I have been working for thirty years in outside sales and in my experience, I would want to be welcomed into any business where I had sold a product or service. I would want the business owner to be happy to see me and even offer a referral or two.
Since IPA is a privately held company, they can say anything they want regarding their revenues since there are no discosure requirements like a publically traded company. Knowing what I know now about IPA's modus operandi, I suspect that their books are as cooked as a thanksgiving turkey. I wonder how some of those people that have been with IPA any length of time could look at themselves in the mirror.