Complaint Review: Primerica - Oak Brook Illinois

So, I received a call a couple days ago from a woman named Jamie offering me a management position. First a little background on myself to summarize why the red flags didn't go up initially.

I'm a 23 year old Business major at NIU with a wife and child. I got out of the Air Force (active duty) last year and have been able to afford my current situation from savings/MGIBill/parents help while in school. Now that I'm within a year of graduating, I have recently been looking for a job in the lending/banking/finance industry and as such have posted my resume online. I should also mention that in high school I worked at the CME (Chicago Merchantile Exchange) and CBOT (Chicago Board of Trade) and while both positions were strictly "helper" roles, I did gain a great deal of financial literacy which, primarily persuaded me towards my current ambitions.

That being said, when a seemingly HR rep from a subsidiary of Citi called (that was the first thing she mentioned, Citi) about management positions in my area and that they were looking for a business/military background I thought "great". I asked a variety of questions, the first of which is probably most important in the lending/insurance industry. "Do you sell only Citi policies or how many other policies do you have access to?"... This, of course, was met with evasiveness explaining that questions were going to be reserved for the "orientation" and that she didn't "have time to give the specifics over the phone". I thought this was particularly odd, especially after she had spent the last 10 minutes asking me trivial questions about my background/family situation, etc.

My primary reason for wanting to get into the lending/mortgage industry is to get outside of my "comfort zone". I believe a sales background/experience is essential for a career in business. That being said, I don't--under any circumstance--wish to push bogus product on unsuspecting consumers.

These threads have been extremely helpful in alarming me to Crimerica, and I'd like to thank you all for taking the time to post. To be completely honest, the first flag for me (prior to reading this site) was the fact that it was Citi as the parent company. Not the fact that Citi uses questionable business models and practices--unfortunately many companies do that--it was the fact that Citi's largest shareholder is Saudi Prince Alwaleed bin Talal is their biggest shareholder. Furthermore, the Saudi Royal family has a firm hand in all of Citi's business dealings. Read below.

An excerpt taken from Forbes magazine:

"In America's war on terror, cutting off the financial flow to the bad guys is a key goal. But it is a particularly elusive one. Even when a patriotic U.S. bank spots something suspicious, it may be hard-pressed to do much about it.

And so it is that Citigroup, the world's largest financial institution, finds itself confronting the fact that a bank it partly owned and managed in Saudi Arabia may have funneled thousands of dollars to terror groups and to the families of Palestinian suicide bombers--at the behest of the Saudi royal family.

The allegations involve Saudi American Bank, also known as Samba, the Riyadh-based affiliate in which Citi had a 20% stake. In late 2002 Samba was added as a defendant in a federal lawsuit filed by relatives of Sept. 11 victims against prominent Saudis and charities to which they appeared to be connected. The suit, prosecuted by Washington, D.C. lawyer Allan Gerson, among others, alleges that Samba "participated in the fundraising campaign in Saudi Arabia for collecting donations to the heroes" of the Palestinian uprising." END

Now, I hardly wish to turn this thread into a political debate (although I have a bad history of this). However, were you ever in Saudi Arabia and witnessed their "culture" first hand, where friday night town square executions are as popular as high school football in Texas, you may feel differently. Had you been on Honor Guard in the armed forces and had to perform a massive influx of military funerals over the past few years, you'd probably feel different. Were you to lose close friends, or maybe they just lost a limb or two, you may feel differently.

Citi's close ties to Saudi and, subsequently terrorism, is an issue up to the individual who is employed by them on a moral level. In my opinion, at least in this context, guilt by association is still guilt indeed. I, for one, want nothing to do with them regardless of them being the "biggest financial institution". If your integrity is for sale though, by all means go for it.

Aside from this issue is the fact that while not every Primerica agent has fraudulent intentions, the prerequisite for success almost exclusively requires this. Citi's policies, premiums, rates, etc., like any other institution, are only the best possible for a small market of consumers. As such, pushing one product in the manner that it benefits just about everyone is purely misleading and borderline criminal. However, due to their expedited education on lending and financial practices, Primerica agents are not always privy to this. While Primerica is ultimately at fault, ignorance does not excuse an individual from screwing people. There ARE good people at Primerica, however, they leave within 6 months after realizing the ONLY way to make money is to misrepresent information. For example, for home refinancing this is a general example of what Primerica does.

The agent looks over the principle, interest rate and monthly payments of the prospective client and pushes a "bi-weekly" payment refinancing. In doing so, the consumer pulls equity out of the house and, paying a higher interest rate, ends up paying a slightly lower monthly rate. How, do you ask? On most mortgage loans, property taxes and loan fees are tagged to the monthly payment. Primerica conveniently disassociates these from the monthly payment, thereby lowering the monthly payments. The consumer, after a year or so, gets a letter in the mail by their respective municipality indicating that their property taxes for the year are due. For those of you who own homes, you know this is not a small sum. Any way you cut it, this is absolute fraud without full disclosure. And, while some Primerica agent will assuredly respond to this email saying the opposite, the point is that under full disclosure NOBODY would take this offer.

In case you are wondering, I am currently interviewing for a few positions in loan origination/officer for companies that do, in fact, offer a variety of lender options to the consumer and as such are provided the means to offer the consumer the BEST AVAILABLE rate, not push an individual product that might be suitable for 1% of the population and say it fits everybody's needs.

My interview/"business orientation" is scheduled for tomorrow morning. Since I live 20 miles away and a recent increase in driving expenses, I've decided not to go and distribute this information to the others this lady called up. However, I am going to call her and give her a piece of my mind. I find this misrepresentation particularly offensive because my wife and I are on a tight budget--both being college students. While I know I shouldn't take it personally, it is frustrating that they are allowed to do this. If I want a "Financial Needs Analysis" or want insurance, going to a Primerica agent is comparable to going to a doctor who never went to medical school. Good luck with that. I will repost with any pertinent information regarding my upcoming conversation with "Jamie the Regional Vice President". Absolutely Ridiculous.

Greg

Aurora, Illinois
U.S.A.

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