Pyramid scheme scam
Okay, so this happened to me last year. I was approached by a college alumni (got my number from college alumni group) who told me he had a side business going on which was leading him to earn more money than his corporate job and that he was going to leave the corporate for his “business”. I was initially not interested but he was insistent and also I was looking to explore some options (may be my naïveté) that I asked him more and so he setup a call with his senior to explain more about this “business”. Now this senior gave all sorts of gyaan regarding how to reach financial independence and picking up on the general mindset of how to make more money. They asked to create a list of 10 things that I desired the most at the point of time which could be solved with more money. I complied thinking it was a good exercise (again, I was a big fool). Now I was connected with another senior who gave all sorts of gyaan regarding how I could make more money and lead to financial independence. Please note, during all this time I was constantly asking what the business idea was and how it would be achieved but got no response on the details and only white washing regarding how I should be prepared to do anything to achieve my dreams. Now, it was revealed that I would need to put in 5L as investment to get bigger returns. Since I did not have that money in handy, I was suggested to get a personal loan through their agents. Also not to inform this to parents because they won’t understand this stuff and get “worried”. Luckily I did went with their suggestion and informed my parent about it. Thinking it was a startup idea, I got the investment from my father through an OD in my name. Now we get onto a call two days later, where they reveal the company QNet and makes me purchase 5L of stuff from their website and explained the business model which was to get other people from your knowing to buy products from this company and get commissions on the sale. Continued……
WattCoconut
Stealth
a year ago
Bruh... what even?! It's a well known scam. I don't understand how you were ready to put in 5L of your money without going for a simple google search.
All these IIT/NIT/IIM/AIIMS means they cracked a certain exam. It has nothing to do with guaranteed moral values or even basic common sense. Lesson learnt the hard way I guess.
Correct. I only listened because they were from my alma-mater. But surely broke my pre-conceived notions and made me learn the hard way.
You should inform all other alumni about this guy and make sure no one falls for same. How did you get into IIT BTW😛
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Continued 2…
The reason I fell for this in the first place was because all these people were from IITs and were placed in well known companies and working on their regular jobs. That was the reason I listened to them in first place.
After all this shit, I realised how you cannot trust anyone in this world, least the people from your alma-meter.
Name and shame those IITians, that will be a great lesson to them. And don’t you know many of the top executives of QNet are under arrest? There are tens of cases against QNet guys by ED. One quick google search would have told you. This had come to me almost 7 yrs back and at that time only within a few minutes of talk I had realized it. Similar to this, there was other MLMs like EBiz, 10 yrs back. Google and a bit of common sense, helps a lot. I absolutely despise such guys who trap innocent folks. They must be named and shamed.
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How y'all keep falling for MLM scams in 2023?
15 min in a convo and if the party doesn't share what the business is about then they either are a scam or naive to think idea is more important than execution. And In both of those cases you tell them to gtfo.
mangoman
Stealth
a year ago
Can everyone stop dunking on OP? He shared an important lesson. There’s a first time for everyone. There’s no need to judge him for it. He did the right thing with the information asymmetry he was dealt with.
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DarkerKnight
Stealth
a year ago
I've heard people making good money. Some of my close known people are doing this full time and are maxing out on commissions (6L per week). Sometimes I feel if it's a good idea to pursue this :/
My personal opinion that I realised after this. I would definitely not want to earn money by duping other people in any way that too my family members and friends. Better to be in a humble state than be ultra rich and scam other folks.
Yeah, defrauding people to make quick money appears good idea to many. So no wonder so many fraudsters have got into it. I just wish everyone’s name get printed and flashed prominently everywhere.
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Continued 1…
Major target would be your friends and family. Now after this meeting is over, I have become skeptical. I am told about another meeting with the founder who is the mastermind behind all this stuff. In the meeting, I realise that this is all an elaborate scheme to prey on the gullible as the other audience member were people in need of money, retired Army officials and uncle aunties having free time and money. I quickly searched on the internet and found all kinds of shady stuff going on with the company.
After the founders meet, I again met with these people and told me reservations and could clearly see their attitude changing from polite to defensive. That’s when I realised I was screwed. I pondered on this shit all the night long and next day told them that I do not want to associate with them.
Luckily I was refunded for the products bought in India, but had to suffer in cancellations charges for foreign purchase and an event fee they took totalling 50-60k.
I told my father about this and he was supportive and I realised what kind of shit people are pulling up these days.
You got a part of money because they don't want to spoil their MLM business model tree for a leaf node.
Loss you incurred is their fail case scenario, so the tree remains robust and keeps driven in recruiting new people as they know their time was not wasted.
Okay it was a relief to know that you got the money refunded and didn't actually lose 5L.
But these kinds of scams are very common. I don't know how you even agreed to put 5L into something even without knowing anything about the business.
But don't believe someone because of their alma mater or what you perceive to be true. Everyone has an ulterior motive.
And not every IITian is smart.
RapidHaunt95
Stealth
a year ago
I guess everyone of us have been invited to these scam mlm scheme meetings...once pr more...
For me in my first meeting with ebiz ...I was in first year and almost was into their trap...up until they said don't tell it to your parents...ask them for money by saying lies like ask for books.. training...and boy that moment I knew what it is ....for something that you need to hide from parents and tell lies to them...then it is not for you...for sure
This reminds of the time in 1st year of college, this guy from my school, who was objectively quite cute, reached out to me on Facebook and asked for my number
I was kinda flattered and gave it to him and then he called and started talking about god knows what business or something his college society was doing or something, I don't even remember the details, I shut him down so quickly, but was quite heart broken 😂😂
Bot_God
Stealth
a year ago
Was it from Madras because someone reached out to me few months back and I kinda said him fuck off ?
randombug
Stealth
a year ago
Got one last week, similar pitch
EarlGreyTea
Stealth
a year ago
A similar incident happened with me few years back.
A dude approached me on LinkedIn (IIT KGP grad I guess), asked me all sorts of Qs about my past academics, current role and future aspirations. I gave him enough answers to make him believe I was interested.
After the first call, he shared me a book to read and review it by the next call.
All this while I had asked him a dozen Qs what that business did...he always went on saying it made him achieve financial independence, made him intelligent, stable blabla. He went on to say he had top level business leaders mentoring him, and he aspires to reach their level. He even denied to mention even a name of those leaders.
I tried to get more out of this dude, but he was adamant as a mule. Dude was trained well by whoever is running the show.
We never reached that stage of investing 5L as I shut him down and asked him never to message me again.
EarlGreyTea
Stealth
a year ago
I had also asked him in the end - Why are you doing this? Why are you trying to sell this to me? How much commission do you get out of this deal? If you really want to improve the world, let the people know about your "business" in open and if it's good, people will automatically approach you rather than other way around.
To be honest, I passed out from my C grade college 10 years back with again so average marks.
My few friends who went to NIT/IITs made big after first placement and so do toppers from my college.
Cut 2 : I was struggling with learnings in my normal IT service company and these friends were doing some sort of business, they started inviting me to coffee shops, pubs to explain the idea and how to get Audi and financial independence in 5 years.
I met almost 20+ of my friends who were rarely talking after getting into these good colleges, I talked about idea, before investment I took treats from them in bigger pubs, hotels and finally ditched them with some excuse on payment day.
I am so glad, they all spoiled thier life, lost jobs, except 1 who made it big, went to jail, came back and again did it. I feel I won my life it big time as I earn better than all, at better position and to be honest can hire atleast 10 like my friends to work under me. P. S. - I am not a businessman, I am still an employee who made it big.
GV_influenzer
Student
a year ago
😩😩 so 2013, my alma mater created meme coin and was selling it to us ☠️☠️ tryna rug pull 🫂 but it's okay it's a long life you win some you loose some you learn some :)
dojacat
Stealth
a year ago
Oh my god.... I got the same kind of call from two different IIT alums and man were they trying to hit on my financial insecurities. Invest 6L now or you will never do it . They lectured about all the compounding of money stuff but never revealed what the actual business was. I had almost given a token amount but thank god I didn't join.
Also wanna ask aren't those people going to Singapore and multiple Dubai trips.?
Yes, they go to dubai and thailand trips with all the duping money and attend these scamster meetings
luci4Morningstar
Stealth
a year ago
Exact same happened with me. The amount of self doubt it gave me, made me rethink my whole life. But then I thought if someone is going to lengths to make you feel bad and the prey on that feeling, you should stay the fuck away!
I too was a victim but of Ponzi scheme, my junior colleague hailed from Patna, says I give 10% monthly return on investment doing trading, he was giving principle and interest, by gaining trust like this investment more money but was not getting any proof of profit from him, eventually took all money back and cut him off of any communication, story of Bangalore
If such quick money was possible he could have taken a personal loan from bank and become a millionaire in a year there is no such thing as quick money . Your greed made you blind to the risk hope u learnt a lesson
Hoooomaannn
Stealth
a year ago
Wait are you from IIT BHU? Know someone selling a similar scheme there
dojacat
Stealth
a year ago
IIT KGP, Roorkee, BHU every other IIT is in the boat.
Correct they have got extensive network, BHU, Jodhpur, Roorkee, KGP
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Hobbit
Stealth
a year ago
@Wubbalubbadubdub appreciate you for posting this!
Im very much interested in scams and have attended a lot of these MLM meetings in my college.Recently,one of my colleagues gave a similar proposal like yours - They told me it's some e-commerce business, I had a zoom call for nearly an hour ,they gave me an Excel sheet to point down my goals for the next five years and whether I can meet it , but the golden rule is they didn't utter a word about the business. They blabbered a lot about financial independence,the future of ecommerce and some other stuff . Asked me to get back ,but since I understood I didnt proceed further; the investment quoted was some 4-5 lakhs (similar to yours)
What's surprising is this model has been adopted now by the people who are in good positions and are already earning well.
Yes @Hobbit , this is the same modus operandi that I had. I was gullible at that point to extend it beyond that meeting and in one meeting they quickly went over the details and made me purchase the goods. Only after the meeting, when I got the name of QNet was I able to do the google search and get the details. I retracted immediately after that.
But its true, people in well placed companies and positions are doing this and they are coming from a respectable family as well. Hence at first it seems genuine but it is not. Purpose is to make people aware as these kinds of thing happen
Hobbit
Stealth
a year ago
Happy that you got most of your money back.
The exact same thing happened with me. It started when I received an Instagram follow request from a senior with plenty of mutuals. Conversation started with reacting and replying to my status. One day he asks for my number to call to catch up. One day bro calls me outta nowhere.
Then after establishing some basic rapport, he invites me for a e-comm business meeting.
Same stuff, asking for my aspirations, making it a point to make me feel like I am not earning enough even though I remarked that I am pretty happy with the life right now. Then he asked me to make a list of material things I want with a deadline. I was quite suspicious at this point, I wanted to see where it goes. Definitely seemed like these guys had an agenda.
Next it was a meet with his mentor who was apparently a ‘bigshot’.
He narrates his sad tale and how he is making plenty money.
He then asks if I can be decisive, and have access to 5l.
Then I started playing with them a little bit, asking how many people are there, how much such clients they have. It was pretty clear this was a MLM then. After I was done, I just laughed at their faces and wrapped up the call.
These guys were nuanced with their approach and I could see people falling for it. Next I reached out to his batchmate who said that he has been doing it for a very long time and everyone knows about it.
That was pretty much it.
Guddu2507
Stealth
a year ago
@Wubbalubbadubdub - In today's fast and internet connected world , if you really invested 5L without doing any research, then there is no fool bigger then YOU.
Accept this hard hitting fact.
Why are you not naming and shaming them on social media and sharing the links here ?
Also, there is no latest news on latest news on arrests in Qnet scams which itself is a shame for India.
@Wubbalubbadubdub are you or your senior associated with Art of Living by any chance?
I was also approached by one of my batchmate for a similar MLM scheme. He got roped into it by people he met through Art of Living. I guess people who agreed to be part of a cult are good target market for these MLM companies.
It's pretty stupid to get caught up in this. Their pitch itself is so cringworthy and off-putting.
Remember OP, if something sounds too good to be true, it's always a scam.
No, I got a call from college group for referral purpose and then the drama unfolded.
I remember now that one of them was in some Satsang following some guruji and used to say in meetings that he was ardent follower and did this to remove negativity. I guess that was required if your main job in life is to scam people.
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