Complaint Review: Salesteam1 - Nationwide

Fortis TCS was a client of mine a couple of years ago. They are an honorable company that has served many customers over the years to become a huge success in their specialized consulting service niche. They help manufacturers file for R&D and Export tax credits the Federal tax code allows. They have experts from the Big 3 accounting firms on staff that performed the same services for F500 clients for huge fees. Fortis made this same standard of service available to smaller companies. I can say right now that Fortis is one the most professional companies I have ever had the pleasure to work with, and maintains a lofty standard of integrity.

Their business is  highly regulated and they work alongside the IRS on a daily basis. If they failed to dot an 'i' the IRS would know about it. The IRS makes thousands of changes to the tax code and many affect Fortis. At the time of the post, that was happening. Pricing and commissions needed to be adjusted.

Fortis is a high-end service. If a prominent lawyer charges $1,000 an hour, some may find the price high. Others a bargain. You can't call the lawyer a crook because you only want to pay $100 an hour. Perhaps you get what you pay for?

In either case, for a failed rep to accuse me of an impropriety because of my client's pricing structure or policies is disingenuous. It is obvious the rep did not understand the business, as he was just getting started. All this anonymous rep had to do was make a phone call and ask for clarification. If he wanted to quit after that, fine. No need to make false accusations and slanderous remarks on the way out the door.

PAUL MUSH IS A SCUM BAG Worked a few deals for FORTIS TCS, the actual deal cycle and follow up on their work was very slow and poorly managed this lengthened the time to get paid - from weeks to months to seasons. I was not advised of tem holdoing fees on the initail payments until after the fact. Paul owes me money - he knows who I am, unless there are lots more of me's out here. Paul is not honest and his partner at FORTIS, Santosh actually led to a prospect I had brought to his attention. I have since been retained as an agent for a competitor and have begun the process to swap my clients over.

I would like thank whoever emailed me a link to this website. You have saved me from a waste of my time. Yesterday I used the links and educated myself on the services we sell, and the more I learned, the more I realized I was being duped. Take the following numbers taken from Trade & Industry Development magazine: Example for a Limited Liability Company with IC-DISC U.S. export sales $60 million Sales commission $2.4 million (4 percent of qualified export receipts) U.S tax reduction $840,000 (35 percent of $2.4 million) Income to Shareholders $2.4 million Tax on dividend $360,000 (15 percent capital gains rate) Tax savings $480,000 ($840,000 - $360,000) This was taken from this article: http://www.tradeandindustrydev.com/issues/article.aspx?ID=257 Above is an example of a company with sixty million in export sales. My commission on this deal would be $9,600, assuming a median 20% management fee to the client. So I asked myself How many private US companies export $60 million a year? Trust me. Not that many. How could the median annual commission on a deal possibly be $8,000? Then I reckoned In this same deal the good folks in Texas would have a been paid an annual commission of over $80,000. Why charge a separate up-front set up fee of $6,000, and not pay us 10% on this fee? Why not incorporate the set-up fee into the commission rate, or do away with it altogether if the commissions are so generous? None of this makes any sense. Then I asked myself What am I doing spending fifty hours a week (a) on a sales job that gives me no research support (b) on a job where the boss only works 3 hours a week (c) on a job where I assume all of the operating costs (d) on a job where I am forbidden to contact the other salespeople on my team (e) on a job where the service people get paid $6,000 up-front, yet the salespeople have to wait 3-6 months for their check!" These factors do not exist in other commission only jobs I have held. Then I asked myself What the heck am I doing here? Oh. And by the way Then I QUIT.

You want honesty? Go work at Walmart, and good luck finding it there. Paul is a salesman. Consider how much the guy speaks about being honest and telling the truth. No one talks this way but chronic BS'ers. Tell me, exactly how long ago did you posers fall off the turnip truck? Think about the pressure technique of telling companies there is only one slot remaining. We all know this is pure BS. Why would you expect any of the rest of it to be true? If this business was as profitable as claimed, would Paul be running sales teams for 3 other companies? Wouldn't he be spending his time running 4 sales teams for just this business. No matter what you may think of Paul, the guy's working to make money. On top of his other sales teams, Paul's launched two new businesses in the last several months: ((ROR redacted))) Does Paul spend more than three hours per week on our business, including phone conferences? Wouldn't he be doing so if the rewards were as great as he claimed? And wouldn't Steve invest in a phone system that didn't disconnect him every fifteen minutes? Here's the bottom line. You can make some money here if you have what it takes, though realistically it's a fraction of what's being touted. It shouldn't take you three to six months to figure out if you can manipulate a CEO, I got my first doc's in my second week. I've busted my a*s and turned in 9 studies in the last two months. Of these, two have been attractive to all parties, and I'll get almost nine grand total for them. 60K a year ain't bad for working in your Pajamas. CLICK here to see why Rip-off Report, as a matter of policy, deleted either a phone number, link or e-mail address from this Report.

Dear Colleague: Thank you for the link email you sent me. After doing some calculations using the links provided on this site I realized that companies needed huge export sales to be allowed the results we are telling them they will receive, and the commissions we are being told we will receive based on these results. We are being told that most manufacturers have never heard of IC-DISCS, yet the National Association of Manufacturers states that over 40% are currently using them! Take a look at some other reports I've found on Paul: http://blog.jwiz.org/archives/000617.html http://thenonbillablehour.typepad.com/nonbillable_hour/2004/04/why_ill_never_u.html Do you notice any similarities? 1. Strict confidence regarding our clients. We are mandated to keep information not only from prospective clients, but also from each other. What type of team building is this? Take a look at our competitors websites. Many of them list the company's they've helped, and some even provide contact information for these companies. Why don't we??? 2. It appears that high pressure (using scarcity) is the cornerstone of Paul's closing technique. Can one be a closer without it? I hope to hear from my other coworkers. As Paul also mandates that we are not to communicate directly with each other, this site is our best alternative. This site was easy to use and has a reputation for unyielding confidentiality. I've emailed several fellow RD's this link. Please pass it on to the rest of us. Should Paul have nothing to fear he would provide us with all the RD's phone numbers and email addresses and we could truly have an "Open Forum". This would keep any embarrassments off the web, and allow the entire team to benefit, not just Paul. Until this happens (don't hold your breath) I am thankful for this site.