| Comment Number: | 522418-10131 |
| Received: | 7/15/2006 7:25:19 PM |
| Organization: | |
| Commenter: | DOUG STODDARD |
| State: | ID |
| Subject: | Business Opportunity Rule |
| Title: | Notice of Proposed Rulemaking |
| CFR Citation: | 16 CFR Part 437 |
| No Attachments |
Comments:
To: Federal Trade Commission RE: Business Opportunity Rule, R511993 To Whom It May Concern: For over 12 years now our family has been involved in the Networking industry. Our purpose for getting involved was to improve my health, which at the time I was struggling with over ten chronic illnesses, and then to earn enough money through helping others so that my wife could stay at home with our six children. We met both of those goals and still continue to do so. In the past twelve years we have literally helped thousands of people do the same thing of feeling better and improving their financial situation. I can tell you upfront that if twelve years ago as I was looking at getting involved in networking and I would have had to wait seven days before I could get involved I probably would not have done it. If that would have happened my health today would more than likely be quite poor. There is a very good chance I would not be working because my brother has had many of the same issues and he is almost to the point where he can’t work. I am only 50 years old. Other huge benefits that would have been missed is the opportunity that we have had to teach our children how to be entrepreneurs, have a strong work ethic, and teach their children the same values which have brought many dividends to our family and communities. The seven day waiting period would be over burdensome, non effective in reducing scams, and would greatly reduce the interest of those who want to get started right away. List of nearest references: Why would anyone want their name on a list that is given out to all kinds of people they don’t know? In a world where identity theft is a big concern, this would be a big turnoff to people. Also the paperwork would be a huge nightmare. Our business is done all over the United States. There is no way I could get this information without the help of the company which would require a great deal of time and money which would raise the cost of everything. Earnings Claims: What keeps the dishonest companies from forging the paper work they use for validation? Cancellations and Refunds: It looks like to me that for the overall benefit of the consumer you would want your regulations to be consumer friendly not anti-consumer. When you have regulations that reflect only a part of the total picture you are doing a great disservice to the consumer. I believe that when you force the potential consumer to make a decision on getting involved with a program when they only have part of the picture you are not being fair and honest with them. This regulation would not give the full story of why people returned their product. Why don’t you just require a sound stable refund policy of each company and let it go at that? I appreciate the chance to share this with you. In every industry you will have those businesses and individuals who will be dishonest. You definitely want to control that as much as possible. You do not want to make the knot so tight on the rope that business is ground to a halt and in the long run the consumer is the one who really gets hurt because they will either not get a good service or product that they desire or it will come to them at significantly higher price because of the all the red tape and paper work. When you really think about it that the very high percentage of the people you are trying to protect are we the distributors or customers that are already involved with the companies in the networking industry. Thank you, Doug Stoddard