Complaint Review: IPA International Profit Association

Received a boiler room call and decided to spend the $300 for a consultation. An analyst came in on a Monday and took up our entire day asking loads of personal questions. Came back Tuesday for more "consultations". He was very smooth and gained our trust by subtle compliments (or blew smoke).

Convinced us that we were in dire shape and made many assurances that without his company's help we would be hard pressed to make a go of our business.
We decided to try the first phase of his program which would be "around" $3000. When asked if it could be more, he was very evasive. When asked how we would be able to pay, he assured us that for every dollar we invested in his services, we would get a return of at least three times. He never explained how that would happen. We were informed that a project manager would be in the next morning (Wednesday). When asked how much the plane fare would be (we were responsible for it) he replied a couple of hundred dollars. "We fly a lot and get very good fares."

We were surprised that this manager would be at our place of business so quickly and became a little concerned. We were assured that they needed to start helping us at once.

In spite of our now good friend's assurances we decided to investigate his company a little bit further on the web. We had already accessed their web site and was foolishly impressed.

In investigating, we came across this site and realized we had made a major mistake. Immediately the same evening (Tuesday) we faxed the IPA office and cancelled our contract. In addition, we contacted the "analyst" who was at a nearby hotel. He was unhappy that there were negative items on the web but said he would be in to our place of business the following morning because we owed him the $300.

The following morning he came in and took the check for the consultation. An hour later the project manager came back with an invoice for $3600 and change. We were billed for 10 hours of their project manager's services (which we never got), plus airfare of $1000 and various other sundry charges!!!

Their contract stated that we could cancel anytime at the end of the business day, which we did. Their contract stated it would start on that Wednesday and we cancelled on Tuesday.

These guys are smooth and we feel fortunate we didn't allow them into our place of business on that Wednesday.

DON'T GET TAKEN BY THEM. They are ponsies.

We expect nasty calls and will handle them but they are horrible people. DON'T ALLOW THEM TO TAKE YOU TOO.

Goldie
Hartford, Connecticut
U.S.A.