Complaint Review: Suddenvalues.com - Wenatchee Nationwide

Lies, lies and more lies. How can you tell when someone connected with U.S. Online Corp. is lying? Their lips are moving.

It takes only a minute to log on to www.suddenvalues.com and begin looking up the abandoned sites. Try Parker CO. Try Colorado Springs. What is an orphan site or an abandoned site. It is proof that someone paid U.S. Online for the rights to work in an exclusive territory and most likely paid for and completed the training and went to work to achieve success. Why would a territory be abandoned? Because either the individual who paid for their "office" as some connected with SuddenValues like to call it and paid for their training to work in their exclusive territory struggled and failed or the other possibility is that Steve Klock the CEO of U.S. Online and SuddenValues.com rescinded the "dealers" rights to continue working with Suddenvalues and took the Keys to Success away from the dealer. This happened in my case on September 20th of this year and I was one of the more successful new dealers in the U.S.

So what I am lead to believe is that inorder to generate cash flow, Steve Klock and the recruiters at SuddenValues churn "dealers". I am not sure churn is the appropriate term but I think this shoe fits how U.S. Online aka SuddenValues does business. It poses as a franchise ( sells you rights to a territory, establishes all the trade dress required to participate in the program and charges a fixed minimum monthly fee of $500 a month to continue participation with SuddenValues.com ) I think by definition the business opportunity that U.S. Online offers is a franchise. I also believe that what is done in fact whether by intention or not is an illegal "Pyramid Scheme". The definition of a Pyramid Scheme included the proposition that the company representing a "legitimate business opportunity" is earning a major portion of its income from recruiting and by charging a training fee. The reason why many companies do not use the franchise model on a national scale is that it is very complicated and costly to complete the legal requirements to registar as a franchise in each state.

In December of 2009 Steve Klock and his staff created a new dealer agreement. By the terms of this agreement everyone in the current dealer network would not qualify as meeting the quotas required by the terms of the contract yet, Mr. Klock uses the quota requirement as valid reason to terminate anyone he wishes to terminate. I have evidence in the form of an monthly email that Mr. Klock sends to every current dealer that shows how many people achieve the required quotas. Because these are his facts I do not wish to reveal number but let's just say than 99% of the dealers fail to sign 5 new advertising clients to an annual agreement. ( Renewals do not count in order to fill the terms of the contract requiring 5 new accounts per month.) Now ask yourself this question: if you are an independent contractor as opposed to being an employee of SuddenValues.com are you bound by quotas? Yes all new dealers since December 2009 signed a contract that indicated the quota requirement but we were all told by recruitiers that those quotas were only included in the contract as a way to get rid of someone who is under-performing.

sorry to hear you got burned. I think the BBB file sums it up nicely:

Lies, lies and more lies. How can you tell when someone connected with U.S. Online Corp. is lying? Their lips are moving.

It takes only a minute to log on to www.suddenvalues.com and begin looking up the abandoned sites. Try Parker CO. Try Colorado Springs. What is an orphan site or an abandoned site. It is proof that someone paid U.S. Online for the rights to work in an exclusive territory and most likely paid for and completed the training and went to work to achieve success. Why would a territory be abandoned? Because either the individual who paid for their "office" as some connected with SuddenValues like to call it and paid for their training to work in their exclusive territory struggled and failed or the other possibility is that Steve Klock the CEO of U.S. Online and SuddenValues.com rescinded the "dealers" rights to continue working with Suddenvalues and took the Keys to Success away from the dealer. This happened in my case on September 20th of this year and I was one of the more successful new dealers in the U.S.

So what I am lead to believe is that inorder to generate cash flow, Steve Klock and the recruiters at SuddenValues churn "dealers". I am not sure churn is the appropriate term but I think this shoe fits how U.S. Online aka SuddenValues does business. It poses as a franchise ( sells you rights to a territory, establishes all the trade dress required to participate in the program and charges a fixed minimum monthly fee of $500 a month to continue participation with SuddenValues.com ) I think by definition the business opportunity that U.S. Online offers is a franchise. I also believe that what is done in fact whether by intention or not is an illegal "Pyramid Scheme". The definition of a Pyramid Scheme included the proposition that the company representing a "legitimate business opportunity" is earning a major portion of its income from recruiting and by charging a training fee. The reason why many companies do not use the franchise model on a national scale is that it is very complicated and costly to complete the legal requirements to registar as a franchise in each state.

In December of 2009 Steve Klock and his staff created a new dealer agreement. By the terms of this agreement everyone in the current dealer network would not qualify as meeting the quotas required by the terms of the contract yet, Mr. Klock uses the quota requirement as valid reason to terminate anyone he wishes to terminate. I have evidence in the form of an monthly email that Mr. Klock sends to every current dealer that shows how many people achieve the required quotas. Because these are his facts I do not wish to reveal number but let's just say than 99% of the dealers fail to sign 5 new advertising clients to an annual agreement. ( Renewals do not count in order to fill the terms of the contract requiring 5 new accounts per month.) Now ask yourself this question: if you are an independent contractor as opposed to being an employee of SuddenValues.com are you bound by quotas? Yes all new dealers since December 2009 signed a contract that indicated the quota requirement but we were all told by recruitiers that those quotas were only included in the contract as a way to get rid of someone who is under-performing.

Well to make it short and sweet here is my suggestion.

If you are in marketing or have a degree, good at cold calling, being rejected then this might work for you. There are many other programs out there that we had to compete with like Fish Bowl and Constant Contact.

With the economy the way it is business owners are looking twice at  where they spend their money.

It takes alot of leg work and ambition to succeed. If I had  know I need more knowledge in the marketing end I would have passed on this.

Their training was great and I learned alot from that but I just couldn't make it work out.

You as the owner of your territory did your own e-mail programs. The company would do them for you for a price.

I feel they should have a ride along program to see it first hand that it is hard. The rewards will be good if you can wait out the economy.

For me it was the fear of colding calling and rejection that did me in.

In response to Chuck, the company does not publish the names of the so-called "abandoned markets" so we can only assume that those that lost money simply left the market without reporting to this website. Some markets are doing well. You can determine that by the listing of clients listed per market. Others seem to be performing dismally. I decided to abandon ship before getting to deep into the doo doo

In regards to Steve's comments about SuddenValues' dealer opportunity being less than advertised, I find it interesting that out of 225 territories (growing to 400 soon) that you'll find SuddenValues, that there is not one other such "rip-off" report or scam reference on this website! Could this be the same "Steve" that wanted to sell SuddenValues using his own methods, rather than following the proven plan used by those successful dealers? I'm a dealer for SuddenValues also and can say without hesitation that the SuddenValues opportunity is a good one for those who can prospect and work the plan. Yes, it helps to have a marketing background. Yes, it helps to realize that success is DIRECTLY tied to individual efforts. The support is outstanding from corporate and the development of new tools and technical advances will only make this opportunity stronger as the company continues to grow.

How long were you selling Sudden values.com? Did you go to their training class? Any other feedback would be most appreciated.