Once upon a time, a nice lady was strolling Orchard Road when she was approached by a teenage boy to fill up a survey for him, after which she can try her luck at a lucky draw. And guess what? She won the first prize of $1,000 worth of holiday voucher! According to the boy, there is only 1 top prize per mth and he can get a $50 reward if she follows him to the office and listen to a 1 hr talk, after which she will get her prize. Seeing that the boy looks very young to be working part-time and partly because of greed, she followed him to the talk.

Upon arrival at the office (which was full of other people attending the talk conducted by individual salespeople), she was served drinks and food by the salesperson. He started making friendly conversation and explaining the holiday program they have. Basically, you buy a membership for more than $10,000 and you get to go to the list of resorts around the world for a nominal fee.

When the lady explained to him that she wasn't interested, he keeps offering to talk to the manager and lower the price. And then he started being sarcastic that she can't even pay such a low amount.

1 hour became 2...3....4. It was only when she couldn't take it, signed up and paid a deposit of $300 that they let her out. Luckily, she was able to back out of the contract the next day. Unfortunately, the deposit has to be forfeited. But compared with some people who paid thousands in deposits, she was still considered lucky.

Point of the story is, even though this tactic has been highlighted on a TV program to warn people, I still see many of these "lucky" people cheated on the streets. I feel like going up to warn them of the scam, but there are simply too many of them! Isn't there anything consumers can do in the face of such high pressure sales tactics?

# posted by Shopaholic : 10:54 PM