Is Cash 4 Gold a scam?
Of course it is. This is one of those random posts that I feel I need to make because I understand SEO and this company makes me ill. I am SO TIRED of seeing companies that prey on the uninformed. Cash4Gold.com Cash for Gold Cash 4 Gold. This is a post I found on another site that needs to be re-broadcast to as many sites as possible. I will print the post in its entirety. You can read the original at:
http://www.complaintsboard.com/complaints/cash-4-gold-c87309.html
I am a former employee of Cash 4 Gold. I did not know much about the company before being hired. On my first day of being hired, I was taught the “Cash 4 Gold Scam” from beginning to end.
1. The “refiner’s pack” that is used for you to put your jewelry is “insured for UP TO 100 dollars, ” according to how much they feel your items are worth, NOT appraised at
2. We receive your “Refiner’s Pack” within 3-4 days, but we are instructed to tell you that it takes “7-10 business days, for us to receive your pack, ALTHOUGH your package has already arrived.
3.Your jewlery gets appraised by hand/magnifying glasses/
a small weight pad, and a bottle of mystery fluid, which your items are then give a value for. Not million dollar equipment or specially trained jewelry experts.
4. Although the payment (check) for your item is dated within 24 hrs of testing your jewelry, we sometimes DO NOT actually send out the check until up to 3-4 days later.
5. We claim a 100% Satisfaction Guarantee or your jewelry returned, BUT THE CATCH IS, that the guarantee is contacting us within 10 DAYS from when your check is DATED. (This begins with the time it takes for the accounts payables dept. to issue the check and also including the transit time for you to receive your check in the mail. **** NOTATE THE COMMERCIALS THAT STATE U GET YOUR CHECK IN 24 HRS.***
5. IF you are lucky you will receive your check around the “7th-10th” bus iness day, AND more then 97% of the time Customers are outraged when they lay eyes on the amount of the check. Some Customer’s even receive a check for 0.01 cents. (TRUTH) Thats including items of great value (Diamonds, Platinum/ Gold and Sterling)
6. They sometimes even receive your valuables and like them so much THAT we CLAIM to not have received the items just so the “TOP” people or even “FAVORED” people can get first dibs on your items. From which point we issued an INSURANCE CLAIM for UP TO 100 dollars. GOD FORBID your items are worth more then a 100 dollars, and when you call in to check on the status of your items, we tell you ” YOU SHOULD”VE ADDED EXTRA INSURANCE ON YOUR ITEMS.” We do not have an actual Insurance company, they use customer service reps as the claim department agents.
7. For those who receive there check within the 10 day frame, GOOD LUCK with trying to get in touch with a cust. srvc. rep before your 10 days are up. Which after your 10 days, your items are “ALREADY MELTED” or NO LONGER AVAILABLE FOR RETURN.”
8. For the “LUCKY” people who do get in touch with us within the alloted time frame, we already know what you are calling about. Customers want their items returned, because there
check amount is so insultingly LOW. The first thing a Rep will ask you is “HOW MUCH WERE YOU EXPECTING TO GET BACK?” This way we can know how much to “BONUS” you.
Definition of a BONUS: We issue low checks just to have you call us back if you are smart enough to realized that you just got scammed. For the smart one’s we are paid to offer u a bonus up to 3x the original amount of your check and you accept. For ex: Sally Smith receives a check for $27.86 for a rolex watch(which we dont issue value for), a class ring, a ring with diamond chips, a pair of earrings with emeralds, as well as a few sterling silver pieces, and maybe a few items that were really of no value. Now Sally Smith calls the cust srvc dept, where she speaks to a rep who seems so concerned and will see if she can do better with the amount by speaking to a “SUPERVISOR”. We then place the caller on Mute, and speak to our neighbors or doodle on a sheet, or twiddle with our hair for about 45 seconds, while we are supposedly speaking to our supervisor about Ms. Smith’s complaint. We then come back with an offer to “BUMP UP YOUR MELT DATE or any other lies the cust srvc reps can think of, and offer you a total amount of $53.20 which is a little under double the amount of your original check. In which case if you accept, the cust srvc rep makes a 15.00 bonus off of your transaction. If the cust srvc rep offers you under triple the amount of your orig check, she makes 10.oo in bonuses.
9. If you accept the offer, the deal is done, and you are told that the call is recorded(which most of the time, the record button does not work.)Just a way to make your feel binded by a verbal contract. IF you do not accept the deal, you have to return your check, and it takes sometimes up to a month to receive your items back after we receive the check.
10. If you only want the items that we do not find of any value back, you have to pay a 10.00 shipping and handling fee to have your own items returned, which varies depending on sales for that week. IF sales are good, there is no fee, when we are slow, you must pay.
Cash 4 Gold is definitely not a trustworthy or credible company to do business with. You are almost better off taking your items to a local pawn shop or shopping around for other companies. With the economony the way it is, Cash 4 Gold seems to be a way out of financial stress for some, but in actuality becomes a stress of its own. I would advice you to think twice before sending in valuables or items inherited and of sentimental value. Its not worth it. I am not doing this as a way of Bashing their money making process 
but more so to warn everyone.
Old client New Headache
I did some work for a guy in Canada a few months back. Nice guy, but man, trouble follows him. The last project was to promote an industry that is firmly planted in the gray area. It’s not sports gambling but is damn close. He came to me with a poorly done site, no real plan, no team, nothing in place. He wanted PPC work done but it was obvious that he could have the hottest paid search campaign on the planet but he didn’t realize what many people don’t, getting people to your site is easy, keeping them there is the hard part. Now throw the fact that Google and Yahoo do not permit this kind of advertising, and some lousy designers and programmers that kept ripping him off and I had a $75 an hour migraine.
I ended up working for him for free for the last month because I felt bad for him, I do have a soft spot. It was a major source of stress for me. PPC became a small part of my job. Managing a designer, finding programmers, dealing with crooks, and fighting with Google and Yahoo to get ads approved took over. He has a frantic leap then look personality, he wanted everything done in 5 minutes and thought he was going to get rich, immediately. I became a shrink, teacher, manager, partner. It was a nightmare. He sort of faded away..
Well, you guessed it he contacted me again, with a new project. At first glance it looks like its a much more thought out idea, the site is sharp, the idea is relatively fresh. Now I have to decide, do I go back to work for him? Can I handle the stress? I know the money is there, but is it worth it. If nothing else, this could provide tons of material to write about. Decisions, decisions.
Get with the program
I really shouldn’t get in the habit of talking smack about people, especially people I work for, but sometimes it’s hard to keep my mouth shut.
Those who can do, those who can’t run a web marketing agency.
The amount of wasted money that flows through is staggering. There is no effort made to stay current, to learn what works, to even know the definition of social media, web 2.0, widget, twitter, social bookmarking – so say any of those things just gets a blank stare.
No interest in allocated even a fraction of the budget to article marketing, or content creation. The #1 method for getting incoming links – ignored.
I wouldn’t be so irritated if the powers that be were informed and made a conscious decision to not participate, but its the total lack of interest in learning about any of the methods that are essential to stay competitive. It baffles me.
There is no trick to marketing your business on the internet. No secret forumulas, no passwords or secret handshakes. It’s a new day. All you need to be successful online is :
1. Offer quality content
2. Educate yourself on what works and what doesn’t
3. Hire people who are actually interested in the process and give them incentive to help you succeed.
Apathy will kill your business like a cancer. You can work as hard as you want, but if your support system isn’t there, then it will all be in vain.
Bill Maher stole my cell phone. Now he’s coming to Milwaukee
well, he tried to. Bill Maher is coming to Milwaukee tomorrow. I have been a big fan of his for a long time. I used to live in Hollywood and I was a regular fixture at Cheetahs, a small strip club on Hollywood Blvd.
I was more than a regular, I was basically a fixture. Cheetahs used to be cool, a good place to see aging child stars and the occasional celeb who was slumming it for the evening. Bill Maher came in a few times, I didn’t want to bug him, I am not one to be star struck. I just like Bill Maher. We have similar views, similar habits, he’s a guy I’d like to hang out with.
At any rate, I had a few regular cabbies that I would call and the usual routine was that 4 or 5 of the staff from the club would spend the night partying at my house up by the Hollywood sign. I was standing outside the bar at closing time which is sort of a ritual, people lingering outside waiting on the ladies to get off work to continue the party. It was the usual suspects, and the guy who sold incense – I probably gave that guy a few grand in 2002. Bill Maher came out with a girl under each arm, he was pretty lit and clearly on his way to a good night. I heard him ask “where the hell is Beverly Hills?”. He needed to go, so I told him he could have my cab, however what I wanted in return was for him to say hello to someone I was on the phone with (they were a Maher fan). Bill took my phone and said “Hi this is Bill Maher from politically incorrect… and I just stole this guys cell phone!” and he jumped in the cab. I had to scramble into the cab after him to pry my phone out of his hand.
It makes for a good story, my run in with Bill Maher. What I am hoping is that Bill is narcissistic enough that he might google himself or possibly Google “Best place to get pot in Milwaukee” and find this post. You never know, stranger things have happened. I wanted to go see his show but I forgot to get tickets.
Bill.. If you read this. Give me a call 414.367.9736 – I have since bought a new phone.