Anyone with half a brain knows that the telemarketers of yesteryear have now moved onto the Internet in order to lure people into their scams, be they wanting to sell you a “great, new product” or offer you an “exciting business opportunity.” Yesterday morning, I had the displeasure of being rudely awoken by a Facebook message from somebody attempting to do the latter. Without further ado, I’d like to present a comedy about pyramid schemes, technical savvy, and wiseassery:
The Cast of Characters:
Michael Pappas: the sly con artist. with an offer I can't refuse. Or can I...? (Dialogue in bold)
Miss Frotrap: our literate anti-hero, who always gets the girl (as long as her name's Felicia!). (Dialogue unbolded; commentary in italics)
Hi Peter,
My partners company, JRM Enterprise, is currently going through an expansion period focusing in the New York area. We are looking for a couple of individuals to work with. I know this may be a bit of a shot in the dark, but do you keep your options open outside of what you currently do full-time?
Regards,
Michael
I’m sorry, how did you find me? Is this even legit?
Hi Peter,
This is legitimate.JRM Enterprise operates with franchising, social networking, and endorsements. We have business throughout the tristate area as well as Greece [Tri-state and Greece, eh? How is it, that in amassing this vast empire, they’ve seemed to miss ANYTHING between these two areas!?]. We deal with various aspects of business. I found you using a search engine my partner designed to locate individuals based on their publicly displayed information on their social networks [Does he mean Google?]. People tend to be more truthful and do not expand the truth as much as compared to a Resume [NOT TRUE! I’m pretty sure most men claim to have bigger penises on their profiles, and many young women choose to lie about their appearance in an attempt to make me believe they’re not human beings, but ducks!]. If you provide me your contact information, preferably a cell phone number, I will have my business partner explain the opportunity in further detail.
Do you have a website or anything that offers a publicly available overview of your company’s purpose and services?
The web portal I have available is password protected for the clients and different corporations I work with. The information displayed on it would not have information displaying opportunities. [Read: I’m full of shit, and rely solely on buzzwords, hype, and hastily put together HTML in order to excite you, America’s young men and women!]
That’s fine, I’d just feel more comfortable knowing the company’s purpose, mission statement, and policies before deciding if I’d be interested in viewing any available opportunities. [Mission statement? What am I, back in Catholic school!?]
Provide me with a way to get in contact you over the phone so I may provide you with those details. I would prefer not to cheapen my business over Facebook. [That’s why you approached me on Facebook, right? To preserve your corporate integrity?]
I understand, but all the information you provide with me will be kept confidential [I fucking lied!]. I don’t really feel comfortable distributing my phone number or any contact information until I know exactly who I’m dealing with.
Heres the website. http://www.thegbsinc.com/ its very general because its password protected like i previously mentioned [Or because it’s based upon flashy looking words and pictures which have been sloppily thrown together, but hey: you say “toe-may-toe,” I say “tah-mah-toe,” right?]. If you have any questions or would like to receive any more information let me know.
I appreciate the link to your company’s website. Even without the benefit of having access to every section of the secure site, I feel it is quite informative. Your client portfolio is full of big, household names. However, I feel as though your strategy of “disrupting the distribution chain and shifting business online” promotes a marketplace which uses grandiose advertising campaigns as a hollow substitute for the quality of the final product, thus reducing the customers of these businesses to mere demographics: as someone who believes strongly in the dedication to quality offered by small mom and pop businesses, this is a practice which I feel I cannot, in good conscience, associate myself with.
Also, in your portfolio, you mention a Miss America mobile app, presumably developed by your company. Upon searching across Google and various mobile app stores, I’ve seen no app available similar to the one described on the site. Is the app being developed or has it been discontinued?
In addition, upon searching for Global Business Solutions on the United States Securities and Exchange Commission website, I have found no record of the company being registered as a legitimate business. Also, upon running thegbsinc.com through the Whois.Net domain-based research service, I see the site was registered by HostMonster.com on November 11, 2011. I’m having difficulty believing that a company which claims to represent hundreds of other companies for the past 50 years and also boasts about providing its clients with solutions in order to “shift business online” has only set up its own website not even four months ago through an online hosting service.
Lastly, the website and address are for a company called Global Business Solutions; the company you initially claimed to represent is JRM Enterprise, which I could find no mention of on the website or through any web searches, even without the context of an association with Global Business Solutions [Actually, that’s not entirely true: I found a local home-improvement service in New Jersey called JRM EnterpriseS. In an effort to support mom and pop businesses, and discredit Michael Pappas, I highly encourage my Jersey followers (do they exist?) to offer JRM’s home-improvement Enterprises your patronage!]. These incongruities do not quell my initial apprehensions about this opportunity offered by your company, but only serve to arouse them further. If I have in any way misunderstood the information I’ve been presented with about your company, please feel free to correct me so I may re-evaluate my feelings about your company and its offer; if not, then I’m afraid I am unable to partake in the wonderful and exciting opportunity offered to me by JRM Enterprise.
GBS is a parent corporation of JRM. Usually I do not introduce my business as JRM however, seeing the growth that we are having within our division, it feels more appropriate to offer an opportunity within JRM instead of GBS. We previously had another website and created a new one. The app is currently very limited to those working within the company appropriately. Anymore information I would be happy to answer over the phone. Otherwise best of luck to you.
A meme is born!
If I may say so, I feel as though you have misrepresented yourself and your company in your failure to be forward about GBS and its involvement with JRM from the start of your offer. Because of this, as well as other discrepancies between the information available about GBS/JRM and the information provided by you and your website, I believe we are quite finished here. Cheers!
Alright, we're done here!
This is not so much to air my dirty laundry as it is to bring to your attention the fraudulent offers made by Global Business Solutions, Inc. and JRM Enterprise. If anyone has further insight on Global Business Solutions, Inc., JRM Enterprise, or Michael Pappas, please let me know. In any event, if you find yourself dealing with any of these people or businesses, be warned that any offers they make you are more than likely bullshit.
Miss Frotrap's Blog 
dude – you have the government after you.
Right? Makes more sense than anything the rep was telling me!
😉
Your eloquent answers are the signs of a true literary marksman. Hi ho!
Thanks for the insight into this! I was just contacted with the same offer earlier. The first thing I did was run a search and thankfully your blog was on the 1st page.
Not a problem, glad I could be of help!
Same here. Thanks so very much for the information.
Guy by the name of Julien Vincent came out of no where offering me a business opportunity on facebook, asked what the name of his company was, “Global Business Solutions”, I googled GBS, there are hundreds of businesses going by the same name, in fact I don’t think Global Business Solutions is the name of a company, I think its a general term used in the financial sector. Anyway once I came here and all the info was similar to what this guy was telling me I blocked him right away.
It’s a very generic name for a company: everything about their website and presentation is generic. Glad I could help give you the information, though! They actually got in contact with me recently about this very post, but I’ll save that exchange for another entry.
Please post when you can!
I was contacted beginning of this month via Facebook from someone from GBS who happens to live in my town and graduated from my high school 3 years later! Pretty girl too (at least thats what her Facebook photo portrays). She followed up with a phone call today (a few weeks later) and actually marketed the opportunity pretty well and mentioned it is a part time job and that she does this in addition to being a teacher. Reluctantly, I agreed to attend an orientation at a nearby hotel conference center tomorrow to learn more about the business and meet the people in charge. But after doing some more Googling and eventually finding this blog, I’ll have to tell pretty girl when she calls to confirm that I won’t be attending….it could’ve been love 😦
LOL. But anyway, excellent post thanks!
No problem! I mean, feel free to attend still and learn what you can: everything in my post is based purely on what I’ve been able to find online (which isn’t much), so if anybody can offer concrete details about GBS it’ll help make a much clearer picture.
As far as Michael Pappas’s follow up with me, he had this to say:
“There are several companies part of one large entity. We are structured very much like Warren Buffet’s Berkshire Hathaway. I am sorry if I have lead you down the wrong path or you feel you are misinformed. I am aware of the blog you have posted and I would very much appreciate it if you can take down the information. We are a legitimate business and we care for our company’s integrity. We build our business responsibly and are accountable for our actions. As a result, I understand your frustration and I apologize.”
So, I shot back this nugget:
“I apologize if you believe that my blog has affected any business dealings that you may have. As I’ve mentioned, I harbor suspicions about your company and the lack of credible, readily available public information, as well as the manner in which you have presented me with internal information. However, as two gentlemen of the world, I believe we can come to a compromise of sorts. I’m quite willing to reconsider my position on your company, as well as my blog post’s visibility, in exchange for some information:
1. The name of your conglomerate’s chairman and CEO
2. Detailed contact information for the main office (address, fax number, phone number, e-mail address, etc.)
3. A list detailing the names, functions, CEOs, and the Tax ID Numbers (TINs) or Employer Identification Numbers (EINs) of the companies under the entire umbrella
As well as any other information and evidence which would be helpful in definitively legitimizing the existence of the multiple companies you represent.”
If (and ONLY IF) they can provide all of that information and it checks out, I’d take down this blog post. I definitely wouldn’t stand in the way of a legitimately run business, but I mean it sounds shady, and there’s really no information about them, which makes it worse. For now, though, I’d like to think I’m at least presenting people with a quick resource on my findings about these companies in order for them to weigh both sides and make their own decision from there.
I just found this in my “spam” mailbox on Facebook (which I never really check)
Hi Christopher,
My partners company, JRM Enterprise, is currently going through an expansion period focusing in the New York area. We are looking for a couple of individuals to work with. I know this may be a bit of a shot in the dark, but do you keep your options open outside of what you currently do full-time?
Regards,
Michael
Baaaaaazing!
Ha, same guy? Pappas?
Yep! I may screw with him a little. Will post updates X-D
Hey guys thanks alot for the heads up. I was recently contacted by a tristian anthony that offered evsything that you put up on this blog. I also recently just got a friend request from a Michael pappas but i am not sure if it would be the same guy or not because of me being Greek myself I know many Michael Pappas’ through different family members. If you could post the Facebook address to the Michael Pappas that contacted you so I would know to block him if it is the same guy.
Thanks all again.
Chris,
Thank you for the information. I must say, your writing is a lost art.
Bring it to justice, the site is already 404 on the contact page because of me!
Abuse@hostmonster.com
Definitely report it, folks! Thanks for the e-mail address!
I was contacted by a Cameron Mitchell on Facebook who initially contacted me asking, “Hey, do you have a background in athletics, business, management, marketing, or social media?
Best, Cameron.” When I asked how he found me and what this was all about he replied, “I work with a large company and have an opportunity in the area that you might fit the criteria for. I can’t promise anything but if you’re keeping your options open, shoot me your number and I’ll give you a call,” clearly ignoring my question of how he found me or what made him decide to contact me. Also, if there is no promise or job opportunity open in the first place, then why even bother to contact me? After this message I replied that I simply can not give out my information without knowing more. His response: “The name of the company is Global Business Solutions and we help companies develop their brand on and offline. We have partnerships with Best Buy, Sears, K Mart, Dicks Sporting Goods, Orlando Magic, And the Detroit Red Wings just to name a few. Now thats not all we do, but just to give you a general idea.” After having a name of the company that I could Google Search, I immediately figured out it was a scam and came across your fantastic blog. After that I just called him out on not answering my questions and told him not to contact me again. I had no idea that this kind of telemarketing scam even existed, but I truly enjoyed your account of the story and hope no one actually falls for this trap!
Thank you very much, I’m glad I could help you out, and hope that more people at least Google the company when people from it contact them.
I just received the very same face book inbox message from a Jeffrey Malkiel. I asked the name of the company and he directed me to this website http://www.thegbsinc.com after telling me everything he told you. After do some research and smelling a rat, I found this site. I asked for his contact information and he has yet to responded. I might have been born at night but not last night LOL. Thanks Missfrotrap and everyone else for this information, it is very helpful.
Oh he just responded with a telephone number with a 732 area code. Told me to ask for Aanand between 1-4, That will never happen.
a collegue called me a few hours ago telling me about a “great opportunity”. this is the third time I’ve been asked to do something business related that smelled like some kind of scam so I chatted with the guy my collegue reffered me to. Right away he wanted to estabilish some “common ground” by saying that he went to my school, that the job he wants me for has communications-based work that’s based on my major, and it all sounded weird and sleazy. looked them up on google, found your site, as well as another scam-watch site, and I’m confident that I made the right decision on not following up on the “generous offer”.
WOW I GOT THIS MESSAGE FROM AN OLD FRIEND : Hey Hun, I have a friend who recently opened a distribution business and is look for part time workers who are looking to make extra cash upon their current job. If you’re interested in making some extra cash let me know.
AFTER CHATTING AWHILE SHE SAID SHE WILL GET HER :FRIEND” TO CALL ME. THE GUY JUST CALLED AND TOLD ME THE COMPANIES NAME WAS GLOBAL BUSINESS SOLUTIONS!!! I IMMEDIATELY GOOGLED THE NAME AND FOUND THIS!
I MIGHT JUST GO TO THAT ORIENTATION TO SEE WHATS UP AND POST IT.
I got a Facebook message from a guy named Michael Kashyap offering a position in Social Media. I actually spoke to him and set up a meeting. What triggered some suspicion was his reluctance to give me a website to check out about the company. And come on – don’t say you do social media work for Apple – they don’t do social media work.
Thanks for the post! You saved me going to some creepy indian guys apt.
I was contacted by a guy named Kiran Bryan. He told me we have friends in common and when I checked we had one friend in common and that was a local politician. He wanted to set an appointment for me in a ballroom and at a local mariott. Would love to the know what the exact scam is but not curious enough to waste my gas or time.
I asked for website and he texted me http://www.thegbsinc.com/
I responded that I couldn’t believe a company that could get the likes of best buy and at&t would have a website of this poor caliber.
This was his response:
“I’m sorry you don’t fully understand what we do, but we are a 10.5 billion company and I’m pretty sure Best Buy , Barns & Nobles and Sears would not ruin there name. FYI we own the Orlando Magics and Sandra Bullock endorses for our company . If you would like to get more information on what we do and how we operate you can still attend the appointment if not it’s been a pleasure speaking with and best of luck with your venture.”
Sandra Bullock…really? LOL
Hey.. Thank God for your blog. I received the same exact email that Cait received on April 17, from a guy I went to high school with. I noticed that we had some friends in common, but I was curious as to why he chose to speak to me, even though we were not friends on FB. He gave me the same exact responses on Cait received in her e-mail. I finally did some googling and came across some websites, but none that coroborates with what he says. Then I found this lovely post after saying a prayer. You are definitely God sent. Thank you for the information, I appreciate it!!!!
LOL, So basically what you’re all saying is…A company emailed you for an opportunity, and you choose to put faith in Google, a search engine (not research engine), rather then meeting with the owner of the company?
I received the same message from someone last week, however I met up with him to see if he was a real person and to see if he was giving me legitimate information. The result from last week turned out to be correct to my shock. I had talked to the owner of the company about this blog, (because I saw it before meeting up with them) and he said that the company has a vast amount of branches all over the world to where it’s hard for the Vice president of the company to keep track of which branches run into problems because they are not doing their job correctly. (Which makes sense because you have good lawyers, bad lawyers, good doctors bad doctors, so you want to find out which ones do what they say they will do). So they allow the owners of that branch to have legal rights to change the name of the company for their branch to tell all of them apart (This way if there is a problem with a certain branch the company knows which one to talk too). Each branch is allowed to get their own website made by the company and everything, so even though the company has been around for over 50 years, that branch has only been around for a few months. Seeing as how it’s only been around for a few months, It also makes alot of sense why that branch is looking to expand.. because they are still very new.
I am scheduled to meet back up with the owner to get even more information in a few days. So far from meeting the owner, and all the people that work there, I am pleased to say it is not a pyramid scheme like Miss Frotrap said (Pyramid scheme’s don’t even have products to begin with where this company has over 600 patent products). I shall inform you all when I get even more information about this company to help you all decide for yourselves on whether you want to meet up with the owner or not. Hope this helps some of you 🙂
-Jonathan B.
Hey Jonathan – would you mind answering a couple of questions? I’m wondering what “research engine” do you recommend? What is the owner’s name? What website were you given? Finally, what are the products?
I don’t understand how basic details are nowhere to be found……highly suspicious.
johnathan fell for the scheme. it IS a pyramid schemes, pyramid schemes DO have products. Quixtar had thousands of products, catalogs, independent business owners, etc.. Noe having said that, that does not mean that it is a fraud. It is a legitimate business, or better said it is a legitimate business/money making IDEA. And it works for some. But the way they lure people in it is very deceiving and wrong. And by the time people who were sucked in realize what it is they are already elbows deep in it. You can go to the meetings in the hotels, listen to the success stories of people who supposedly got their financial freedom by doing this, listen to the motivational speeches, etc.. but it is a shady operation/scheme and NOT what they initially present you with by painting all these pretty pictures.
It would appear from your post that you are (again) misprepresenting the facts – it is obvious that this post is also a scam and that you are, in fact, someone from GBS pretending to be a genuine ‘normal’ person in order to attempt to fool us – and failing. Nice try GBS!
Girl by the name of Chelsea Lee on Facebook contacted me this afternoon, saying she is working with a large company that is expanding its social media division & asking me if you want to make extra money on top of what you do? I asked her what exactly is this company that you work for & what is this description of social media. Her response: “We market for Dell, Apple, Microsoft, Dicks sporting goods, Best Buy, etc. You would be learning to drive business to these companies through social networks such as Facebook. If that is something you would be interested in, shoot me your number and I will touch base with you this week. Or if you’d prefer to contact me, my number is 609-218-3749.” She then gave me the website: http://www.thegbsinc.com/. I decided to do research & I came across this blog & have recently warned friends of mine who have gotten messages like this & to avoid them completely. Thank you missfrotrap for this information
Thanks for this. I was contacted by a woman on facebook saying she owned GBS. Her profile picture made her look no more than 25, so I did some fishing. Her name (and exact profile picture) came up in a magazine article, saying she is a hairstylist. When I called her out on it, she directed me to the poorly designed website you mentioned and noted she was also a hairstylist. Your blog definitely confirmed this is a scam.
Same thing happened to me, ugh!
I was also contacted. But I’m confused as to the purpose of this. You go to the meeting and then what? You get paid for attending? Not understanding what they want people to do for them and how.
Hello everyone, I work with Global Business Solutions, we’re a NY division of a larger corporation. It’s not a scam and it’s not a job, it’s an opportunity to build a secondary residual income through building social networks of shoppers. If you have any questions or concerns feel free to contact me. Facebook.com/richstevensiii
Again, it’s not a scam, our larger affiliate organization actually has a documented A+ Rating with the Better Business Bureau and is Approved by the Federal Trade Commission which could be shown to you if we found you to be qualified to work with us and you came to a location we were working out of for a group orientation. Good Luck to everyone!
Regards,
Rich
Got an invite from the under-mentioned.
mark mohammed director at JRM Enterprises ltd
Since you are a person I trust, I wanted to invite you to join my network on LinkedIn.
Thanks for info.
I must thank you for the efforts you have put in penning this blog.
I’m hoping to check out the same high-grade content by you in the future as well. In fact, your creative writing abilities has inspired me to get my very own blog now 😉
I am truly glad to glance at this blog posts which carries plenty of
valuable facts, thanks for providing such data.
I received various threatening voice-mails claiming things like “The FBI is after you”, or “If you don’t call right now, a lawsuit will be put against you, not in your favor” etc. I finally answered one of these calls and of course got routed overseas to an Indian telemarketer.
The woman on the phone said I owed $600 to a company called “Gateway Olden Group” for a ‘pay-day loan’ I applied for online over 2 years ago. I explained I accepted no such funds and the bank account in question was no longer active (she had my previous banking information and last 4 of my SSN). I still wasn’t convinced.
I asked why I had not received any letters. She explained the company sent several and won’t be sending anymore until they receive $600 from me. She said if I paid in full she would drop it to a small fee of only $400, but I wasn’t allowed to hang up and I had to give up my banking information today. (YEAH RIGHT). I said if they are legitimate they will send me a letter, otherwise I wasn’t worried about it. She then threatened me by saying the next letter I get would be for a court appearance. She tried convincing me that paying $400 to make this all go away was better then the fees of taking it to court. I told her fat chance and hung up.
I then called my previous bank, explained the situation and asked for records around the time in question. NOTHING WAS DEPOSITED INTO MY ACCOUNT. If it’s real and they take me to court, I have paperwork on my side. Since this isn’t real, my only concern now is that they have too much of my personal information.
This needs to be stopped, and people should be aware this is one of MANY scams out there.
If you don’t have it in writing, and you can’t verify the company, then it’s not real!
Thanks,
Jessica