Complaint Review: Video Professor Inc. - Denver Colorado

In regards to the real scoop of Video Professor marketing procedure and tactics, they pretty much fall into these guide lines: A. Video Professor customer service representatives tell customers that refunds can't be credited until after 1-2 billing cycles. This is incorrect! The reason this policy's enforced is because Video Professor collects interest upon the funds collected from their customers' cards. What's really funny is that once customers return the the CD tutorials for refunds, Video Professor destroys the product, as opposed to repackaging it for resale. B. It only cost Video Professor a $1.00 to a $1.50 to produce, manufacture and package there CD's. Customers who pay $69.95 for a 3 CD package are getting completely ripped off. Even the $6.95 freight charge is a money making scam, considering that the total weight of the package should only cost no more than $1.50 to $2.00 to ship with U.S.P.S. C. Video Professor staffing requirements for customer service is ludicrous. They pay their call center employees a measley $8.00 an hour, while paying their marketing and promotional representatives incredibly high salaries. This is obsurd, considering they have so many marketing avenues such as VP Online, Software Savers, Compu Cards and offer 3rd party upsells for products such as Business Works Suite, McAffee Virus scan and Digital Camera and Learning Digital Camera packages. Lets put it this way, John Scherer is an incredibly wealthy man. So if consumers really want to fight back against Video Professor and all their marketing ploys, they're required to call 1-800-525-7763 (customer service) or send their request to [email protected]. But the chances of response are slim to none. If customers really want to have their feelings of frustration, as well as the violation of their rights as consumers addressed, I suggest they contact the following people, via email. It's a much more effective and faster way of getting their complaints known. Here are the following email addresses. Bettye Harrison, President: [email protected] Dave Laughlin, Vice President: [email protected] Kathy Franz, Human Resources Mgr: [email protected] Anthony Richardson, Project Mgr: [email protected] Michelle Wood, Ecommerce Mgr: [email protected] Eric Hansen, Marketing Director: [email protected] Cindy Reiff, Marketing: [email protected] Karla Hallquist, Teleservices: [email protected]

How's that for a subject line, Anthony? Of course, all of you have heard that I've been recently terminated from Video Professor, and with everything I do, a grand spectacle had been involved with my leaving. There's a part of me that chuckles, knowing that you'll never see me again. Well some of you will but others, like Anthony Richardson, won't and choose to hide behind their cowardliness and inability to retain their integrity. But everyone knows that Anthony's a coward, a snitch, and just an insecure p***y that just couldn't stand that I was more innovative, more capable, as well as honest and original in terms to doing my job. Plus, I could drop his a*s at anytime as well. I didn't have to play the politics and nonsense that the others did, yet I was still able to do my job, and do it better than anyone else without adhering to all the bullshit and bureaucracy. The funny thing is I did this all while being myself, which antagonized alot of people, due to speaking my mind and following my own rules (this is called foreshadowing). Buckle up, because this will be a long one. However, there is a duty of legality to this letter, but like my life, persona, my period at Video Professor, as well as my leaving - I had to get in my final say. Ok, technicalities and legalities! (this one's addressed to Kathy Franz and Bettye Harrison, but I still encourage you all to listen in) Where was I? Oh yeah, Kathy! To: Kathy Franz, Bettye Harrison and John Scherer (if his dumb a*s actually gets this) In accordance to state requirements requiring the former employer of an employee to relinquish information to any unemployment agency in regards to unemployment benefits, I'm required to request the last form of correspondence that was sent to [email protected] and [email protected], which included the last documentation entailing occurrences and the duties of my position at Video Professor. This documentation, which was sent from [email protected] indicates the events leading to my termination and can be sent to the following address at [email protected]. If you have any questions or concerns to this request, please feel free to forward them to the above mentioned address. Sincerely, J.S. Brown Alright folks, got that outta the way! Now, who's ready for a little story? So I guess you're all wondering what happened with my mug shot being posted within the company halls with the msg - DO NOT LET THIS PERSON IN AND CALL 911 IF YOU SEE THEM ON COMPANY PROPERTY or something to that effect. I'd talked to an Agent Halpin from the Lakewood Police dept, previously that afternoon, and he'd informed me about having to come in for some harassment ticket issued that was related to all this. This meeting wasn't to be detained, but to receive the issuing of the ticket, Per agent Halpin. I'd asked him if I'd be incarcerated and he said, "No, but if you don't a bench warrant will be issued for you're arrest, unless you come in and discuss the ticket for harassment tomorrow." (this is another legality just in case this porker wants to pull a bait and switch!) So let's start from the top... Chapter 1 - What actually happened - So I come in, do whatever the hell I do in themorning, get coffee, check emails, you know...s**t like that. All's fine and dandy until I decide to jump onto another pain in the a*s project for VPOnline. So before I do, I decide that there was an issue to close out with VPNOWGC5, the advmodule setup test for the 14-day prepaid gift card that was being launched. So prior to this test, we needed to see if the stupid thing actually worked in the production side of SQL and see what the correspondence between Gen21 and AREV would be like. It worked, blah, blah, blah and then we moved on to whatever. Well, to get this account in the live side of AREV, someone had to place an order using their live credit card. Of course, Mr. Goody Two Shoes/Boy Scout volunteered to use his card (b***h!). So I knew that panzy-a*s wouldn't want his card billed, so I inactivated it, checked the results on VPonline and just sent a brief simple email, indicating that the account was inactivated, the salesprogram worked, and Gen21registered the inactivation by generating a Your Username and Password cannot be verified message. So I send this email with the subject line reading as the following: "http://learn.videoprofessornow.com/knav/navFor VPNOWGC5" So Anthony responds back with, "Thanks for the info. FYI: This company is email reliant and the subject line should be read as Gift Cards" or some s**t like that. Now everyone knows that Anthony's a shittalker, an antagonist and a real p***k. All he does is run his mouth. He use to have this saying -"I throw my weight around!"- and would use this same phrase in regards to other former employees that he's gotten fired. Now this all stems from Anthony being threatened or intimidated by anyone who makes it a point to question what he has to say or proves that they have a more developed sense of potential and ability than he does. That and they can see through his bullshit and understand that he pretends to know more than he actually does. So this saying -"I throw my weight around!"- means that he runs and snitches to Bettye Harrison (president) and Dave Laughlin (vice president), creates a one sided story filled with false accusations, if at anytime an event involving another party doesn't go his way or can possibly make him look unfavorable. Now Bettye and Dave don't know the specifics of everything. They're office politicians, so of course they're going to believe some ambitious dumb a*s who uses the same big words within every email and report such as, "tentative" and "directive" to come off as some major player in the office politics game. Their job, is to pretend that all the little a*s munchers beneath them tell them exactly what they want to hear. So I'm like, "What the f**k??" and respond by saying something like, "I'll take that into consideration, but for future reference the URL and the advmodule were included in the subject line for clarity" or some s**t like that. In my opinion, Anthony and Kathy were pissed because they sent me some dumb a*s self-assessment form and I took to heart thephrase, "Please be candid!" Well, I didn't say too much but touched upon how Video Professor succumbs to the bullshit of politics, hires employees externally at a higher wage who often tend to f**k things up, yet show no appreciation for more experienced and dedicated employees (especially customer service) who have consistently proved their worth. I'd also touched upon how this was a direct result of John Scherer's assistant stealing company money. So Anthony responds back like the big bad wolf, huffing and puffing by replying, "THIS IS THE FINAL DIRECTIVE (SEE!) AND YOU'RE LAST WARNING...BLAH, BLAH, BLAH..." When you think about it, there's like 10-15 different types of gift card program setups and the only way to tell the difference between which one's are active or on staging are by the advmodules(vpnowgc5) and the urls (http://learn.videoprofessornow.com/knav/nav). So I'm just pissed because he's talking s**t again, pretending to act like he's important and making threats.So I march straight to his cubicle and tell him "We gotta talk!" and then head to one of the conference rooms. I start in and tell him how he has a tendency to make mountains outta molehills and just wants create an issue of controversy to make himself look better. He then interrupts with, "You don't understand anything about corporate politics and no one can understand your repor-" so then I immediately interject with, "Don't interrupt me, I wasn't finished! And who's been saying that they don't understand my reports?" Anthony's flustered at this point and responds by saying, "I don't have to tell you and I don't have to sit here and listen to this! I'm resolving this once and for all!" and then leaves to Kathy Franz's office and starts talking s**t, followed by a quick visit to Bettye's office to talk s**t. I attempted to explain my side of the story but Kathy had closed her door and refused to listen to what I had to say. So as far as I'm concerned, f**k her and f**k Bettye too! Now, let me tell you about the ongoing rift that's been going on between me and Anthony (for those who are still reading). See, they asked me to do this job because... A. I'm internal - meaning that they can pay me less as an analyst for a semi-out dated dos database system, than some external one with RBasic programming knowledge. B. I had the experience of working with AREV, being a tech for the Cd's along with basic documentation skills that came along with my previous experience as a supervisor. C. (most important) I work like a dogg for nothing. Anthony, Kathy, Bettye all knew this. Pat gave them the scoop of what I was capable of and what my intentions were. Of course, Anthony wants to use this to his advantage because it meant giving him a new title (QCmgr-formerly QC Web) and a raise which jumped from hourly to salary. Plus, it gave him a feeling of importance in knowing that he had a minion to help him, along with being one of the upper echelon of VP management. So I start, don't know what exactly is going on and just outta my gourd by not understanding the actual validity of my position. Anthony didn't want someone who knew the exact specifics of QC, because what he did wasn't that technical or effective in any regards, and is incredibly easy to learn. As I recall, Anthony was very intentional about keeping me "Out of the Loop" concerning very projects. He considered me a threat if and when I had access to various information. So by the time I had comfortable understanding of testing AREV, I'd realized that AREV testing was way more important than web testing and had a direct effect on the overall operation of the company. But I wasn't aware of this at first and neither was Anthony. But at some point we had both figured this out. But it was a difficult adjustment at first, because I was so use to working 12-15 hr days for $9.00/hr, along with no incentive check to compensate my efforts that it seemed odd that someone would just want me to sit at a desk and pretend to randomly write test reports for 8-hrs straight. Now what you have to understand is that Anthony's job is absolutely pointless. How he got it was beyond me, he must've licked enough of Bettye's arse to have gotten it because I can say this...QC web does absolutely nothing. They time downloads for landing pages, select phrasings and products from some retard admin tool and somehow still f**k things up! This was the issue with Nami until I intervened and saved your sorry asses! The little bit that Anthony did and the small remnants of knowledge required to do it wasn't much. But, of course, like all dingle-berries driven by ambition and warped into fighting until the bitter end for their job security, Anthony adamantly refused to share or include me on certain information. He didn't want me to know what he did, how he did it and why. Yet, at the same time, would b***h, talk s**t and threaten if I didn't copy him in on every bit of correspondence in regards to AREV. But the little b***h would actually threaten and yell to the top of his lungs if I didn't do everything his way. I even recall him flipping me off and saying, "f**k you! I'm the manager and you can't talk to me in this way!" after I'd responded defensively to one of his tirades. This went on until I threatened to beat his a*s in Kathy Franz's office about 4-5 months ago when he went into a temper-tantrum about what not. He used to snap at me until I started to tell him "Watch your f**king tone of voice!" and stick my finger in his face. Chapter 2 -Revolt- See, what happened was I'd been written up twice prior to getting fired (over the same exact bullshit), and 4 times previously before I left customers service. But it was the same type of attacks and had to do with me not tolerating anyone's s**t.I had this saying that for every position I've been in, I've been written up twice during that period. Primarily it always dealt with some manager or supervisor talking s**t and me responding by flipping them off or telling them to go straight to Hell! It wasn't so much a saying but more of an observation. Now what's unfair is that Anthony's lead, Melissa Koltes, had been late every day by at least 45 minutes to an hour, and not once has she been reprimanded or disciplined for her actions. I have no qualms with Melissa at all in regards to this. But on the other hand, since I happen to disagree with and stand up to the on going hypocrisy, I'm the one who had to be made an example of. The difference between Melissa and I is that Melissa's adheres more to the politics and social structure of Video Professor personnel. In my case, I make it a point to disregard it and create my own path, which makes me more of a threat. So of course I'mconsidering the outcome of this situation to be more on a personal basis than professional. From the time I'd started working at Video Professor, I was constantly being targeted for all types of different things. Anyway, I explained to Kathy that the f****t doesn't treat me equally, doesn't respect me, calls me Jigga Boo, says that I look like a Arab or Hindu (I'm African American/native American/Irish for all who's concerned) and would constantly aggravate and taunt me on a daily basis with stupid remarks. They primarily consisted with, "Phish sucks!" (Which is stupid considering that the moron has no clue about what's aesthetically valid about music or art) "I told you to do this or that!" "You're not following directive" and all types of quotes and phrases that were the extent of his s**t talking. See what happened was that if I said anything in my own defense against him, he'd take what I'd said and use it as an issue of insubordination, while making it an issue to be reported to Bettye, Dave and Kathy (HR). So what could I do besides take the s**t until I couldn't take any more, which lead me to going to Kathy Franz and requesting to go back to customer service. Kathy, of course, intervened with her signature voice that's been seasoned by cigarette butts and coffee grounds, by asking, "Anthony, would type of effect would have on the QC department if James went back to customer service?" This, of course, prompted Anthony to beg for me to not leave because it would screw everything up (His moving up to Project MGR, that is) and blah, blah, blah. So Kathy said we needed to work things out before it was taken into the Parking Lot. I replied with this exact statement, "He's already threatened me before, but he backed down like a coward!!" Anthony then rolled his eyes, but knew enough was enough and that at any moment I'd beat his a*s if I wanted to. Then, as always, he extends his hand and wants to be friends because he's afraid of a violent confrontation. My problem is that this same a*****e who makes it a point to go run and tell every time something doesn't go his way, has the nerve to make statements such as, "I can't stand snitches and Bitches!" Which is just ridiculous because it sounds like a desperate attempt to emulate the ideology of a hardened criminal. Remember the movie "Good Fellas" by Martin Scorcese that tells about Wise Guy, Henry Hill, who turned insider and went into FBI witness protection, while working with the Luchese family? I was at his site one day and this is the remark that Anthony made- "I'd never go to his site, he's a f**king Rat!" But at the same time this same mother f**ker went and ratted me out because I wouldn't let him talk s**t to me over using an advmodule and url for an email subject line. This is the same rat who talks s**t about senior management (not Bettye or Dave, that would be giving me too much ammunition) by making statements such as, "Chip Hopkins is dumber than a box of rocks!!" or "All that Peter Dunlap does is hide in his office so he doesn't have to be responsible or do anything all day!" He continually runs his mouth about other employees of the company. I could've easily done the same and repeated whatever I heard and used it to my advantage. But I didn't and never would consider using the same methods as he did. This is the same b*****d who would yell and become threatening to Betsy Butler, because all she'd asked for was my assistance. Then turn around and criticize her work after she endlessly saved your stupid company's asses over and over again. This is the same person who criticizes and makes fun of Lane Dolan, Bettye's daughter, when she's not around but somehow kisses her a*s when she comes to the office. This is the same person who tells tales of bravado by describing oral sex he received from various female representatives of the marketing department, and then has the nerve to ask his wife, Jenn Richardson, if she'd be interested in joining a swingers group, because he has a hard on for the blondes in Marketing and Ecomm. In all honesty, it's blatant that he's been the disruptive force within the QC department and disturbs the over all progress of your stupid company. I can even recall a time in which, for some odd reason, he described an event in which an ex girlfriend was upset due to finding out that Anthony had given her Chlamydia. This is the behavior that one can expect from the person, who because they didn't thoroughly test ecomm, realized after I'd begun testing for AREV that ecomm had been losing thousands upon thousands of dollars for over a year by sending the incorrect upsell modules and codes for 3rd party affiliates. But made this exact statement, "Don't say anything to Bettye because heads will roll!" and has the nerve to snitch me out. What a f**king panzy! So of course I'm pissed! In the past year I've gotten arrested and brutalized by a Denver cop who falsified a police report to have me convicted of bullshit, followed by the fact that my mother's dieing of diabetes and needs someone to help take care of her, along with finding out that someone nearly killed her in a car accident last week by running a red light. I've had nothing but numerous amounts of stress to deal with, still I came to work on time and did my job. Yet, this f**ker knows all this and wants to attack and intimidate, yet I'm the one getting fired because I wouldn't take s**t from some turn-coat f****t who's afraid that I'm going to make him look bad because I'm smarter and more effective than he is.In truth, I don't give a f**k because I knew this was coming. I should be glad that I'm not in jail, even though Anthony filed charges against me with the Lakewood Police. But somehow, he reserves the right to hate snitches and bitches. Anthony, this is not a threat in any way shape, or form. But I do have one question and would like to inquire about one thing. Anthony, you indicated that you'd be waiting for me in case a confrontation between you and I occurred. This was followed by a s**t eating smile of enthusiasm afterwards. I just want to formally ask if you'd be willing to meet me in a neutral area and without s**t talking, threats, weapons or charges being made to the police and settling this once and for all? I would like to know if you're willing to let your a*s cash a check that your mouth wrote? I'm interested in knowing if you have the balls to stand up to me one on one and go heads up?! Because for the most part, all you've done is run, hide and snitch. I even called and asked you if you'd be willing to meet me outside and fight but you went and called the cops. I'm quite serious about all this. I'm just interested in knowing if you're willing to threaten and attack me without having a company president and the cops to hide behind. Because in all honesty, I don't think you do. You knew it would come to this, so no more arguing, no more yelling - just an honest fight! Can you do that, you sorry little b***h? Here's the number you can dial to reach me it's... -1-800-EAT A FAT d**k! I really am interested in seeing you backup all your threats and bullshit. Like I said before, anytime and any place. This just isn't for me, this for everyone you've insulted, put down and never apologized to. Oh, and if you're inquiring as to why I've gone to this lengths to include others in regards to this email, especially over such an indifferent matter, it's for closure, but most important to clarify that I have no intentions of inflicting harm or damage to an unwilling party, unless this party (Anthony Richardson 303-232-1244 x391) is willing to actually face and confront me. That and there's more than one witness to the composition of this email. Also, this was my way of saying goodbye! I hate some of you but allot of you I love and the rest of you can kiss my grits! Pulse

I noticed in the rebuttal area for complaints against video professor that employees of the company like to blame the customer for problems they have had. Well that stinks of bad business to me, first of all if you want to run a decent business the customer is always right, second if you use deceptive practices such as extremely small print (online at least) to make a claim then you are obviously hiding something that you are doing wrong. I revisited the site I ordered the "FREE" trial of video professor on and was dismayed to find that in tiny print, not even on the order area on the page after it, was a little disclaimer, barely visible, basically unreadable and after the fact. This is full deception and I know that there will be many, many more complaints about this company, especially since they started their new deceptive sales practices. And to the idiot who claimed video professor had been in business for sixteen years, HELLOOOOOO LOSER, none of the products video professor sells would have been any use to any consumer even ten years ago. They may have been in business all those years but not in the consumer business, probably sold to businesses only and that isn't the same as direct sales to non-business customers. Video Professor is fraud, lies and deception and they should be ashamed of themselves.

I have one question for this person spouting what she claims is the company's policy. If I agreed to receive programs for review, especially moronic novice tutorials, why does your package clearly state: "IF YOU DID NOT ORDER, PLEASE DO NOT OPEN! CALL 1-800-7763?" I'll wait to see what my state's attorney general thinks about it.

Anne Dweeb of Lakewood: your transparent shilling is making me sick, sick to the point of...HAMMERTIME! POW! Take that! If you want to be pimped out by the Video Professor, trake it somewhere else! If you had taken time to read ALL the reports filed by dissatisfied consumers, you would note that ALL felt deceived by VP. Why don't you tell your corporate masters to stand by their "product" and stop hiding behind Orwellian titles and legalese? Ooooh! BAM! Ouch!

Video Professor has been in business for over 16 years. In most complaint cases, it appears that the customer either doesn't recall hearing the information and doesn't read over the enclosed information in their package, or they have buyers remorse and gives false information about Video Professor. We have two types of ordering processes: telephone orders and online orders. For telephone orders: The customer will call the 800 number seen on our various commercials or newspaper ads. When a customer calls to order our free lesson, they are given the OPTION to receive two additional lessons for a 10-day free trial period. After 10 days they are advised that they will be billed $69.95. They are also given information about our Monthly Review Program. The customer is under no obligation to accept the review lesson and can receive the "free-only" lesson they saw advertised. However, ALL of our calls are recorded and 99.9% of the customers do agree to receive the review lesson and the terms it is shipped under. There are also several pieces of information regarding the review program in each of the shipments the customer receives. Therefore, the customer is advised of our review program during the time of their call, on the inside flap of the packaging, and also in the "Program and Warranty" booklet in each package. The other method of ordering is via online: This offer is different than offers on TV or print, and states such on the web page. The review information is printed clearly for the customer. In closing, it is NOT necessary for any customer to log on with Earthlink in order to utilize the lessons. This again is another OPTION for the customer that can be easily bypassed by clicking on the "Go To Lessons" button on the customer's computer screen. If you need more information regarding our companie's shipping and billing practices, I would be more than happy to comply. Sincerely, Customer Correspondence Manager