Remember the group of ambulance chasers who followed California’s play with a class action law suit of their own just days after Jerry Brown made his bold attempt to topple what he called a “gigantic pyramid scheme”?

We all know by now how successful California was in shutting YTB down.

In June, the court ruled that the groups initial class action “failed to provide sufficient factual allegations” concerning those who were not Illinois residents. The group has re-filed once again and “corrected their deficiency” by amending the first filing to give it a go once more. The first filing did not have standing to sue because the plaintiffs brought their case under the Illinois Consumer Fraud and Deceptive Business Practices Act. In addition, after spending over one hundred hours pleading and arguing, counsel for the ambulance chasers realized they had framed their clients relationship and argument with YTB incorrectly. The new suit now holds claim that the relationship between YTB and RTA’s are under consumer laws, (business-to-consumer) even though the RTA-YTB relationship would typically be viewed as business-to-business.

Do words like “failed”, “corrected”, “deficiency”, “amending”, “incorrectly”, and “realized after 100 hours of arguing”, give you a warm fuzzy concerning the counsel that is representing this group?

After admitting so many errors in the first filing, it appears that Counsel is just as clueless about the Network Marketing Industry as our critics who have been yammering about pyramids and scams for years. They may have even sought advise from the likes of Robert Fitzpatrick, Jon Taylor, and heaven forbid, John Frenaye. (After Wednesday’s post, you know what a huge mistake that would be.)

The suit filed back in August of last year went after the same four executives California did, Lloyd Tomer, Scott Tomer, Kim Sorensen and Andrew Cauthen. The new filing has added a smorgasbord of other names and companies to include two former board members, Timothy Kaiser and Clay Winfield, as well as their companies, Meridian Land Company and Winfield Development. The list also includes Beryl Martin, the printing company owned by Sorensen and Tomer, and while none of the defendants have been with YTB since October 2008, our new co-CEO who just joined back in April, Robert Van Patten has also been named in this new plea.

We’ll call it what it is: a shotgun approach.

Counsel certainly didn’t get any help from the plaintiffs in this action concerning YTB’s marketing model or opportunity. When we looked at the list of Plaintiffs in the filing we found an average of eight months worth of experience with the company. Two gave up in just four months, and decided playing the role of victim was a much easier option to make the millions they were after when they signed up.

• Courtney Speed – 4 months
• Kwame Thompson – 4 months
• Grace Perry – 5 months
• John Stull – 6 months
• Faye Morrison – 11 months
• Jeff and Polly Hartman – 18 months

Surprised? Not me.

I got a call yesterday afternoon from a client who debarked in the port of Miami with his family of three. He called to tell me that I was right, a five day was too short, and he’ll be booking a seven day with me just as soon as he can. Of course, I’ve been with YTB for four years, not four months. So it’s not surprising that this group who “dabbled as a travel agent” for an average of eight months were not as productive. I think back to my first year, and remember how slow bookings were. But I was also new to the industry, and spent a considerable amount of time learning, not selling. What I did sell was from pure passion about a product I loved.

I found a couple of humorous concepts in the filing which I’d like to share with you just to show how ridiculous this new suit is.

The claim states that BandBVacations.com is not a business that sells products or services. Since YTB strictly controls my actions, they are the ones who are selling the products and services. Therefore, the call I got from my client from Miami apparently was routed through the home office and not directly to me. According to the claim, everything goes through the home office in Wood River. I couldn’t get the call, couldn’t book the cruise, and won’t be seeing the commission since I’m an “agent of the travel agency”. I don’t offer a 100,000 ton cruise ship product, YTB does. The service of an excellent vacation to the Caribbean, also YTB’s.

Poppy cock! My clients don’t even know who YTB is, but they do know Doug and Ronda with BandBVacations.com, and Illinois will have a tough time finding anyone who has a better relationship with someone at the home office over any one of our RTA’s.

As an RTA I’ve made a net profit from travel sales, but the suit claims that this is impossible for most, if not all, RTA’s. I would agree that that it would be impossible for any RTA who spends less than six months in this business. But to say it’s impossible for the 25th Largest Seller of Travel in the Nation with $425 million in gross product and services sold, and a net of $27.9 million is a farce. I know the margins in the industry stink, but that’s not because it’s an illegal pyramid. Unless of course you want to call Carnival, Pleasant Holidays, Disney, Sandals, and Holiday Inn a scam. (I will agree however with a growing number about United and American Airlines.)

I’d would assert that a number of RTA’s have figured out how to make a profit, including yours truly. Instead of complaining about it, why not find someone who is making a profit and learning how to do what they do?

And finally in a very strange twist, while the suit claims that we don’t sell a product or service. (In order to make it sound like a “pyramid scheme”) The suit deducts and supports it claims that it’s impossible for RTA’s to make money selling travel in the following mannor.

(You’re going to LOVE this…)

YTB Defendants marketed and sold products to the travel purchaser market generally. As of 2007, YTB was considered the 26th largest travel agency in the United States, and their market share continued to grow. YTB Defendants directed their operations at the travel purchaser market generally by marketing and selling their products and services, such as airline tickets and cruise packages, to the public at large. Moreover, YTB Defendants’ illegal pyramid scheme injured both their travel agency competitors as well as travel consumers. YTB Defendants stole market share from brick-and-mortar travel agencies, putting many out of business. Moreover, by eliminating their competition, YTB Defendants increased the cost of travel for travel consumers at large. As such, Defendants’ illegal pyramid scheme was directed at the travel consumer market generally, effected the consumer market and otherwise implicated consumer protection concerns.

Give me a second here…I have to dry my eyes.

Do you see what they’ve done here? By taking the products and services away from us, (the RTA) the suit slaps YTB Corporate with not only defrauding consumers, (our clients) but Corporate is solely responsible for Cruise Value Center closing, Liberty Travel layoffs, and the Joystar bankruptcy. They all sold a product and service that YTB not only took away, but YTB is now increasing the cost of that product or service to these consumers.

Picture Ron Head or Coach here when I say “WOW!”

Come to think of it, this IS filed with the courts now, so this idea that YTB is putting Travel Agencies out of business has to be true right? (Nah…it doesn’t cut the mustard when John Frenaye pull that stunt, so why should it with me.)

The point here folks is to show you how absolutely absurd this new filing is, and this is a second swipe at it after the first attempt needed to be amended. If you want to buy into this crap, I’d have some serious reservations about how much common sense you actually have. This entire claim is nothing more than a fishing expedition to save face for those who wouldn’t take that time to learn a craft that frankly is very easy to talk about. And because it’s easy to talk about, simply opening your mouth and telling someone that you sell travel will give you the same shot as Travelocity when they see some Roaming Gnome on TV.

And to the Plaintiffs in this case, the quote is NOT “punt”, it’s “try, try, again”.

Idiots.

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Doug & Ronda Bauknight AKA: TravelPro Travel Agent / Networker Phone: 678.458.5812

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Tags: Critics, Pyramid Scheme, YTB International

This entry was posted on Friday, July 17th, 2009 at 5:00 am and is filed under Anti-MLM, Critics, Cruise Value Center, John Frenaye, Jon Taylor, Joystar, Layoffs, Liberty Travel, MLM, MLM Myths, Network Marketing, Pyramid Scheme, Robert FitzPatrick, Travel Agent Issues, Travel MLM, YTB International, YTB News, YTB Travel. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.