Erictravelwriter
Abington,#2UPDATE EX-employee responds
Sun, January 25, 2009
Hello all, My name is Eric. I did work for MORGAN AND CHASE PUBLISHING based out of Medford, OR. I worked in the Eastern Pennsylvania area in the Philadelphia region (and surrounding Counties Bucks, Chester, Delaware, Montgomery, Lancaster, Adams. ) If you are reading this and I worked with you and did your story in the Pennsylvania area in the book that was to be titled "TREASURES OF EASTERN PENNSYLVANIA", I personally just want to say I am regretfully sorry about any aggravation this company (Morgan and Chase Publishing) may have caused you. If you are elsewhere in the US or Canada I apologize to you as well. Here is MY STORY which I feel you deserve to hear. I worked with this company nearly 2.5 years and HONESTLY I never had a problem with them. They were a pleasure to work for, I met MANY interesting and great business owners as well. I was hired as a Travel Writer and did my job thorough and well. Above all I was ALWAYS HONEST with every client I dealt with. I would like all people reading this in PA and elsewhere in the US and Canada to know that. We Travel Writers are/were always honest with you and NEVER HAD ANY INTENT TO LEAD YOU IN THE WRONG DIRECTION. Out of the blue one day in Sept or early Oct 2008 I received a call from a supervisor in OR. saying "the business is no longer SOLVENT and thank you for your work". I was UTTERLY SURPRISED. I said "what about the people (Clients) I dealt with?". They said they will be getting a letter as to the incompletion of the book". Now honestly I was not thinking about the deposits and the money that was paid in full by the clients who gave ME (representing the company) in GOOD FAITH money for their stories to be told through the book. However after a little while (3 weeks later) I did start thinking about it, and realized I had no idea what the company would do if they were to become "insolvent". My thought was they would HOPEFULLY refund any and all customers which they were holding funds of. I was told when I was working there that if a book WAS NOT PUBLISHED that the funds would be returned to the customer. Of course, in two years this situation never arose, so when it was asked to me on occasion I told my customers EXACTLY THAT, "that the funds would be returned to them if the book was never printed" because this is what was told to me. Getting back to the story...so about 3 weeks had passed since I was let go from the company and I started getting calls from some of my past clients that I had worked with over the prior year in the Philadelphia region. They asked me what company letter meant (because it was vague and didn't say how they were getting their funds back, only that they were insolvent and left guessing if they were or weren't getting it back). I said I never saw the letter however I was let go from the company. I tried to be AS HONEST as I could be with them, telling them what I knew, what happened to me because I was at a loss of information as well. Some were satisfied , others were Angry and some said they will deal with. I told all of them to call the company and see if they can get answers. I gave all the numbers I had and that was it. I also said if they paid via credit card to try and call their CC company and maybe it would be insured. I thought that it was HIGHLY SUSPICIOUS that the company just folded virtually overnight with me not being aware of any wrong doings. However, in lieu of the economy at present (Sept 2008- January 2009) it could be reasonable that they had "economic problems" but still that is no excuse for NO WARNING to me or my clientele with no prior contact via Morgan and Chase with us! I want to say that I was unaware of anything mischievous HOWEVER I am in defense of my clients and think if they did not/ or do not get their HARD EARNED MONEY RETURNED TO THEM then it's plain WRONG! Remember, I am just a Travel Writer (who worked for the company) and I wanted to tell you my end of the story. I do sympathize with you all. I want you to know that again, it is not the Travel Writer's fault. I do want to SINCERELY APOLOGIZE TO ALL OF YOU who got caught in the middle of this problem. My heart goes out to you all. Eric