Complaint Review: Al Chiara Stanley Barber - San Jose California

The lack of professionalism and the incompetence that I experienced at this firm was so stunning that I have been viciously depressed for many months. Due to some health issues, aggravated by the treatment I received at Stanley Barber, I have not had the energy to address this issue until now.

If a friend (who received your services over 10 years ago) had not referred me, and if I had not been ill and extremely needy I would have started to question things at Stanley Barber right away. In fact, in our first meeting I was candid about how vulnerable I was; that I had post traumatic stress syndrome, low self-esteem and several health issues. I told Al I would not be able to work a full time job. In our first meetings Al was very sincere and friendly and told me he could find me a part-time job which paid more salary within 3 months. In addition, by stating that he might want to hire me himself, he managed to reverse our relationship so that I was unwilling to question or complain for the first few months. I now know that I am not the only person to have had this experience with him. RIPOFF Report has reports from others that have had very similar experiences.

Charlotte's incompetence, lack of support and outright defensiveness was stunning! When we were first introduced, I, with my gray hair, she, over a decade younger than me, said to me, well hello young lady. Again, my self-esteem was so low that I did not respond but it made me feel very badly about myself. Though I finished the PARS exercises in record time, I never received any feedback on it; I never got any feedback on anything I submitted to them. I never received the scored results of my Myers Briggs test. I had to give her my resume several times, over several weeks, before she could find it on her computer. I never had any evidence that she had actually studied my resume, for example: we'd been working on my resume for several weeks when she emailed me a draft revision showing a job I'd had 30 years ago as the first item on my resume. When I questioned her on this she agreed that it should not be on the resume, but never responded with a corrected version. Further, when I very politely questioned her on some other matters she was blunt, defensive and flatly denied my allegations her behavior was uncalled for and unprofessional. Working with Charlotte actually eroded my confidence rather than building it.

When I finally began to question Al about the way things were going with Charlotte he got very defensive, bordering on hostile. Soon thereafter I received a blunt email from Charlotte stating that Al would be working with me from that point forward. At this point I was not finished with the PARS, I did not have a finished resume nor did I have a job objective. At my first (and last) meeting with Al, he spent somewhere between 30 and 45 minutes with me he fidgeted with his computer and printed some job posting from an internet source which were not compatible with my skills or qualifications. He answered his phone several times, he got up and left the office several times and, in the end, left me with a piece of torn paper upon which he'd scribbled the names of 3 or 4 temporary job agencies that I should contact. He assured me that he knew people at these companies and that he would provide me with their names after I'd looked at their web sites.

I went home and finally looked him up on the internet and sure enough there were other people who had had very similar experiences with him. I realized that I'd been had.

His treatment of me contributed significantly to the debilitating depression I've been struggling with. I was vulnerable and he knew it and he took advantage of me.

Margo

San Jose, California

U.S.A.