LIBERTY LEAGUE AND COSTAL VACATIONS!
This update article about Liberty League and Coastal Vacations Prompted By:
1. Complaints – after several stack up it is time to go to press. I hate handling a lot of complaints so the easy answer is to go to your Attorney General in the State you live in (see the report below) and the Attorney General in the State they operate in. It is easy you can use the same complaint letter. Unless the state goes nuts like Oklahoma below and goes after the throat of the company you should get your money back from the company (who does not want trouble). Pop $6000-$7000 for a seminar? The law really gets attentive. No returns on complaints = deadly!
2. A conversation with a friend in Oklahoma. It seems the Securities Division (who handles pyramids and biz opps) in Oklahoma chased down 30 people who has joined a company that charged over a $1000 pop to play. The reason they interrogated the 30? To find out if anybody had bought the package without the expectation of making money. Of course none of them had. Wow…. Handcuffs time… Certainly no respect for the training! = ripoff.
3. To let you know why these things do not last. Some 23 states have biz opp laws that say you can’t charge over $500 (South Dakota $200) for a biz opp (yes Aussie 2 Ups are big time biz opps). Not a problem if the company registers with those 23 states and puts up a bond. However since a full disclosure and description of the business must be given… Aaaah not too many would make it!
4. By the way if you wonder who buys all those $5 pre-qualified leads it is folks from companies like this with a big front end pop around a $1000 dollars! If they bag one sucker a day that works out to $20,000 a month. For Global Prosperity, ProStep even had phone operators pre-calling and qualifying those leads 24 hours a day. Good leads bag a $1000 before lunch and take the rest of the day off!!
5. Personally I dislike the 2UP because it steals the first two good prospects from the newbies warm market. Since at best a newbie signs up 2.3-2.6 people, the trainer just tore the guts out of the newbie making money. It is made for hard sell hard phone scammy folks who like a $1000 a day to live on and are not adverse to screwing a newbie. Great teamwork huh?
5. By the way Coastal Vacations and Liberty League both say they are not MLM's. Wrong in about 13 states where the MLM law says if you induce another person into a business opportunity it falls under MLM law. I guess Coastal Vacations and Liberty League only tell a 1/4 lie about !!
6. Let us hope that we can say goodbye to Coastal Vacations and Liberty League. We need more good people (newbies) in MLM. We don't need them getting shafted in Aussie 2 UPs!
COASTAL VACATION RIP OFF REPORT
Ed Note: Costal Vacations has been ripping people off for years. I first wrote about them in 1996 in the MLM Insider Magazine. There is an article here on the MLMWatchDog site. The article in 1996 was about the Alabama AG hitting them. Since then I am pretty sure the owner moved to Florida and has a bunch of dumb henchmen out front so he can avoid THE LAW Here is a recent report.
Fellow Warriors,
I‘ve had very bad experiences with a company that is being marketed with at least one top marketer here and I want to at least share my experiences with this company and complaint case numbers, because it was also in my own signiture link until recently, and I don’t want anyone else mistakenly thinking that it’s a good company - -at least from my point of view.
Note these could just be my unique experiences with the company is question, Coastal Vacations, under the name of several other entities but all having travel vacation packages beginning around $1,295. It says it is not MLM, because it offers the Aussie 2-tier or something along those lines. But as simply a retail purchase, here is what I’ve found:
1. When I decided to test their marketing packages for what they call “Directors,” one main Coastal website seller turned out to sell me a site with misleading automation that supposedly “tracked every visitor, giving me their name and email address & phone number” - -right. Never happened. When I asked about this, I was ignored until the Better Business Bureau helped them reply to me. The company in question said that this technology does not exist and that everyone should know that. (I didn’t, so guess I’m not a techno-geek or something). Anyway, this company did refund my total payment and even reworded their business site after prompting from the Attorney General’s Office and Better Business Bureau.
2. The one so-called “approved” Coastal Vacations’ business online who does lease sites and offer other services and products to Directors via
http://www.coanetwork.com/coastal seriously lied to me to get me to order products and services that were NOT at all what they’d said over the phone, nor what they faxed nor what they postal-mailed me about. What I was supposed to get for my $$ and what I actually received were very different - - like sites that would not allow me to edit the products that I wanted to show (for example, I only wanted to show a Level 1 package and was told in writing, on the phone, etc. that this was what I would get but never did. Instead my site with MY contact info sold very much higher packages that I cannot even order which would force sales elsewhere or of course ME to purchase at thousands more, their packages myself via a licensed Director (& giving this Director my 1st 2 sales afterwards - --duh!!!!!!!!)
3. Further testing of my own retail package, which I should have done BEFORE trying to resell, proved that it was worthless garbage, again in my opinion and to me. There were zero, let me repeat, zero activated membership cards at all in the package. I had to jump more hoops and send in $10 to have these beauties sent separately. Plus I’ve yet to find any value in them - like the Roadside Assistance - - there is NO assistance with this card that I found. If I call, they will find companies willing to make a deal to SELL me services at a discounted rate - - right - -while I’m stranded somewhere, like I could call and compare! I’m sticking with AAA, thank you. They INCLUDE services for the price –duh.
And the half-off / discounted cards for all kinds of hotels, food, theme parks, etc. are junk. I live right outside the capitol city of Ohio and there is like 3 “restaurants” in this directory - - and 1 is a cookie making shop (some Dining establishment, huh??) Again, AAA offers much better tickets and deals and no hoop jumping.
4. Finally, last but BIGGEST - -get this: I was NOT allowed to book any travel from my travel package with over 25 trips, because – don’t laugh: I’m married and want to travel alone. (I’m a freelance writer & do this frequently, hence my interest in this package - -but am happily married to a hubby who runs his business in Ohio and doesn’t travel). Married people HAVE to have spouses travel with them. Period. Thought I was in the USA, but must be the Middle East or something….
Anyway, Warriors, please be alert that NOT all speakers at these big marketing events announced by fellow Warriors and linked as affiliates / selling programs (unfortunately even in my own links) are worth your time and effort. The hosts at these events are probably very much unaware, too. And the resellers may be like me and NOT have tested their wares first - - -major error!!!
So look out for your own company and test, test, test things.
If anyone was mislead by my link, I sincerely apologize and do honestly continue testing my own affiliate / jv deals and announce troubling ones like this as soon as I can.
Again, this was my own personal experience with Coastal Vacations, so this only represents my side. Here are case numbers & complaint info on my Coastal dealings for reference (so far most $$ has been refunded):
1. Ohio Better Business Bureau: Complaint #: 1339515, Complaint #: 1346544
2.Ohio Attorney General's Office: Complaint No. 246865
3. NJ Attorney General's Office: OCP Complaint Form ( -Reply)
Date: Mon, 05 Jan 2004 16:51:39 -0500
4. Attorney General Florida Office
5. Chase VISA and Paypal have active complaints on file, too.
