Ali Baba
London,#2
Thu, September 17, 2009
I attended a group interview yesterday (16th Sept 09) and the context of the interview has already been mentioned; therefore, do not need to repeat it again.
I was offered a position at the academy and accepted. I mentioned the company to a friend, who said to have a look at this website and also found article in a Birmingham newspape via Goggle.
Naturally, I became concerned and called their number. Steven (not Steven Punn) did mention that the roles involve direct face-to-face sales, which is not what I was looking for in a job. During my conversation, he explained the details of the academy and job, although did contradicted what Steven Punn had said (re: Steven Punn talked about becoming managers). He understood my concern and why I would no longer be interested, his answers were straight forward and was helpful in the whole process.
My advice would be if they call about starting at the academy, speak to them about what has been written. If direct sales is for you, then attend the first day and see what it is like; however, it is not for me.
ToryTory
London,#3
Wed, September 16, 2009
I recently attended the interview day, I was told any late-comers would
not be allowed in the interview process, yet candidates were arriving
well after 11:30. I have been to some strange sales interviews, so am
aware they can be unorthodox; however, this was something else.
It was strange from the start. My profile was on totaljobs.co.uk and I
get a call at 16:30 about an interview the next day, which puzzled me
because I had not applied for any days and why they would call so late
for an interview the next morning. When in reception, the sales area
looked like a customer service centre, there was no staff buzz, staff
with no motivation and looked like people not earning lots of money.
I thought there would be personal interviews at the end and instead of
it being interviewed in a room on an individual basis, it was a few
questions asked in front of everyone. How do you find out about someone
by just asking a few questions.
We were told to bring our cv's and a passport-size photo, all the cv's
were put on a table on the side (on the left side of the room) but were
not looked at. Steven Pun just collected the cv's and just briefly
looked at them when asking every person to talk about themself. There
were some strong candidates and they had their interviews first,
probably so they that could not see that everyone is asked the same
nonsense questions.
Steven Pun talked about his apartment in Dubai not being ready because
of the recession and then latter on talks about how he has several
properties in Dubai.
The maths did not add up when he (Steven Pun) was talking about the pay
structure, in sales they do bull-s**t about over-target earnings, but
Steven was saying you can become a team leader of salespeople who earn
up to 147k within 8 weeks and earn 78k. Hello! Would I not want to be
a top salespeople instead. The figures were just made up as he went
along, why have potentially such a highly wage position but most of the
people with little or no sales experience.
Steven Pun talked about how he had problems with this speech when he
joined the company in 2004 and they helped him. If you look as this
link, http://www.linkedin.com/pub/steven-pun/13/77a/406, you can see he
had two degrees from English universities before joined XLN. This link
is very important, it shows he is not a director of XLN but of SP
Markerting, his own company and he worked for XLN since 2003 as a
franchise owner.
Steven's degree at Kent was very important, it covered 'employment law' and with this knowledge, he protects himself from unhappy employees.
On the journey home, thought about the whole strange process and
researched the company and Steven Pun. I am glad I did this because
when they called, i declined. If you go to Google's homepage, when you
type XLN 'XLN spam' and 'XLN complaint, 'XLN academy' are in the search
results. Why Ofcom has not stopped the company trading I do not know.
I wasteD four hours at the XLN office and 1.5 hours each way travel. That 7 hours could have been spent applying for jobs.
In addition, have at look at Steven's website, http://www.angelfire.com/pop2/stevenpun/home.html
Christian Nellemann
London,#4
Fri, September 11, 2009
It has been brought to my attention that some people may have been unfairly treated by some of our field sales franchisees.
If this is true then this is completely unacceptable to me and to XLN.
I want to make it clear that inappropriate people management has never been tolerated within XLN and never will be tolerated. I also want you to know that we have reviewed our field sales operation and have completely restructured it, so that we are now only using experienced people orientated trainers and managers, recruiting only experienced field sales staff and reengineering the recruitment, training and sales processes so that the whole team can feel informed and fairly valued.
We appreciate very much the feedback we have received from people who feel they have not been properly treated by the old training process.
As a responsible company we treasure our staffs that are the backbone of our organisation. We would never do anything to disadvantage them.
I would like to make it clear that my door is always open to anyone who has any concerns about XLN and if anyone has any specific complaints about how they have been treated then please feel free to contact me in writing at XLN Telecom Ltd, The Brewery Building, 69, Bondway, London SW8 1SQ or by email [email protected]
I especially want to hear if someone feels they have not been properly paid for the work they have carried out. If this is the case then I will personally make sure this situation is rectified.
XLN is a very successful company which has grown hugely over recent years because of the efforts of its staff who are properly and promptly rewarded.
XLN has an excellent reputation in the telecoms business, a reputation which has been hard earned and a reputation that XLN is determined to keep.
Very truly yours,
Christian Nellemann
Founder and Group CEO
Anonymous
London,#5Consumer Comment
Thu, July 16, 2009
I too wasted 5 hours of my life listening to the arrogant, yet persuasive, Steve Pun speak about the "wonderful" opportunities at the XLN Telecom Academy at 69 Bondway, Vauxhall, London. After enduring this marathon sales pitch with no food or water, I was nonetheless suspicious but couldn't understand what Mr Pun was gaining from what appeared to be an elaborate con. I got home and telephoned the number Steve had instructed us to ring. I was informed by Kelly Reed that "congratulations(!!)" I had the "job" and would be starting Monday. Still suspicious, I searched for XLN Telecom Academy on the internet and found this report. The missing pieces of the puzzle instantly fell into place. As soon as I read that the 8 week Academy consisted of cold-calling potential customers under the guise of "management training" I understood how Steve benefitted from his scam. This is obviously a pyramid scheme designed to exploit the unaware and obtain up to 8 weeks of their labour for free or slave labour prices. Eight weeks of recruiting customers for Steve with the impossible promise of a management position at the end of it. At no stage during Steve's 5 hour speech did he mention that his "management training" would consist of cold-calling potential customers. Think about it - Steve informed us that after two weeks in the academy we would be teaching a new recruit (someone beginning week one in the academy) what we had learnt in the previous two weeks. By week 8 we would be teaching up to 10 new recruits. ALL OF THESE NEW RECRUITS WOULD BE FOLLOWING THIS PATTERN - TEACHING OTHERS AFTER WEEK TWO - AND SO ON AND SO ON. Pretty soon you are talking about hundreds and hundreds of people going through this scheme. It is obviously impossible for the "management position" to ever eventuate for such a large number of people. I totally agree with the above report. I thank the writer of the report for sharing their story and allowing me to avoid wasting any more than 5 hours of my life with Mr Pun. Avoid Steve Pun, SP Marketing Limited, and Xln Telecom Academy like the plague.
Anonymous
London,#6Consumer Comment
Thu, July 16, 2009
I too wasted 5 hours of my life listening to the arrogant, yet persuasive, Steve Pun speak about the "wonderful" opportunities at the XLN Telecom Academy at 69 Bondway, Vauxhall, London. After enduring this marathon sales pitch with no food or water, I was nonetheless suspicious but couldn't understand what Mr Pun was gaining from what appeared to be an elaborate con. I got home and telephoned the number Steve had instructed us to ring. I was informed by Kelly Reed that "congratulations(!!)" I had the "job" and would be starting Monday. Still suspicious, I searched for XLN Telecom Academy on the internet and found this report. The missing pieces of the puzzle instantly fell into place. As soon as I read that the 8 week Academy consisted of cold-calling potential customers under the guise of "management training" I understood how Steve benefitted from his scam. This is obviously a pyramid scheme designed to exploit the unaware and obtain up to 8 weeks of their labour for free or slave labour prices. Eight weeks of recruiting customers for Steve with the impossible promise of a management position at the end of it. At no stage during Steve's 5 hour speech did he mention that his "management training" would consist of cold-calling potential customers. Think about it - Steve informed us that after two weeks in the academy we would be teaching a new recruit (someone beginning week one in the academy) what we had learnt in the previous two weeks. By week 8 we would be teaching up to 10 new recruits. ALL OF THESE NEW RECRUITS WOULD BE FOLLOWING THIS PATTERN - TEACHING OTHERS AFTER WEEK TWO - AND SO ON AND SO ON. Pretty soon you are talking about hundreds and hundreds of people going through this scheme. It is obviously impossible for the "management position" to ever eventuate for such a large number of people. I totally agree with the above report. I thank the writer of the report for sharing their story and allowing me to avoid wasting any more than 5 hours of my life with Mr Pun. Avoid Steve Pun, SP Marketing Limited, and Xln Telecom Academy like the plague.