SCAM ALERT: Stay away from this well-organized "Business Partner" Scam!

SCAM ALERT: How many of you fell/seen someone fall into the well-organized “Business Partner” Scam?

These people call their close friends and relatives and say, “Hey I am running a business”. After some weeks they will say, “We have a position open in our business and if you want I can recommend you”.

Then they call the candidate for an interview at some hotel, and where they try to find business compatibility, & ask questions like, “How much you can invest in this business?”

If the candidate falls into the trap and invests 2-3 Lakh, sooner or later they will become like others, trying to lure others into this so-called business.

Their ideal candidates are young adults who are currently unemployed, and are from the lower middle class or even poorer. Sometimes they extract 40-50k from some poor guy and vanish.

Mostly their business model is MLM Scheme (Multi-Level-Marketing) where the more users a people bring into the system under his referral, who directly pays money to his/her referee, the more the person earns.

Once someone already pays a huge sum of money and realizes it’s just a trap, they have no other ways but to resort to the same process of making others fool by asking them to invest money.

Over time, this process becomes so streamlined, and it converts so well, that they continue to do it and earn money.

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Characteristics of their business: (they can vary, but is mostly similar)

  • They are operating without any office. No registration. If asked they will say, it’s business under sole proprietorship.

  • They take an interview for an open position as if its an employment but then asks for investment as if its a business.

  • They always call for an interview in some hotel or cafeteria. They tell the candidate to come in blazer/suits and formals (even with color codes) for the interview. They also suggest the candidate read entrepreneur books like ‘Rich Dad Poor Dad’.

  • The investment generally happens in the form of a cheque written off to the other person directly, instead of some company name.

  • If asked what’s their work, they say they work with various brands, manages their overall business growth, development, and product supply. For example, Kent RO, Panasonic, Sharp.

  • They will say the entire work is online. It’s like a side business for them, daily 2-3 hour investment is more than enough.

  • They will say it’s a 4-5 year of hard work then you can earn huge. Some of their “seniors” are earning 30-50 Lakhs per month.

  • They will occasionally conduct business meetings and conferences at different hotels.

  • You’ll find them showing off their luxurious life on social media. They will share pics from conference rooms, hotel lobbies, restaurants, and especially swimming pools and/or golf clubs.

  • They will also do an annual trip to either Dubai or Thailand, can even book a full flight if the team is large. They will say it’s for their international conference. (Shows how big scale they operate)

  • They will post motivational posts on social media, for example, “Life has given me everything”, “Forever grateful for this independent lifestyle” etc etc.

  • Overall their company has no names, no websites, no communications via emails, everything is verbal, either f2f or telephonic.

  • They always target their friends and relatives because their modus operandi is the ‘trust factor.’ It’s very easy to convert friends and relatives and lure them into it. It sounds very harsh, but it’s the truth!

If you suddenly discover similar characteristics from your close friends or relatives, just stay away from them. This thing is running openly even in 2021.

They don’t get caught for two reasons:

  1. Someone who has already given a huge sum of money becomes desperate to earn it back and becomes like them only.

  2. Someone who has sensed trouble and moved away without any investments, does not have any real proof against them. Also, they keep no records, no emails, or written proofs.

Can’t disclose more details for obvious reasons. You can follow this FinTalks Facebook Group Thread to hear similar experiences from our other members. Check it out. :wink:

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