I live in Schaumburg, IL and I was a victim of the Integrity Program LLC Magazine Rip Off on September 13, 2007. A very well spoken, clean cut young man representing himself as Tim, a senior from Schaumburg High School, came to our door selling books for a fundraiser to help him and fellow students go to London England to perform Phantom of the Opera. He said his theater group was rehearsing to perform it here and offered us a CD of their local performance. The concept was he would sell us books from Barnes & Noble which were to be donated to children's hospitals. Barnes & Noble would reimburse us 90% of the cost within seven days and use it as a tax write off. We thought it was a double win, the high school kids get their trip and experience of a lifetime and sick kids in hospitals get something to educate, brighten their day and show that someone cares. We would get nothing but satisfaction, so okay, a triple win and we met a really nice kid to boot.
Very encouraging in today's world. We were even given a name and phone number for the person at Barnes & Noble who handled this program, should we have any questions. Tim said he lived down the street and had relatives in the neighborhood. Some of the books were musically oriented, a passion of my wife, "and of his." We bought eight books at $432, a little steep, but all included CDs or DVDs. We needed to write two checks because of some rule pertaining to the purchase.
We were also told that his mother was making him do some kind of chore for all who bought anything to demonstrate his appreciation and to really earn this trip. He eagerly offered to come back and help with work in the back yard. He was very engaging, and told us what his parents did and asked what we did. He talked about college plans. He even said he'd pray for us after I revealed that my wife's mother had recently been diagnosed with Parkinson's disease.
After he left, We started to feel like something was not quite right. He was just a little bit too much, but we hoped he had represented himself honestly. My wife looked up the site on the Internet and thought it looked legit. Still uneasy, the next morning she looked up info on Schaumburg High School's web site and found things did not seem to jive. I called the head of the music department and was informed we had been scammed. I then called the phone number Tim gave us, only to find it was real, but not the person he said. Next, I called Harris Bank and discussed our options with a manager. She explained how checks are processed and even though I could let it go thru and cancel within 24 hours of it getting to Harris, recommended I do two stop payments now for $30 each check, a total of $60, because considering the amounts of the checks, it was too risky for us if I missed it.
My idea was to find who was processing these checks and what institution they were using. A stop payment causes the check to only go as far as the Federal reserve and then get returned to the cashing institution. I was informed that although Harris Bank and I could not have access to this, the police could. After talking to my bank, we googled "Integrity Program" and found the bad news that many others had been victimized. Next, I called our Schaumburg Police to report the scam. They said no check had been cashed yet, so no fraud was done.
I said it would be, and they could get info from the Federal Reserve Bank to prove it. They said since I put a stop payment, I was not not out anything. I said that it cost us $60 and I wanted to try to prevent others form going thru this, if possible. I was told I could go down to the police station and file a report, but they would not do any follow up on it. I asked if that meant the report would just go into a drawer and stay there with nothing else being done and no one would gain any protection from this kind of activity. I was told that that was correct.
I feel like we have been triple scammed, first by Tim and Integrity Program who trains people like Tim (he was an excellent student too), second by my Harris Bank, to whom we have given considerable business for as long as they have been there and of whom we have never asked something like this before ($60 is beyond excessive even for a non-client, but for long standing customer, it is outrageous), and third by my Schaumburg Police department who are there to serve and protect, but will do nothing to prevent others in my village from being similarly victimized. They suggested I tell my neighbors, of which we have over 75,000. Unless other towns are different, people are fooling themselves if they think a police report will help others. Calling the Police for this in Schaumburg apparently does not accomplish anything except to waste one's time. Although I had to ask, I suppose I should be grateful that my police at least told me the truth, even if it is not very commendable.
It is so sad that things are the way they are today and so disillusioning when we need to believe in the good of people. It forces me to be someone I do not want to be. Trust, honesty, integrity, and compassion are a thing of the past, while distrust, greed, dishonesty and laziness are becoming dominant in the present.
By the way, we even have Tim's picture. He is agent # 1295. They proudly post many of them on their web site: http://www.integritypgm.com/team.asp
Tim's is the first picture in the sixth row under the heading "Agents". He is the only one named TIM, and if you move your cursor over his picture, it will show the following link: http://www.integritypgm.com/profile.asp?agent=1295
It is not a particularly good picture. In scam mode, Tim does not press his lips together, but has a nice smile.
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