Comment Number: 522418-09238
Received: 7/14/2006 6:04:09 AM
Organization: Hubbard Marketing
Commenter: Sandy Hubbard
State: VA
Subject: Business Opportunity Rule
Title: Notice of Proposed Rulemaking
CFR Citation: 16 CFR Part 437
No Attachments

Comments:

My husband and I have been business owners with Quixtar for a little over a year. We love the opportunity for extra income our business provides. Before making the decision to start our own business we spent time with people who had experience and were successfully making money in their own businesses. They were happy to answer our questions and give advise. We've followed this example and never push or pressure prospects into something they don't want to do. We assure all our prospects that they have 6 months to try the system and if they decide business ownership of this type is not for them, they can get their money back. We've had people do this in our business, and their money was refunded without any question or problem. We applaud the overall goal of giving consumers the information they need to make an educated decision about business ownership; however, we have some concerns about the new rules proposed to direct selling. Some of the ideas would greatly hinder our business and would likely cause us to lose money. Our first concern is with the 7-day waiting period. Many people are looking for ways to earn extra income. With all the information available on the internet, people can often have most, if not all, of their questions answered very quickly. If a person is really looking for an opportunity like business ownership, it won't take him 7 days to decide if it's a good idea. Also, once someone has been presented with the opportunity, they immediately start telling their friends and family. How discourageing it would be to a new person to have this wonderful opportunity, but not be able to start earning income right away because all their prospects had to wait a week to register. People succeed best when they see the business work for them right away and get good results. Many times if people don't get the results they want as fast as they want, they quit, and that affects our income as well as theirs. Our second concern is regarding the requirement to provide a reference list to new people. Our new peopole are invited to MEET people who are successful. Surely meeting people is better then simply talking to them. That aside, the prospect might think someone on the list is more succuessful or qualified than we are and choose to register with them. Then, I've done the work and not received the benefit. Also, there are, unfortunately, some people who don't run their businesses with the utmost of integrity and might try to "steal" the new person for their business, There again, I've done the work and not received the benefit. Another point to make on this topic is that I don't want my personal information on a reference list that could be given out to just anybody. Not every prospect is a good person, and he might use that information to harm my family or me. For example, if he thinks we are wealthy, he has been given an open invitation to break into our home because he now has our address and phone number. Finally, we are concerned about the requirement to provide personal financial documents to substantiate our income claims. We often talk about the money our business provides. At times we show people the checks that Quixtar sends, but we choose which checks and to whom we show them. To be REQUIRED to disclose this information would, first of all, take a lot of the fun out of it, and secondly, would again invade our privacy. People don't disclose financial information about their salary at their jobs; so, we shouldn't be required to disclose information about our business. Our financial information is no one else's business unless we choose to tell them. Again, we applaud the FTC for attempting to protect unsuspecting consumers from fraudulent business opportunities, but to do so at the expense of legitiment ones hurts everyone.