Utility Warehouse (Telecom Plus) Discussion

kippen_noedel

Quentin wrote: »

Have you seen them at their rally?

http://www.networkerplus.co.uk/videos/rejection-free-presentation-big-al.html

lol, no I haven't Quentin but if it's like any other US inspired motivational "conference", I can imagine from the title what it'll be like. Scientology-esque ?

NigeWick

kippen_noedel wrote: »

Neither do I really decry UW. I only find distaste in the methods used by many of its sales agents to procure themselves an income by distorting facts.

How many is many? Have you spoken to all the distributors to confirm a number? How many customers have you spoken to in order to ascertain that facts have been distorted?

Don't get me wrong, I am sure there are Independent Distributors who are the Spawn of Satan, but, I doubt the percentage is more than with any other company.

kippen_noedel

SwanJon wrote: »

I've never heard of a big 6 sales agent doing a survey (pretending to read a meter, asking to 'sign that I've been' yes, just not a survey).

Not so sure about that, didn't nPower recently get a £1,8 million fine for something similar. Most likely just a horrible coincidence that UW are supplied by nPower.

In reality all companies have bad apples.

1carminestocky

So is ANYONE going to take up my challenge? I have to say the silence is as deafening as usual. But this time I'm even more disappointed as we have feisty new blood on this thread. I notice 'artful' has vacted the premises since I challenged him, lol. ('Artful has left the building')

I repeat again, this is a money saving site, look up there it's called MoneySavingExpert. It's owned by The Money Saving Expert Martin Lewis and states CONSUMER REVENGE as one of its attractions. I say again, the energy industry is the most discredited industry in thew whole of the UK industries (Which? came to this comclusion in April, this is not just me saying this).

THERE ARE NO GOOD GUYS. ALL THE SUPPLIERS HAVE SOME DODGY PEOPLE WORKING IN THEIR MIDST. You just have to get the very best deal you can with one of them. I believe I have and have asked you 'experts' to get me a better one. You are ignoring my challenge therefore you have no credibility on a money saving site.

kippen, you've got a lot to say for yourself, perhaps you can take up the challenge?

NigeWick

SwanJon wrote: »

What steps are UW putting in place to prevent this kind of activity (which surely it frowns upon)?

Any Independent Distributor found "behaving badly" will have their association with Utility Warehouse terminated. As quite a few are earning goodly amounts, this tends to keep them honest. Some new people will no doubt step out of line in an attempt to "get rich quick," but the trainings that I have attended discourage any questionable activities because of the company wanting to keep a good name.

As with any business, there are people who mess up by accident and some who deliberately break the rules. I have made mistakes in the past and am not ashamed to admit it because the only people who do not make mistakes are those who do nothing. However, I always try and make good when I have messed up so that people I deal with trust me in the future. To my mind, profitable business is all about good relationships with customers. Treat them fairly, be honest and give good service in order to ensure good quality referrals from them to expand.

NigeWick

kippen_noedel wrote: »

but if it's like any other US inspired motivational "conference", I can imagine from the title what it'll be like. Scientology-esque ?

I have to say that the ones I have been to are a bit too "RahRahUpSchool" for me personally. OTOH, there is always some good information about new innovations at the annual conflab. AND, the opportunity to win good prizes in the "ticket sweepstakes."

keggs

kippen_noedel wrote: »

lol, no I haven't Quentin but if it's like any other US inspired motivational "conference", I can imagine from the title what it'll be like. Scientology-esque ?

More utter garbage.

Quentin

kippen_noedel wrote: »

..... if it's like any other US inspired motivational "conference", I can imagine from the title what it'll be like. Scientology-esque ?

Apart from seeing the video of the speaker encouraging the reps to manipulate the minds of their contacts, we also got a report on what goes on from conmenot who attended one (although long, the report does give a comprehensive insight):

conmenot wrote:

A quick summary of this conference:

Two fairly high level execs tried to compere the 8 hour (!) show with an attempt at comedy which was pitiful at best and downright embarrassing at worse, especially when the audience had better punchlines to their "jokes" than they had written.

Lots of "motivational speakers" who turned out to be execs at the top of the pyramid imploring the audience to find more customers/distributors.

They then dragged a hearing impaired man on the stage and a visually impaired woman, both of whom got a standing ovation for some unknown reason, as if the ability to sell utilities is somehow an incredible achievement for the disabled, which was patronising to say the least.

There were three signers eagerly translating all the sales pitches in BSL to what appeared to be only one deaf man, so they were definitely going down the "we love the disabled" route, and indeed much of their pitch was to do with helping communities.

I was rather hoping the blind lady would win the Mini Cooper just to see how the comperes would get out of that one without a script.

A senior level exec from Liverpool dragged his young family onstage and actually started crying (with his back to the crowd) when telling the audience about his nice new house. Then recovered his composure immediately.
His kids didn't look remotely concerned their dad was crying, because he was clearly putting it on... the son was looking at the crowd dead pleased with his dad's acting abilities.
At that point it really did resemble an American evangelist church meeting, with all the appalling emotional play-acting that goes with it.

There was a reasonably funny guy with a dry sense of humour with a guide to failure, how not to succeed, that kind of thing, but even he was being pretty patronising and even insulting - implying that people who work for a boss and have a small house are losers, that sort of nonsense.

Then they wheeled out their "celeb", who was - wait for it - an Olympic Gold Medallist!!
Turned out he rowed in Sydney 8 years ago as part of an 8 man team and won a gold medal - he's now their commercial director.
Seemed like a nice guy, though very posh (like all their top brass) unlike the mainly Northern middle class aspirational audience, then spent a painful amount of time describing the minutae of winning, before showing his successful rowing team win the gold. Then showing a replay. It was pretty sad by then.
You would think with all the money made from a sell out theatre show they could have afforded a decent celebrity endorsement.

The whole day was peppered with personal testimonials from people (an unusual amount of them were former police officers) who had achieved "SE Gold" which means they have roped in a minimum of 10 personal
customers and a minimum total of 50 customers within two months and get a mere £500 for bringing in what would potentially amount to tens of thousands for the company.

The comperes summed it up at the end most aptly by describing the whole day (and it was a very long day!) as being "an emotional rollercoaster".

Which is of course true - emotions were being manipulated all day, to make those who were not selling enough feel guilty, and to massage the egos of those who were doing OK.

It's very much an American style set-up, and seemingly has found popularity in the north of England, where social networking is somehow easier and more practical with smaller communities and the pub and sport culture that isn't so prevalent in London.

To be fair, the people we spoke to during the break (only one 45 minute break in 8 hours!) were really nice people, but had been hyped up to the point of obsession and were purely motivated to try and sell to us once they realised we hadn't become customers yet.

Trouble is - as this site has shown, you're not!

UW/T+ prices are not really very competitive, they're only buying from the same place as everyone else after all, and are subject to the same rises in costs.
A three minute comparison with other providers will result in a far better deal.

Raising the prices without warning is a mean trick - not one I'd like them to pull on my friends and family.

And as for having to get up on stage and recieve a public pat on the back for using your treasured social circles as a commodity for making the poshos at the top of the chain richer - no, definitely not for me.

By the way - none of this could be construed as disclosing private business information - as I have a feeling a lot of the UW distributors will read this post in horror and try to get it deleted for breaching company privacy - which is nonsense.

It was a public show in a public theatre, and this post is genuinely warning people to avoid the cult-like behaviour and virtual brainwashing that is going on at these things - it's deep level marketing dressed up as charity work.

It left a very nasty taste in my mouth.

Utilities Warehouse/Telecom Plus?

Avoid!!

keggs

More utter garbage

jimexbox

Carmine, ever thought about using 'T internet to make phone calls? Obviously I have unlimited worldwide call plan:rolleyes:, so would be worthless to myself, but its worth a look. Although your particular fetish for 0845/0870 numbers are an expensive extra, so maybe its for normal folk.;)