exrefundbroker, im sorry to hear of your problems,
the list of franchises with serious complaints in your pdf, just for my education, does this mean that anyone on this list is a definite no-no if you were looking at a franchise???
Refund Homeloans - any feedback/experience
- Thread starter mickyc
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exrefundbroker, im sorry to hear of your problems,
the list of franchises with serious complaints in your pdf, just for my education, does this mean that anyone on this list is a definite no-no if you were looking at a franchise???
I cant say for all of the people on the list, they are outside my experince (except for scottys: our delivery guy was one of the franchisees that had his business taken off him when he had it on the market, which funnily enough happened to me) bear in mind they would not be included if there was not a good reason behind it.
I would be very diligent and look for key indicators that they are not all they are meant to be.
what stands out in my experience include:
them saying : we wouldnt do that, the accc will come down on us.
point you towrd certain franchisees which they claim are similar to you so you would get a better idea of the franchise.
give reasons why people arent with them anymore and try to steer you from speaking to them.
say you have to choose a few people to speak to beacsue you cant speak to everyone if you choose too,
make sure you
take lots of notes at the information events and take them with the disclosure documents to your solicitor. that way you can pick up the lies they tell you vs the actual document.
Being part of various government inquiries into franchising as really opened my eyes to what really goes on in franchising. My story was horrific enough which included threats from the frachisor to make sure I loose my house, him holding my income, public vilification and lies. However some stories even included a poor man in WA who recieved death threats.
Unfortunately many people dont speak up because of gag orders they and are forced to sign.
Franchising is a messy business and the document tends to tie you up with less rights than an employee.
hope that was helpful
If you have to pay someone to get business then your no good at what you do IMHO.
I see these guys are going into Life Insurance under PIS. I hope they don’t use the same model, as clearly there are very complex cases where I believe they will not be able to handle the compliance nor the financial evidence requirements of some applications
I see these guys are going into Life Insurance under PIS. I hope they don’t use the same model, as clearly there are very complex cases where I believe they will not be able to handle the compliance nor the financial evidence requirements of some applications
oh I find it terryfying............ and that is from my experience and subsequent knowledge. There is information that would make your skin crawl with what goes on. and the lack of industry clout to have it fixed.
If you wanted to know more send me a private message with questions I will answer on not such a public forum. lets just say this is not the first attempt into the finanacial planning side.
on the cash back I agree however:
It is my personal opinion on this matter: if you advertise to prospective franchisees that you give a cash back and sell hard on the point that you do it out of love and genuinely trying to help people you attract an altruistic group of people. These people by nature find it hard to comprehend the dark and nasty side and get sukered in very easily, once in and the money is gone then these people are grateful to get out with any cash, or they are left in such financial and emotional mess that they are unable to fight the process.
So MLM isnt so bad after all 
ta
rolf
ta
rolf
Very much so and thank you for sharing. Confirms many of my views on franchising- I always like to know the players in the field.
you are welcome. I often ask myself why I did it, I was brought up in a business backgound. Then I remeber the sales techniques and cant beleive I fell for it....
ALong with the very real and costly pain of the venture, There is always a gift, I have learned alot, made great freinds and have some great experiences simply because I verntured down the path of franchising.
Hi exrefund broker.
Some great insight from you re the mentioned business in this thread.
Has this experience turned you off companies that are franchised, or only certain ones?
My understanding was that (in the ideal world) the franchisor was supposed to be in the franchisees corner.
Regards
Marty
Your question would seem very straightforwrd however it is supriseingly complex.
Yes it has put me off franchising alot... certainly has made me more cynical and less trusting of people in general. Especially people with the particlular convictions of those that churned me out of my investment.
however as the old saying goes: you shall be judged using the same measurements you judge others, I am pleased to say that I been able to maintain my loving,kind, honest and grateful out look on life and people. So I never say never.
I spent some time in business development for another franchise system and they had their challenges to sort out however I saw an excellent relationship. where the franchisor and franchiee made commtiments to turn the business around during a very difficult time. (i asked for help and i was teminated and my business sold off)
The complexity deepens with my current business is ready to expand and the question comes, subcontract, licence or franchise.
At the end of the day to franchise means you tie that person up in a anticompetion contract that is far more iron clad than an employee. I know that my employees would have many more rights and protection than a franchisee. however the cost of enforcing the franchise contract would be so expensive it may be better to licence or subcotract rather than involving franchise lawyers in the drafteing of the documents. (either it is too expensive or the numerous threats of "my laywres intructions are clear, you will doo blah blah blah or we have no choice but to take action" were just to attempt to intimidate me into silence becasue I am still waiting to be sued)
In summary: if you are looking at a franchise you need to try an get behind the motivation, is it so the can expand the business, share the branding and be ethical. or is it so they can create a contract where you are tied to them to give a false impression of loyalty,
Be wary of a franchisor that claims to have a specific process of selection yet evryone passes, does not actually check your references, pushes that they are about to take off with the new ads they are about to have, speak loudly of the government regulators and how they need to do everything right, set up a feeling of urgency or you will miss out, steer you towards or away from particlaur people, ask for the details of anyone that has given you negative feedback, (they could be punished if you give up the names)
these franchisors could be controlling the information available to you far more than you can ever imagine.
Hi exrefund.
Kudos to you and thank-you so much for sharing your experience. It sounds as if you have been through a fairly scarey time.
I'm glad you can reflect on it as a learning experience and hopefully have moved on to bigger and better things.
I enquired into refund a while back and was put off by their casual response to my enquiry regarding other brokers in my area.
I was concerned about broker saturation within the surrounding areas. If for instance you have 5 brokers within the same group within 10km's of each other, how on earth could I expect any leads or to stand out against competitors.
I did not like the fact that just "anyone" could sign up and become a competitor 2km's away. Afterall, we were not talking about McDonalds!
Regards Jo
Thought that was the case. I also thought I would love to see some P/L Statements and one of these successful broker's Tax Return!
Regards JO
I may be wrong however you do the maths and see if it makes sense.... he claims to have sold 40 franchisees over the last 3months. If we assume that the revenue of 15.5mil in a yearDOES NOT INCLUDE franchise sales the the revenue divided by the 300 francisees thats less than 1000 per week less your advertising and business costs for your local area plus fees to the groups advertising funds.
I get phone calls regularly from people trying to exit. (very few entering) It breaks my heart to hear what has happened to them and that they think I got out without financial distress. the most common thread is lack of loans volume and an inabilty to earn money. some of the most recent exiting franchisees had even more horrific stories which included not recieving their franchise documents and being put into a postion of debt to the company with little prospect of new leads. as an exbroker them selves the only work in 6 months was from thier previous clients. what hope do you think non brokers have. the most alarming was the weekly reports are as little as 10mil per week. the starnge thing is they thinks thats a big volume, however thats not settled thats written. divide that by 300 brokers. and take out your average failure rate of loans that dont go thru.
even in the event that the impossible happened and they all settled I could live on that income, could you?
paints a very different picture....
Doesn't seem reasonable to me ,either. If it's so simple why didn't someone discover it centuries ago,and after looking at those numbers and knowing the way the system works the % must be very tight..imho willair..
Hi exrefund.
I did not like the fact that just "anyone" could sign up and become a competitor 2km's away. Afterall, we were not talking about McDonalds!
Regards Jo
fyi they had another 2 brokers that lived and worked inside my territory. they were not my mini-franchisees and 1 actually enquired about my territory while mine was on the market.
so you are lucky you went with yor gut.
Hiya
On balance.........
I dont have a big heart for franchise models in the finance area generally, and the comm rebate models even more so. Ormond has "large scale commercialised" what Gruen et al could not., and while he is one of my aggregators biggest volume performers, most independents ( inlc me ) dont like the way they portray the broking business generally, and its not because they are stealing our clients
Ultimately though, the responseability for a service business must rest with the person that runs the business. If most of the frans are making ok money, and 25 % arent............usually thats not a franchsor issue, often but not always you gotta look in the mirror and ask, would I pay myself today......
Sitting around waiting for the franchisor to hand feed you quality leads will ALWAYS end in tears.
Cannibalisation of territories is also nothing new, the other large number mortgage franchise biz has been doing it for mouch longer.
While I know little of the current disputes and arguments, there are usually 2 sides to the equation.
ta
rolf
On balance.........
I dont have a big heart for franchise models in the finance area generally, and the comm rebate models even more so. Ormond has "large scale commercialised" what Gruen et al could not., and while he is one of my aggregators biggest volume performers, most independents ( inlc me ) dont like the way they portray the broking business generally, and its not because they are stealing our clients
Ultimately though, the responseability for a service business must rest with the person that runs the business. If most of the frans are making ok money, and 25 % arent............usually thats not a franchsor issue, often but not always you gotta look in the mirror and ask, would I pay myself today......
Sitting around waiting for the franchisor to hand feed you quality leads will ALWAYS end in tears.
Cannibalisation of territories is also nothing new, the other large number mortgage franchise biz has been doing it for mouch longer.
While I know little of the current disputes and arguments, there are usually 2 sides to the equation.
ta
rolf
tight is an understatement. if you belived their sales pitch the mortgage brokers basically get money for nothing and you would be greedy to not share.
well anyone in the industry knows a broker is underpaid at best. the house gets sold a realestate agent has a final inspection and settlement to worry about. they get to keep selling. A broker has to worry about all the different stages and then chasing all that extra paperwork for various unforseen reasons, we then wait months and now the changes could be longer before we get paid and on top of that you sweat out the claw back period because you know that another broker does not neccessarily care that you will be clawed back. Then as a refund broker the bank takes the full com back and you have to chase the client for the refund money back.
Hiya
On balance.........
I dont have a big heart for franchise models in the finance area generally, and the comm rebate models even more so. Ormond has "large scale commercialised" what Gruen et al could not., and while he is one of my aggregators biggest volume performers, most independents ( inlc me ) dont like the way they portray the broking business generally, and its not because they are stealing our clients
Ultimately though, the responseability for a service business must rest with the person that runs the business. If most of the frans are making ok money, and 25 % arent............usually thats not a franchsor issue, often but not always you gotta look in the mirror and ask, would I pay myself today......
Sitting around waiting for the franchisor to hand feed you quality leads will ALWAYS end in tears.
Cannibalisation of territories is also nothing new, the other large number mortgage franchise biz has been doing it for mouch longer.
While I know little of the current disputes and arguments, there are usually 2 sides to the equation.
ta
rolf
oh I agree many a time a franchisee fails because they go into a business and expect to be able to sit behind a desk and get paid.
If most of the franchisees of this model were making money then you will see that at the next conference. watch the numbers of franchisees take out the top 5 (there is a specific undercurrent for that one and you could even take out their top broker) and then see what the numbers tell you.
I believe that the model is doable just not as easily as claimed and people will not simply do business with you for the refund.
I myself thought I had a saleable before I was churned out.
I did not wait for them to give me leads, when you are a business you must get the work, thought without action is simply daydreaming.
Yes the business was alot slower than it was promoted but I had invested a great deal of cash into it and was not about to let it go. most of my 12mil loan book that I accrued during my agreement was generated through my own network and adverising.
a newbie in the industry will buy a finance franchise to be compliant from the begining. not to slap up a shingle and hope for the best
as you have the same aggregator. how do you feel knowing that part of your group has been encouraged to write loans they have not trained in, offer from a panel of lenders that they have not been accredited with, allowed to interview and write loans before they have completed their qualifications, or putting thru CBA loans under another brokers id becasue they havent done the accrediation.
.
Some balance please
Guys, the adds are recorded weekly in most cases. Only real customers are used. Exrefund broker is known to most Franchisees at Refund she was defranchised for working as a real estate agent at the sand time she was a broker and not telling anyone. The franchisor tried to work with her but she refused. She then went making all sorts of accusations in the press that simply are not true out of spite. As far as the Accc is concerned, they have investigated like they will if anyone makes a complaint, but no action has been taken so far and the complaint was made nearly 3 years ago. As far as training is concerned Refund has come along way since it started and was one of the only groups in the industry that didn't have anyone expelled when the MFAA expelled 1500 members recently for no compliance. Refund has people from all walks of life as Franchisees and lending is not rocket science. We have doctors lawyers engineers etc amoungst the ranks, as a customer I would sooner deal with someone that's had life experience and then trained as a lender rather than someone whom was trained by a bank like a machine.
Guys, the adds are recorded weekly in most cases. Only real customers are used. Exrefund broker is known to most Franchisees at Refund she was defranchised for working as a real estate agent at the sand time she was a broker and not telling anyone. The franchisor tried to work with her but she refused. She then went making all sorts of accusations in the press that simply are not true out of spite. As far as the Accc is concerned, they have investigated like they will if anyone makes a complaint, but no action has been taken so far and the complaint was made nearly 3 years ago. As far as training is concerned Refund has come along way since it started and was one of the only groups in the industry that didn't have anyone expelled when the MFAA expelled 1500 members recently for no compliance. Refund has people from all walks of life as Franchisees and lending is not rocket science. We have doctors lawyers engineers etc amoungst the ranks, as a customer I would sooner deal with someone that's had life experience and then trained as a lender rather than someone whom was trained by a bank like a machine.
my bad I should have said they were pre recordered when I was part of he system and sometimes they are brokers they use.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kJAnpV4W5Ps
you should recognize a couple of faces.
I am not sure what you have been told, but that was not the offical reason for the termination, thankyou for the insight.
I did not mention the ACCC and their involvement, I find it interesting that you brought it up. I find it more interetsing that you refer to the first complaint being 3 yrs ago. Is that because mine was not the first, as my complaint was 2 years ago.
as for the article, did you actually read that, I put forward a story which I could prove to be true, Wayne ormond responded through your PR company with a strong personal attack against me designed to incite hatred. I ask you, who is spiteful.
I have done my best to keep the information in this forum restricted to what I have experinced and therefore know first hand, I can tell by your response that you do not know the full extent of the matter nor the full truth. which means that at best the information you are delivering about me is second hand.
I truly hope that your experince is better than mine.
(you sound like you have the passion that I once had)
Good luck and best wishes.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kJAnpV4W5Ps
you should recognize a couple of faces.
I am not sure what you have been told, but that was not the offical reason for the termination, thankyou for the insight.
I did not mention the ACCC and their involvement, I find it interesting that you brought it up. I find it more interetsing that you refer to the first complaint being 3 yrs ago. Is that because mine was not the first, as my complaint was 2 years ago.
as for the article, did you actually read that, I put forward a story which I could prove to be true, Wayne ormond responded through your PR company with a strong personal attack against me designed to incite hatred. I ask you, who is spiteful.
I have done my best to keep the information in this forum restricted to what I have experinced and therefore know first hand, I can tell by your response that you do not know the full extent of the matter nor the full truth. which means that at best the information you are delivering about me is second hand.
I truly hope that your experince is better than mine.
(you sound like you have the passion that I once had)
Good luck and best wishes.
The add link you show here is two years ago. We all know eactly what happened, we saw for ourselves. Refund wanted us to know in case we had questions from clients as what you did put everyones business at risk. And when you tried to Attack us in the press, Wayne had no choice but to respond. Your were defranchised for abandonment, because you went to work for Harcourts RealEstate, we all saw your listings. It's a direct conflict of interest and Refund had no choice but to try and talk to you about it, you refused and then you were terminated. Tell the truth not all the lies you have been saying on this site. There are alot of Franchisees that are very angry at the mistruths you have been saying. For one saying that Refund only writes 10m a month not true, do the sums Refund is Choices largest writer, they settle last financial year nearly 2billion nationally. You also have to remember that Refund has put on over 100 Franchisees in the last year, those guys are still learning, imagine when they start. By the way you say you had a loan book of 12 mill, and you were knew to the industry never done this before, so there training can't be that bad can it. BRW have featured Refund it lots of it's edition it's a business mag they do there checks, Wayne wouldn't be there if we had been succesful. Wayne cops alot of critism because were doing something different. Some did John Symonds when he started. Because you were kicked out because you refusedto follow the system and there are always people like you, take some resposibility for your own actions. As the 300 Franchisees at Refund are sick of your lies.
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