United First Financial - Looking for the truth

Ah, one of my favorite threads, along with agape and, of course, the mother thread. Probably because the MLM threads make even ME feel smart.

PMonkeyDishwasher said:   I love the Ponzi/MLM/scam threads. Always entertaining to watch the believer crowds show up and ignore all warnings and red flags, then slowly come to the realization that they've been burned and demand justice.

There's one in Deal Discussion right now if you're interested. Someone started a gift card-based Ponzi called Cardilly.
Link please!

It seems Accelerated Equity & Development (parent company of United First Financial), doing business as Accelerated Cashflow Technologies (ACT), is still at it with the direct mail side of this scam:

AOL Finance link

AOL Finance said:
In 2010, the Federal Trade Commission issued its first alert about the bogus auditing practice. That year, the Better Business Bureau had no complaints filed in its category for forensic loan audits. But in the first eight months of 2011, the BBB said it filed 50 complaints in that category, with more than half of them against Accelerated Equity & Development, Inc., and Tila, LLC.

See full article from DailyFinance: http://srph.it/qUdaBs


They're still mailing letters to random people, claiming to audit mortgages for $99 to find fraud and mistakes totaling tens of thousands of dollars, then they are given the spiel for the Money Merge Account, which is now sometimes described as budgeting software (click that link at your peril).


And the Pill Method people are still popping pills, selling 3 or 4 MMAs per month. It's comical. You've never seen a group so deep in denile. They hand out promotional DVDs like they're made of gold, because the leader of this mini cult (Donald Daniel) burns the DVDs and sells them for $25 apiece, or $80 for five. Fortunately for Donald, the agents he managed to recruit think making a DVD involves witchcraft, so there's no chance they'll figure out how to copy the DVD for a few pennies. The best, though, is their recent Facebook entry:
Donald Daniel said: WOULD YOU LIKE TO KNOW HOW I PREDICTED THAT THE PILL METHOD SYSTEM WOULD SUCCEED AND THE OTHER METHODS OF MARKETING THIS PRODUCT WOULD FAIL?
So far, in October, they have 1 sale for the month.

OK Ill throw a new twist in this thread....

I am officially recanting my disapproval of the UFF Heloc/ALOC loan offered in years past. Yes I was wrong. This loan was perhaps the best loan ever offered.

In fact, it has a current rate which I believe to be UNDER 1 PERCENT. They used an index which has dropped so low, that while it was a terrible deal when originally offered, it is now the BEST LOAN EVER OFFERED (assuming the lender did not try to cut peoples credit limits or freeze the line).

So there , I said it.

of course, their current ALOC/HELOC is not based on the same index and its too late to "get in on this deal" now. And while it may have been possible to get a HELOC with the same crazy index as the UFF ALOC on our own a few years ago, it was actually worth $3500 to get this loan if it was held to today, given the insanely low current rate and likelihood rates will stay low for quite some time.

They recommended using a particular one, which I believe was libor indexed....the software was still a $3500 ripoff, but the loan they recommended getting , while seemingky not a good deal at inception, has become one of the lowest rate loans ever offered

Yes this is due to the overall financial markets and downturn in the index, but it turned out to be much better than say a heloc indexed to the prime rate

I just had to share this Facebook entry from the fearless leader of the Pill Method folks:

Donald Daniel said: The attempt to write complicated mathematical instructions to have a computer perform complex operations has proved to be too difficult. What once was thought to be impossible is now the only way computers will be able to take over important functions for us. A machine must learn and write its own instructions!!! The PILL Method Financial Robot uses some of the same methods as Stanford University .........to develop its artificial intelligent decision making algorithms for the PILL Robot! We have instructed The PILL Financial Robot to find the fastest way to zero debt and build wealth. All with no refinancing, with no chage to your payments, and with little to NO increase to your budget!!!! Our system costs more because it does more to save you more money than any other system on earth!

http://www.facebook.com/ThePILLMethod

The jokes just write themselves.

I haven't looked at this in a long time, but this video from their facebook wall is precious:
Short version:
This guy Inherited house free & clear from his parents plus had some equity in another house that he sold.
30 years later, retires and realizes he doesn't have enough money. ???
Gets a reverse mortgage and didn't have enough money to live on.
After using UFF Money Merge, he now claims he will be debt free & have money to give to family when he's dead.
Huh?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tlv_8IpTG4k

In every case I'm aware of, the refund was denied. UFirst had plenty of small print which allowed them to deny anyone who did not request a refund within 3 days of signing. Even if you weren't yet set up with an login for the Money Merge Account, once three days had passed, you were locked in.

Now, there's nothing left to get a refund from. They operate as "Accelerated Equity and Development" now, scamming by misleading direct mail advertisements for a bogus "mortgage audit" service and the letter they send doesn't even include the name of the company. Skyler Witman and John Washenko are scam artists, trying to milk every last penny from the development of this less-than-useless software.

There is a way to get out of payments, though. Just send them 30 days notice, and cancel any pending payments thereafter with your bank or credit card company, because no way should you trust UFirst (or AED) to stop taking those payments. Check your agreement, but I recall the 30 day cancellation clause being in there.