FireCo Does Sleazy Business

A week or so ago, I was hired by FireCo in Asheville, North Carolina, to sell fundraiser concert tickets over the phone. They have been granted special privileges to cold-call people from 12pm to 9pm because they are a "non-profit." The office was full of 10 other guys making phone calls. Seemed pretty legit to me.

The first red flag was that the company doesn't have any information about itself online. What little information I did find was a complaint forum. People were mostly angry about the fact that they were receiving calls, but one lady had actually gone so far as to research the percent of her donation that might actually go to the charity and help the firefighters. She came back with a startling 15% that goes toward what the salesmen are trained to say over the phone.

I asked the head honcho about it, and he slathered his response in salesman speak, but didn't deny it a bit. If $22 comes in for a ticket, the first of the money goes to pay the rent for the venue and the performer, neither of which are doing anything for free. Then, the next of the money goes to pay the operating costs of the fundraising operation. What's left over is split 50-50 between the firefighters and Fireco. If you break that down, it comes out to less than $5 a ticket that's an actual donation for what the fundraiser tells you. But wait, there's more...

Most people don't even go to the show. 2,700 was a high turnout the last time, but many of those people had gotten the tickets for free from charities and businesses after the purchasers turned them back in and accepted this as the donation that the salesman will swear up and down that it is not, even though they probably don't realize that 85% goes to operating costs and executive pockets. But wait, there's more...

Not content to stop with those profits, the company has to swindle its "employees" as well. Of those 10 guys in the office last Tuesday, only 5 remained on the following Monday: The manager, the assistant manager, the letter mailer, the b2b salesman, and one other guy who had been there a while. The others had all recently started but either left or were shown the door pretty quickly. Basically, two tiers: The insiders on the scam and the outsiders brought in to man the phones with no training for a minimum amount of time before being shown the door because they weren't selling like champions in a week or a month's time.

I became the sixth in a week to receive the good-bye handshake, only realizing then that it's probably what happened to the first 5 guys, who were dismissed never to be seen again. Sure, my numbers weren't great after a week, but champion cold-calling isn't going to occur in one week. They knew they'd probably fire me this quickly when they hired me, but they didn't care. They didn't care that I had another job offer but instead am sitting umemployed. But wait, there's more...

I had accidentally left my cellphone in the office because I was slightly startled by the firing, so I went back in this morning to pick it up. It should be noted that they had already hired all of the replacements and had mine sitting there already. The manager was very cordial in handing me my phone and talking to me about picking up my paychecks. When I calmly said to him, "It's a lousy way to do business. I had another offer," his face dropped and he scooted back over to his new employee to wreak the same havoc on his life. By the time I had finished my other errands, he had left me a message instructing me not to come in, that my checks would be in the mail. Can't have someone coming in and blowing up the scam, right?

This has been your public service announcement about FireCo. Do not give them money for their lousy concert that you won't go to. Give your money directly to the Fire Fighters. It'll be put to better use.