Complaint Review: IPA-IBA / International Profit Associates

Our experience with IPA reads almost verbatim to the others already posted by other small businesses.

We received a phone call that a representative from IPA would be in the area and would like to set up a meeting to analyze our company. During that meeting just one person arrived and it was a short meeting to set up another person to come out to conduct a preliminary survey.

Now where I've seen others were quoted $300-450 for this service we actually wrote a check for $950. This man was well dressed appeared to be a professional. He arrived at our office and spent a full day and then part of a second day "analyzing" our companies A/R, A/P, P&L and Tax Returns for the last 3 years. He typed all of the information into his laptop and made a lot of nice charts to look at. He talked in analogies most of the time. He made it very clear that things were going well for the company but we just didnt know how to use the percentages to our advantage.

He used tax strategy as a selling point and employee benefit programs as the incentive. He said what we would save in taxes would cover the cost of IPA's consultants. He made sure to emphasize that they were not cheap but they would make great improvements in the companies profits.

He left on a Friday and we were set up to have our "team" arrive on Monday morning. About 1pm on Friday we changed our mind and called IPA's corportate office to inform them we did not want to continue their service at this time. We canceled the appointment with the person from IPA's office during that phone call.

On Monday morning 3 people showed up (we originally were told 2 people) 1 was a tax advisor from ITA. Our company President informed the "Team" that we had canceled their services. The Project Manager insisted that he just hear them out. Our office Manager had to be called in from a regular day off to assist in providing once again, the A/R, A/P, P&L, Balance sheets and Tax returns for the last 3 years. The Tax adviser also asked for returns for the corporate officers. The tax adviser stayed probably a total of 4 hours and left with a check for $4922 (his services, travel and meals). The project manager spent a lot of time walking back and forth asking for reports and talking to employees. The Senior Project Manager
sat at his laptop the entire time inputing information. At the end of the first day and without a lot of confidence in the results.

On Tuesday morning we informed the first IPA consultant to arrive that we were canceleing service. He insisted on waiting until the project manager arrived, an hour and a half later. We she was informed that we were canceling service she became upset and produced a bill for over $8,000 for the previous day (for 2 people). When we refused to pay she then called her corporate office and asked us to speak to that person who insisted we had to pay for the first day as well as that day because you have to cancel by 5pm the day before. At that point she then produced a bill for almost $10,000, which included both days.

Needless to say they were asked to leave immediately, they did not get a check and we are now looking for an attorney to handle the impending lawsuit they are threatening our company with.

Ron
Tracy, California
U.S.A.