Comment Number: 522418-05295
Received: 6/30/2006 2:38:18 PM
Organization:
Commenter: Tapp
State: ID
Subject: Business Opportunity Rule
Title: Notice of Proposed Rulemaking
CFR Citation: 16 CFR Part 437
No Attachments

Comments:

I would like to comment on this subject. I feel that I can speak from some reasonable experience as I am a veteran of over 10 different business opportunities and until now have never made any significant income from any of them. So the first question that pops to mind is, do I feel like I have been taken advantage of or lied to? The answer is absolutely not. There are frauds and get rich quick schemes out there but I feel that it is my responsibility to protect myself. A legitimate business opportunity has free and open disclosure upon request. They will also have a money back guarantee and a track record that can be researched through the normal avenues that we already have available. BBB etc. To require so much personal disclosure would be another invasion of privacy for a legitimate business owner. Even to require a business to publish it's income averages is as misleading to me as having someone lie about their income because those averages have to factor in all the people who get involved and do nothing. That is not a realistic reflection of the opportunity. The real reflection of whether an opportunity is legitimate is do the numbers make sense, does the company have a track record, can I get the info I need about them, and can I meet some people who have succeeded using their system? After that the due dilligence is my responsibility. Also, we have got to stop confusing lack of success with a fraudulent system. There is never going to be a business system that everybody succeeds at. If that is the criteria, then why don't we close down the stock markets? People in this country lose more money there than almost anywhere else. I think in this country we do a pretty good job of shutting down fraudulent systems already. So why do we need to burden one of our most successful industries with a whole bunch of rules and regulations that really do nothing but squelch energy, effort and ambition? A seven day waiting period to sign up in a good business opportunity? That's a gigantic kneejerk reaction that will seriously hinder the honest efforts of millions of entrepreneurs in this country. When you have a great opportunity you need to be able to share it with as many people as possible as quickly as possible. That is one of the beauties of our free enterprise system. What if we told every advertiser on TV that they had to wait 7 days after the customer came in the store to actually sell them their product? Lists of references? Lists of legal allegations? Substantiation of income claims? Those things are already available to the public who is willing to research them. We don't need more regulation to make that happen. These are all very negative type ideas. How about a positive one like providing a reasonable cancellation policy. Which most every legitimate company already does by the way. So in closing, based on my experiences, let's not start burdening an industry that's working for literally millions of people in this great country, all because of a few bad apples. Continue pursuing the bad ones. Maybe require a reasonable cancellation policy and enforce it. Say 30 days. My experience has been like many others who I have talked to. You don't always succeed the first time. But this is America.You can learn from your mistakes and try again. Your success is your responsibility and yours only. Nobody owes you success. This time has been the charm for me. We have found the right opportunity for our family and we are succeeding at it . That's the American Dream. Let's don't ruin it.