Fortune Hi-Tech Marketing review: Pyramid Scheme - FRAUD 2

Fortune Hi-Tech Marketing (FHTM) Analysis of Product and Business Model

FHTM is a multi level marketing company that purports to allow you to work directly with well known companies and make lots of money by taking a percentage back from purchases made through your FHTM representative site. In reality, if a representative stops signing people up under them, they will make very little money, as little as .5% on products sold through the site (unless you have eight levels of representatives sign up under you, and you also get a small cut of those under you who sell services or products). The get rich quick portion of the presentation relies on signing up people under you for $299 a person, and getting them to sign others up, as well as pay for training at $250 a person. Note that you also must pay a $199 renewal fee each year, and if you pay for the trainer course, an additional $100 trainer renewal fee. This is a text book example of a pyramid scheme, with a token product line on the side to try and make the business legitimate.

I will analyze some of the products that a FHTM representative can get a percentage back on (.5%), which is supposedly the primary focus of the business (if it is not, it is possibly illegal, so they have to pretend that this is the focus). From research and hearing actual representatives say it, the way to make money is to sign people up under you. One representative I heard from only made $17 in a month through the products, but made much more by convincing others to sign up too.

The whole point of this analysis is to show that the sale of products and services through FHTM is not a way to make large amounts of money, and in fact is offered to try and mask the true source of most earnings, which are derived from the sign up fees of new people joining. Thus the primary purpose of the company is to sign up new representatives, making it an illegal pyramid scheme.

MyTelTag
This is a product only available to Representatives and costs $19.99 a month. So clearly buying this won’t make you money as a representative, and in fact will cost you $19.99 a month.
Peter Lamas has a direct affiliate program paying 20% http://www.lamasbeauty.com/affiliate/, that is free to sign up for. So going through FHTM pays you .5%, and signing up for a free affiliate account pays 20%.

Choice Plans RX
This is a FHTM company that they pay Ocenture to set up and run for them. When you go to the website, it has copyright FHTM, but when you look who owns the domain name, all contact emails are to ocenture.com email addresses. If you use this product, remember you are actually buying from FHTM, and be sure to check prices you are paying against a site such as drugstore.com. ChoicePlanRX Price List is available at http://www.choiceplansrx.com/downloads/pricesheet.pdf. A spot check of the price list shows the drug Pegasys for 180MCG/0.5 for $1, 482.23. It appears to be available from drugstore.com as a 1ml vial for $651.98. If the 0.5 in the ChoicePlanRX price refers to half a ML, then you pay $2, 964.46 for 1ml, while at drugstore.com you can get it for $651.98. I suggest you look at the prices yourself.

Health Card
This product is yet another product that FHTM paid Ocenture to run, and Ocenture uses VantageAmerica Solutions, Inc. to run the card discounts. It looks like FHTM paid Ocenture to rebrand their pre packaged product called MedAffordable. If you want a Medical Card, I suggest you go straight to www.vantageamericasolutions.com so you can work with just one middle man instead of three (FHTM, Ocenture, and VantageAmericaSolutions)

Travel FHTM
This is another service where FHTM paid Ocenture to rebrand and rename their existing product called TrotHop http://ocenture.com/docs/OC_Prod_Travel.pdf, and to set up an affiliate site through Travelocity, to book tickets through an airline. If you buy from TravelFHTM, you are going through three middlemen to reach the airline (FHTM, Ocenture, & Travelocity). Basically this service uses Travelocity, rebranded to look like TravelFHTM, adding on a fee to each ticket. Tickets tend to be $5 – $10 dollars more on TravelFHTM than buying straight from Travelocity, you can test this by checking the price for an identical flight through Travelocity and TravelFHTM. Also, in order to offer this product, the representative must pay $49.99

Roadside AutoClub
This is simply a service set up by Ocenture to provide roadside assistance. You can go to http://ocenture.com/PrePackPrograms to look at all the services Ocenture can set up for your organization. It looks like this is what FHTM did.

Ingrid Home Security
The link to this service did not work, so I was unable to assess what this service was. If the link is not working, it’s safe to say you can’t use this service.

Protect America
This appears to be a GE security product that FHTM markets, by going through an authorized dealer, greatalarms.com. So you have 2 middle men, (FHTM and greatalarms.com) As of 2.26.10, the FHTM’s site had free* sign up options, but the asterisk beside the FREE does not have an explanation. It should include this: * “Standard monitoring agreement required with approved credit. “, FHTM is misleading if they don’t show the disclaimer. It is not free.

FortuneTV.info
This is a product only available to Fortune Representatives, and so is not a way for FHTM reps to make money.

EZnet Tools
This is a Quick Website Creation Company that welcomes Multi Level Marketing Companies as affiliates. Information about joining EZnet Tools as an affiliate is available at http://www.eznettools.net/reseller/multiunitcorp.html. If you want to set up a simple website, I suggest you use a reputable company like wordpress.com, who can have you online on your own domain name for $15 a year

Dish Network
Anyone can become an affiliate of Dish Network, and be paid $120 per installation, you can become an affiliate here
http://www.vmcsatellite.com/red_design/program_overview.cfm. Compare that to .5% through FHTM, and the best choice is clear.

Magazines.com
You can sign up for free to be an affiliate of Magazines.com, and earn a 35% commission on subscriptions sold. http://www.magazines.com/affiliate/index . Compare that to .5% through FHTM.

The Wireless Shop
One of the most talked about services at FHTM is the wireless shop. This is a website that FHTM uses Simplexity to run. You can buy cell phones and cell phone contracts through this service. Simplexity uses linkshare.com to purchase these services. By going through FHTM Wireless Shop you appear to be using three middlemen (FHTM, Simplexity, and Linkshare). Linkshare can be joined for free by going to simplexity’s site which can be joined for free by going to http://www.simplexity.com/Pages/affiliate_main.html# and clicking on “Join Our Wireless Program Today” Alternately, you can go straight to LinkShare.com http://www.linkshare.com/publishers/join/ and create a free affiliate account, and start earning the full commission instead of the .5% FHTM gives back to their representatives. With this free account, you can earn affiliate money from many companies, a list of which can be found here http://www.linkshare.com/clients/ . So FHTM does not really have a direct relationship with Verizon and AT&T, contrary to the impression given by the company.

The money that is implied to be available to be made to Representatives (as much as $80, 000 a month is shown) is derived almost entirely from spreadsheets showing what would happen if you signed up three people at $299 a person, and they each signed up three people, and so on, down to eight levels. The problem with this type of business model, besides possibly being illegal, is that in order for people to make the money they were told they could, they have to continue signing up people. Whenever people no longer sign up, then all of the people at the bottom of the pyramid will lose their money. So even if you can get into a pyramid scheme like this before it collapses, and make money off of signing people up under you, when it does fail, most of the money that you made would have been taken from those under you, and they would lose it. For ethical and moral reasons, I would not want to take other people’s money, knowing that sooner or later the money I make will be lost by someone down the line.

If you are still not convinced that this is not a legitimate business, the North Dakota attorney general issued a cease and desist order against FHTM in December (it has since been lifted).

Update: News Coverage of the Cease and Desist order in Montana available here (thanks to comment below for this info)

Update 2: You can read the Temporary Cease and Desist Order here. It is lengthy, but has a lot of very relevant information.

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