After nine years

It has been nine years since we left... from our own perspective, our lives have become much better. Not everyone would agree with that, but that is just our own experience. I am sure that for a lot of people, the network marketing business is still working great.

Our only sincere request to all the business owners with such enterprises is to be honest with themselves. Do what is right. Practice what you preach. Make sure what you speak from stage aligns with what you actually do.

I know many people in such businesses stay in for the serendipity. If that is so, what you are telling is that, you are not treating it as a profitable business. In that case, make sure you at least let your up and down lines know that. So, that way, they don't need to wonder what's "wrong" with you.

I would like to thank this business opportunity for helping me in several ways:

• It helped me understand who I am and what I stand for.
• It taught us the importance of, and joy in donating money. It helped us become more detached to money.
• The "book of the month" club exposed us to several excellent books, some of which I still read, refer to, or recommend. Here are some I have used in the past three months:
• Think and grow rich 
• Success through a positive mental attitude 
• Seven habits of highly effective people 
• Man's search for meaning
• The one CD per day recommendation helped me become a better listener.
• The group messaging system (it was called Communikate then) helped us stay connected with other people in the business.
• The business pushed us to limits that we wouldn't have experienced otherwise.
• It helped us become less egoistical by making us do very uncomfortable things (like talking to strangers in malls, and following up people until they shut the doors on our faces).

Finally, to our sponsor and up lines, about whom we have complained a lot here, I don't think they suggested to us anything that they did not actually do themselves. They genuinely felt that they were helping us grow. When I confronted my up lines with things that were uncomfortable to us, they always told us, "Look. This is how we did it. This is the only way we have seen this business grow for us, and the people on our team who are platinum today." - I don't think our up lines were lying when they said that. What I should have done is tell them how I really felt, and gone with my own inner guidance system, than blindly follow whatever "Power of submission" suggested. Each one of us has an internal moral compass, and once it is well calibrated, submitting to that inner guidance system is enough. You don't need to submit to other people, because other people can't know what is going on inside you.

Also, with this (hopefully) final post, I absolve everyone else that we were involved with, like our up lines, down lines, cross lines, and all the people whom we came across, and take 100% responsibility for whatever we experienced.

Your 401(K) and Your Upline

It has been more than seven years since I quit being actively engaged with Amway, Quixtar, BWW and my uplines, but its impact on my life is felt every once in a while. Here I want to share how my 401(K) account was ravaged by my uplines and my own stupidity in listening to them.

I had quit my Ph.D. degree in March 2005 (a year and a half after I started) partially due to my uplines' discouragement. They never encouraged anyone to complete grad school, even a Masters degree; forget about a Ph.D!

I had joined my first job for a salary of about $50,000/year with a university. They had an excellent 401(K) plan, for which I became eligible six months after joining. The employer match was phenomenally good. Employer contributed twice the employee contributions up to ten percent, so if I put five percent, they put ten percent! I didn't realize how fantastic an opportunity that was at that time. I had listened to a recently released CD by Kevin and Beth Bell in which Kevin Bell made a statement: "We never contributed to any retirement plan at work because we didn't want the stock market or the bond market, essentially somebody else, to take control of our money. If you are contributing to your company 401(K), you don't trust the business enough. Nothing else out there is going to give you as much return as your business."

As naive as I was at that time, I asked my uplines for advice on what to do. My sponsor (and best friend at that time) recommended I go with what Kevin Bell says and not "waste" 5% of my salary on 401(K), which is money I can't touch before 60 without hefty penalties. I actually went to my HR and told her i did not want to contribute and she was literally shocked! She was asking me why i was turning down a ten percent raise! I did not have an answer for her, so I called my sponsor's sponsor, upline platinum RR and explained the situation. RR was way smarter. He asked me to start contributing five percent to get maximum employer match straight away and said that was best in the long run. He also suggested I put all in stocks. His reason? He told me it is anyway a gamble, so just take the riskiest. His reason was flawed. Today I know it is best to invest most, if not all, your money in stocks if your time horizon for investment is twenty five or more years. I did not know it then, but anyway decided to go ahead with what RR suggested. I then updated my sponsor with what RR told me. My sponsor said i should then follow what RR told. All was good. I was thankful that RR gave me the right advice at that time.

You might have read what happened to us later (late 2006), with my sponsor lending $10,000 for us to qualify silver. My wife lost her job a few months later (primarily because she was going late to work after several night trips to San Diego, which is two hours South from LA where we lived). That is when I understood  RR's plan for my 401(K). He recommended I take all the money out of 401(K) to immediately settle the debt with my sponsor! I lost almost 40% of my 401(K) in taxes and penalties and paid off my sponsor. The only solace at that time (late 2006) was that the stock market had given excellent returns. The money I took out was less than $7000, getting about $4200 after taxes and penalty, but had I left that money in my 401(K) in index funds and kept rebalancing, it would have been worth more than $15K in 2016 (in spite of the 2008 recession)!

The point of this is not to discourage you from getting into Amway, but just be careful about what you follow with that they teach. Educate yourself in general finances too. Read excellent books like "Bogleheads guide to investing" to understand how to handle your money. And please do not check with your upline if you should read that book because it will never be in their recommended reading list. They will never have that gem of a book in their reading list, because you really become smart about your money and may not put all your money in their basket.

So this post is not just me whining about something bad my uplines did to me, but actual recommendation to you about how you can save yourself a lot of heart ache in the future by knowing some basic and important things about your finances, 401(K), asset allocation and long term investing, all if which are explained in full detail in the Bogleheads book. (Check your local library if they got that book, if you do not want to spend money buying it.)

Hey, if you succeed making a lot of money in Amway, that small chunk of money in 401(K) won't matter to you at all, so what do you have to lose?

Amway India Products sold through "Heaven and Home" store

Amway India Products sold through Heaven and Home an online premium Home Décor and Furniture store. I believe Amway is officially having a sale through this website. I thought Amway products were exclusively self consumed sold(?) by IBOs. Check the Link http://www.heavenandhome.com/home.php?cat=1127

Are the Tools(??) really worth your money

I read an interesting comparison on Amthrax's blog about the cost of some of the top selling books on TEAM and the prices of the same books on Amazon and how they are available for free in Library.

Here is the link for those who are interested
http://amthrax.wordpress.com/2012/01/09/team-life-top-50-books-price-comparison-jan-2011/

Most of these books were/are also sold through BWW.

Funny thing is once we became inactive, I sold about 50 of my personal copies of some of these useless books on Amazon. I did not make any profit, but atleast got rid of some clutter (better than shipping my unused tools to my upline who did not pay me anything for that). The rest of the worthless books, I donated to a Goodwill store.

What surprised me the most was the speed at which I sold most of the books. Made me realize that that there is a huge market for PMA books and people were willing to pay for some of the titles that they would not normally find in a bookstore (I sold some of the books for a high price, inspite of the remarks like "book underlined in many places and notes are there on the sides and the backcover).

Also made me realize that people truly like to buy and dont like to be sold. Remember the line from your Amway/network marketing days. We had to sing and dance to make a new IBO get on standing order or purchase some tools. But people who are really looking for PMA titles, were willing to pay for it.(ZERO promotion needed on your part).

Some of the totally nonsensical titles that I can ended up donating, are WWW- stands for World Wide Whinners (yeah right), leadership secrets of Atila the Hun (I swear the author must have paid the system to move these books:-) and not the other way around)). The crappiest part was to sound excited about these idiotic books and promote them at the PASE meetings. Talking about a book you enjoyed is fine. But having to promote an idiotic book and the crowd has to also nod and look excited. Man..it was torture.

What was really upsetting was, the upline GURUS who are supposed to be high on many of the PMA books and can quote page numbers and passages from some books, sucked at people skills, HONESTY, INTEGRITY big time. When you told them about some issues/problems, instead of truly listening and understand your point of view (like how the books taught you to do), gave you tough talk and pushed you to get their point of view. My upline emerald's favorite quote from "Seven Habits of Highly Effective people" was how your map and destination did not match up, then you wont get there. Well this jerk had his destination in mind, but the means he used to get there...wonder if he could ever tell his kids about how he got to Emerald level (Many of us would have gone ooh and aah when upline emerald lady talks in her cd about how her dad did not get influenced by his colleagues and end up drinking, inspite of the teasing. Why, dear lady, you could never use the principles you learnt from your dad about doing things right).

We still do have the books that we really enjoyed, which are still relevant to our daily lives and not promote "vicious network marketing cycle (keep at it no matter what....why it makes sense to keep investing on ABC (association, books and cds) no matter what...u get the drift). Some of the books that we still have are Seven habits of highly effective people, some of John Maxwell's books. Though I still cant understand how a person like John Maxwell would promote WWDB and Ron Puryear and would speak at their functions.

Anyways for active IBOs who are out there if you really sit and think about the contradicting things that the upline and system recommends, there is a chance you might wake up. Why counsel you on delayed gratification, shopping at the cheapest possible places, no vacation, no classy stuff and then drill it to you that you are expected to be on standing order and extra tools and dont you dare return tools that your downline returned to you, why drill it that you have to do 300 + PV (way overpriced, stuff you need only when you are in Amway) on the first day of the month.

Anyways I remember a famous quote from the Amway days "Every IBO has a shelf life. You determine how long it is going it to be." We are sure glad we werent in for "long haul" and came to our senses in 5-6 years.

One more Amway/Quixtar Story

One of the anonymous commentors on my site has shared his Amway/Quixtar Story. You would not get to hear REAL stories like these in the opens, pase or on CDS. But sadly this is the story of 99% of the IBOs.

"Just like yourself I got started about a decade ago and I graduated top of my class and got multiple job offers. RIght around the same time, I was exposed to this opportunity by a person who went to school with me. I saw the plan and it made sense. I loved the association where people spoke positive and felt these are group of people who are growing somewhere in life. I started showing the plan and noticing most of friends and families were not excited about it. I felt that I will prove them wrong by succeeding.

As I was making good enough money from my workplace, I wasn't counting money for the standing order, 300 PV (1000$) and the trips to New Jersey where the leaderships were happening. We were 11 wide paying 7 PV checks and were profitable. I liked everything what the business has to offer, what the speakers said and the whole nine yards. When things did not happen, I did not google the internet to hear other people's experiences. I was part of Rishi and Shampa's team who were new Emeralds. Very aggressive funny couple. There are lot of doctors who were involved which gave great credibility to the whole thing.

Main problem started when one of the uplines decided to go Q12 and Emerald. They said " We are counting on you". I had vowed that I will do everything in my side to make it happen and so are my cross lines. Upline went Emeralds and we were talk of the town as we were one of the people who made it happen. There are few months where we did personal 2000-3000 PV. We had about 40 people in our team and we did not make anyone buy extra stuff as we were not comfortable doing that. Uplines directly did not force like Exeagle case, but since we knew them for 4-5 years at that time, they said stuff like "whatever you do for uplines someone will do it for you".

Since we were making good money we made it happen. We had extra E-Springs, Atmospheres to make the entire city clean. Finally the day came where I lost my job and my wife was taking care of the household. Within months, she lost her job and we were making roughly about 800$-$1000$. We were spending about 1000$ on the products and another 300$ on tools, associations etc. Whatever we were spending before, we had to slow down and watch what we are spending. Uplines who had set higher goals had the same expectations that " we will do whatever it takes". The moment we talked about our financial situations and what is happening, they said not to worry and focus on the business. Well, the months of qualification started and we couldn't do extra volume other the regular 300 PV (even that looked like a big chunk and we started charging in the credit cards). The moment we backed of and started talking about financial situation, they started putting us through guilt and saying stuff like , "Are you fired up'?" What happened to you? Can't you retail? Retailing can take care of your financial situation?

Uplines starting calling our people and started mentioning that they need to stretch to make things happen. We had built tremendous relationships with our team and they were comfortable with us all the time and after they started getting calls like these from uplines they expressed their dissatisfaction about getting calls during work hours, late hours and felt pressured. I brought this to my uplines attention and they got defensive and they mentioned that everything they did was to help my team go. I had told them that I am not comfortable with this pressurizing and told them to slow down and back off.

This was the time I really slowed down to think what me and my wife have accomplished for the past 7 years. We had a sizable group making about close to $1000 bucks but again whatever we built , our uplines destroyed and our team started to exit away. Long story short, I started seeing the rift between my downlines and uplines. Even though everybody seems to be having good time, there were lot of undercurrents. There was a Q12 ruby in our diamonds team (Bald Bengali couple) who always built the business with many people. He was going Emerald 10 years back. He is yet to go Emerald. Rishi and Shampa, our upline Emeralds were talk of the town when I got started. He was like a body guard to Kanti Gala and were powerful speakers. Now I am not sure they are building the business.

The last Emerald in our uplines team was my uplines which was several years back. I am just talking about upline Diamondship which is TD and Suparna. If the business is growing in leaps and bounds, wouldn't you expect more people to go Platinum, Emerald and Diamond. I am not talking like it is everyone else responsibility to move on. I slowed down and looked at my financial cash-flow. My wife and I worked hard to find a good job. It doesn't have the promises of business but at least I felt I do not have to give false promises to people saying in a period of 6 months, you will make $3000. I am able to sleep better. When I was actively building the business, my uplines gave lot of guilt trips. My sister was getting married. We went home for four days and behaved like guests. On the outside we said we built the business for the family. Inside we hardly spent time on anything.

Anything we enjoyed we had a side order of guilt which was killing us. Last three years we took good vacations, cruises, everything self paid but no debt. What is my conclusion? If you have a good upline who lets you be you and build the business with right mindset who never pushes you for volume and never pushes you to buy extra tools (when you already have it), keep building it. Build it once, build it right. Please do not manipulate your hard earned relationship to get PVs. I enjoyed the business when I built it right. The moment my uplines started pressurizing my team, my fun ended and they lost us and our team. Now, they might have to do the same thing with different set of eyeballs (maybe talk about us as someone who lost their dream, whatever!). This is not the way I choose to lead my life.

Amway vs Amazon

One of the techniques we were taught to use when prospecting was, when the prospect asked "What is it?". We were taught to answer, "Do you know about Amazon?"

The truth of the matter is Amway and Amazon are light years apart.

Amway's Ditto Vs Amazon's Subsribe and Save

Ditto was promoted like it was the neatest little tool and (smirking) Amway's patented way of ordering products. Now what are benefits of ordering through ditto??? Not much that I can think of.

Amazon's subscribe and save offers 15% dicount. Free shipping. Now those are some benefits.

Do you need any motivation to order through Amazon??

BWW/Upline Tool Refund Policy

I am posting an anonymous commenter's comment as a separate post.

"On May 20, my credit card was automatically charged for the next quarter (until Aug 20)for $50+ for the Bww TV and Webspace package .It was around this time when I decided to not do the business anymore. So, I missed cancelling that service and was charged. Anyway, that is fine and usual business practice. However, next thing I noticed is that immediately my Website and BWW TV service stopped working even though I had paid until Aug 20!! I contacted Bww and they said that the service cancels immediately upon cancellation! Now that is not how businesses operate, the so called "traditional" businesses that BWW puts down so much would either give me a partial refund or at least continue my service until the date I have paid for it!! I don't know where I can report a business practice like this."

One more testimony that any money that goes to upline/system is like a one way channel. Any chance of getting a refund is slim to none unless you are persistent and consistent:)

By the way, most of the videos posted on BWWTV are filmed at functions. You pay for the functions, then pay for cds to listen to these talks and then again YOU HAVE TO PAY TO WATCH THESE TALKS AGAIN. Upline and system is interested in only one thing and that is their profit.

By the way here are Amway's rules regaring tool returns:
https://www.amway.com/en/support/ordering-product-support/business-rules

7.1.2.2. During the first 90 days following an IBO's registration, the IBO may return all BSM of any form purchased, including meeting tickets, together with proof of purchase, for a 100% refund of the price paid for such BSM.

7.1.2.3. Except as provided in Rule 7.1.2.4., an IBO end-user of BSM may return BSM purchased, together with proof of purchase, within 180 days following purchase, for a refund on commercially reasonable terms.

If I remember correctly, there used to be rule that an IBO can get off BSMs any time they want to. Dont know what happened to that. Remember, Amway keeps tweaking their rules. They will tweak and tweak till everything is in the big pins favor.

If in case, any of you IBOs decide to get off standing order and your upline says things like, it takes a couple of weeks to get you off standing order or any other excuse, do know that they are just giving you a bunch of BS. These same guys will put an IBO on standing order as soon as the IBO is willing to get on it. Why didnt it take them 2 weeks to put them on standing order?

Do share your comments if any of have had tough time getting a refund for tools from your upline.

BWW/Upline Tool Refund Policy

I am posting an anonymous commenter's comment as a separate post.

"On May 20, my credit card was automatically charged for the next quarter (until Aug 20)for $50+ for the Bww TV and Webspace package .It was around this time when I decided to not do the business anymore. So, I missed cancelling that service and was charged ... anyway, that is fine and usual business practice ... However, next thing I noticed is that immediately my Website and BWW TV service stopped working even though I had paid until Aug 20!! I contacted Bww and they said that the service cancels immediately upon cancellation! Now that is not how businesses operate ... the so called "traditional" businesses that BWW puts down so much would either give me a partial refund or at least continue my service until the date I have paid for it!! I don't know where I can report a business practice like this .

Founders EDC Ganesh and Neha Shenoy divorced?

This was really a shocking news. Man, I thought marriages of IBOs lasted forever.

We would have heard statements like these so many times, "Amway saves marriages", "our marriage got better and better only because of this business, " "we were going in two different paths, only because of the business we have common goals. "

The last year we stayed in this business only because of "supposedly intangible values" you get out of the business. Latha Gala's statements about how their kids turned out to be great only because of the business would play out in our minds and we would think "Gosh, what would happen to our future kids without this business." All these statements are just a trap to keep IBOs who are not making any profit within the business. Uplines want you to belive that your life will be doojmed without Amway. Even when we told our uplines about our decision to become inactive, they asked us "What about the intangible values?"

Yeah right "Intangible values". My foot.

Anways curious to know how BWW is handling this news about this split. I guess like Paul Miller's divorce they would just not talk about it and pretend like it never happened or acknowledge that Debbie Miller ever existed.

You cannot argue with my upline

I was thinking about how clever my upline "big pin" was. I still believe that he is very clever. If I ever talk to him again, I will still be impressed. He is so convincing and dynamic! That's why I never want to talk to any of my up lines :-).

Nice guy, except that he is still exactly like how he was during his U.G. years. If you listened to his CD you know that he says he used to get things done, but would leave a trail of destruction behind! "Get it done one way or the other"! "Hook or by crook" philosophy!

I thought about something that happened couple of years ago... I had a down line IBO of mine whom I was "counseling". I asked him what his goal was and he told me he wanted to save $60,000/yr in 2 years and use it as a down payment to buy a home. I was impressed by his goal, but I did not know how to give him a game plan. I was already in for 5 years and making $200/month. I could not "act" like I had that much in my savings via "my business". I had barely gotten out of debt then. I told him I would ask my up line to give him a game plan. I was feeling bad and I called my up line. I asked my upline "My down line wants to make this much. How could I help him make that much when I am not making that much?" To this my upline initially stuttered - but I told you he is clever - he responded by asking me how much I am making. I told him my (pathetic) income of $200 to $300/month. He told me I should first get my down line to start making that much and then worry about the rest later! I was convinced by hearing that!

But I was spending $1,500/month or more each month, spending close to 50 hours per week doing all the 9 core steps and making $200 to $300/month... my up line wanted me to teach that to my down line. I thought that down line will definitely save $60,000 in 3 years if he first quit Amway and started saving 25% of his job income!

Amway (pipe) dreams

When you join Amway, your upline recommends that you cut out pictures of your dreams and put them on your refrigerator. This is a wonderful visualization technique and it supposedly works for many people. But I want to caution you on this as well.

My recommendation to IBOs is the following: first go and figure out your short-term i.e. 3-to-6 month goal. It could be just as simple as making your car payment with your Amway profits. Note that it is profits, not income. Let us say your goal is to pay your car payment of $200/month with your Amway profits. Then print out your car payment bill and write a check below it for $200. Write on the check "Amway profit". That way the philosophy explained in the BWW recommended book The Secret by Rhonda Byrne is followed exactly.

Then go out and work and accomplish this in the time frame you have set. Here is what you will most likely realize: you will realize that you have not reached your goal after 3 to 6 months! Ok, you want to reset it... you reset it and try again. If you reach your goal in 9 months, it is OK. But if you see yourself missing your goal after 2 and 3 years, please do not put pictures of bigger dreams! Because that is where you will lose faith. You already know that you could not accomplish your small dream - how could you accomplish your big dream?

I was so foolish that I cut out my long-term dreams and put them on my refrigerator! I had a yellow lamborghini murcielago, a red lexus sc430, a black lexus ls460hl, a nice big home and several travel destinations. (What I was driving was a 1995 toyota corolla with body damage!) It was a BIG mistake! Because your mind keeps thinking that "some day" you will accomplish those dreams via Amway. But if you really think whether you are first accomplishing your short-term goals, your eyes will be opened!

Hei, if you accomplish your goals in the time frame you have set, GOOD FOR YOU! Go ahead and build your business! But my experience was that I could not accomplish any of my dreams through Amway. I accomplished many of my dreams by simply quitting Amway! What an irony!

Also I am seeing my downlines' PV going up and down and finally remaining at the same level after 1.5 years! If there are pins like "founders 300 PV", "founders 600 PV", "founders 100 PV", "founders 1000 PV", then you can award them to my downlines! In between one guy went silver, but his PV has come down to his original... Another IBO signed up with spouse's name under my sponsor and I see credit card PV/BV transfer out of that IBOship every month. But I wonder how well that "new" IBOship is doing because I do not see my upline fake platinum's name yet on my LOS as qualified platinum! I feel so sorry for all my downlines and the other 99.9% of the Amway IBOs who are pumping that "pump in the desert" (remember Ron Puryear's 2-tape set?), which does not have any water table below!

Amway (pipe) dreams

When you join Amway, your upline recommends that you cut out pictures of your dreams and put them on your refrigerator. This is a wonderful visualization technique and it supposedly works for many people. But I want to caution you on this as well.

My recommendation to IBOs is the following: first go and figure out your short-term i.e. 3-to-6 month goal. It could be just as simple as making your car payment with your Amway profits. Note that it is profits, not income. Let us say your goal is to pay your car payment of $200/month with your Amway profits. Then print out your car payment bill and write a check below it for $200. Write on the check "Amway profit". That way the philosophy explained in the BWW recommended book "The Secret" by Rhonda Byrne is followed exactly.

Then go out and work and accomplish this in the time frame you have set. Here is what you will most likely realize: you will realize that you have not reached your goal after 3 to 6 months! Ok, you want to reset it... you reset it and try again. If you reach your goal in 9 months, it is OK. But if you see yourself missing your goal after 2 and 3 years, please do not put pictures of bigger dreams! Because that is where you will lose faith. You already know that you could not accomplish your small dream - how could you accomplish your big dream?

I was so foolish that I cut out my long-term dreams and put them on my refrigerator! I had a yellow lamborghini murcielago, a red lexus sc430, a black lexus ls460hl, a nice big home and several travel destinations. (What I was driving was a 1995 toyota corolla with body damage!) It was a BIG mistake! Because your mind keeps thinking that "some day" you will accomplish those dreams via Amway. But if you really think whether you are first accomplishing your short-term goals, your eyes will be opened!

Hei, if you accomplish your goals in the time frame you have set, GOOD FOR YOU! Go ahead and build your business! But my experience was that I could not accomplish any of my dreams through Amway. I accomplished many of my dreams by simply quitting Amway! What an irony! Also I am seeing my downlines' PV going up and down and finally remaining at the same level after 1.5 years! I feel so sorry for them and the other 99.9% of the Amway IBOs who are looking for that "pump in the desert", which does not exist at all!

Extending end of month order AGAIN in Nov

So End of month ordering deadline was again extended in Nov till Dec 1st 6 p.m EST.

This time the reason was that the deadline was extended as lot of IBOs were travelling and a even more funnier reason- that many IBOs will be Achievers(Funny considering the percentage of IBOs qualifying for Achievers trip).

Why do "sharp IBOs' require an extra day to make their "anyway purchases"???

Instead of going against the LOSs whose main way to breaking new pins is end of month "stocking up orders", corporation seems to be promoting such practice by extending the ordering deadline.

What would be the reason for extending end of month orders in DEC- "IBOs very busy with New Year Celebrations?"

Fake customer orders

n Gala diamondship, IBOs are really smart. New IBOs are taught to register their friends or neighbors as customers and then ship their personal orders to that customer id. This way the new IBO gets free shipping, and also gets 20% PV/BV uplift(customer orders get 20% PV/BV uplift) and the new IBOs also qualify for $50 bonus in the first 3 months(if u do 150PV in the first 3 months out of which 50PV is customer volume, you get $50 bonus during the first 3 months).

It is a good deal for new IBOs as they have to spend less money to complete 150 pv because of the 20% PV/BV uplift, they get free shipping and also $50 bonus.

So in my line of sponsorship IBOs have gone from zero retailing, to now zero personal use as all the orders are now fake customer orders. I should say uplines are really smart. They teach the IBOs to order products like sales kit, catalogues, gift albums (which has free shipping anyways) to their own home instead of shipping it to customer id, so that Amway does not become suspicious.

This is what the honest and most upright uplines teach new IBOs (to cheat big time on Amway promotions). People like IBOFB will claim that new IBOs should be responsible for their decisions, inspite of these dishonest teachings by upline. I dont know who can hold these dishonest uplines responsible for their total dishonest teachings.

Instead of promoting such practices, Amway can offer free shipping to everybody who orders products worth $75 or everybody who orders 50PV or 100PV on ditto.

Again for people who claim, Amway cannot offer free shipping for all IBOs as products like XS and protein shakes are heavy- please note that #1 online retailer Amazon.com does offer free shipping on so many heavy items and what is more interesting is Amazon also offers 15% off if you order a product regulary(like set up detergent order for every 3 months or so and so on).

Go broke fast with core products, faster with 100% product use

Extending end of month order

On Oct 31st, I noticed a message on the Amway website, that the end of the the month ordering deadline has been extended till Nov 1st 6 p.m eastern time, as Amway was experiencing heavy traffic.

Why do the ordering time needs to be extended, if it is not to aid people in qualification to hit their pin levels. If IBOs genuinely needed the products, they could have ordered it a few days later as well or why shld a IBO care if the volume of his/her order goes to month of OCT or Nov unless all of a sudden this becomes very very important for somebody upline in Platinum/Emerald or whatever qualification.

For all those IBOs whose main job seems to keep repeating that " that this does not happen in their line of sponsorship or this does not happen in this day and age" I guess Amway kind of acknowledged this practice is widespread across North America (stocking up products to hit new pins), by extending their ordering time. Otherwise why would there be heavy traffic on the last day of the month?

If this business is such a great residual income business, why would Amway experience heavy traffic on the last day of the month??? Shouldn't people qualify easily atleast by 20-25th of the month?

What would irritate us more than the calls we would receive from upline on the last day of the month convincing us to order 1500-2500 PV would be the calls from my upline platinum lady asking us why we did not process our ditto for 300PV on the first of the month( this after us ordering 1500-2500PV on the last day of the previous month) and would give us lecture about how core IBOs are expected to do 300PV on the first day of the month.

If only Amway would bother to check with IBOs who went from doing 300+ plus PV for years to less than 50 PV once in a few months, they would really know if there is a genuine demand for products or if people just buy PV and the products come free( famous statement by double diamond Kumar Shivaramakrishnan)

Beware student IBOs

If you are a student IBO, you need to be quite careful with how you interpret what you hear from stage or from your upline.

I joined as a student IBO pursuing my doctoral study in a decent university. There was constant bombardment from my uplines that I should quit my doctoral work and join a job. My upline emerald told I could get all the degrees I want, after I go diamond in 5 years. I was so stupid and naive that I believed him. I completed course work (with a CGPA of 3.97) and passed my preliminary examination for Ph.D. degree with flying colors. (I was ranked #2 in my department.) But my sponsor and other uplines were always asking me to quit and join some job, so that I can build the business faster... I eventually did that after 1.5 years into my Ph.D.

In addition to influencing me, they also tried to make my wife quit her Master's degree. Many times my uplines would ask her why she needs to study the degree. There was also pressure on several of my downlines to quit their Master's degrees.

But then you look at how diamonds think about their own childrens' future.

I was working at one of the top ranked U.S. schools until a few years ago. I and my wife once drove our upline diamond and his family at that time. They came to know where I was working. His wife was so impressed - she said she wanted her kids to go to some school like that! My upline diamond added that he wanted all his kids to go to a similar school close to his home town and how nice it was that he has saved up all the money he needs to pay for their education! But both of them ridicule education and working for top companies in their talks from stage. My upline diamond was so obnoxious in one CA bay area function when he was making fun of all the people who work for Google, Yahoo, etc., That ticked off so many people big time. Our upline diamond lady also personally has advised many of us to quit education and get some low-paying job to build the business faster.

If you have listened to enough CDs, you would have heard that diamonds are actually very proud to send their kids to top schools. Another Indian diamond based in Atlanta bragged how his son got admission to Georgia Tech and is interning at qualcomm.

When it comes to their own kids, the diamonds value education so much. But when it comes to their downline, they could care less.

If you are a student IBO, do not make the stupid mistake I made. Go ahead and complete your degree. If you are thinking you are not growing fast enough only because you are a student, let me tell you something - even if you quit your school and join a job, your business growth will still be almost the same as what you are having now.

Penny wise; pound foolish

Today while having dinner with my wife, we suddenly remembered how our upline tried to control even what food we ate daily.

My upline sponsor was once visiting our home. He saw that we had a small ethnic snack item (chilli powder) in our kitchen. It is primarily used as a side dish with Indian pancakes (called dosas). It costs only $3/pack and usually lasts us for 2 to 3 months. My upline started his rambling: "Why do you need that snack? We never buy those kind of snacks at our home. You know how much you could save by not buying such snack items?". Then he added "I made a calculation how much Indians lose money every day by snacking on ethnic grocery items. I calculated that it comes to about $100 to $200 per month." He also later added looking at some fruits in our refrigerator: "I completely trust nutrilite. We do not eat any fruits at our home. I haven't eaten an apple in years. Why do you need fruits when double-ex has everything? People waste so much money eating fruits."

Do you know how my sponsor would set an "example" for his downline? He would literally not eat anywhere outside, because he told it is a business decision. Once I, my wife and my sponsor went to do a home meeting couple of hours away from my home town. I was literally dying of hunger after the meeting around 10 PM and I could not hold on any longer. So I, my wife and my upline went to a restaurant and ordered food - he did not order anything. I told I would buy him some food, but he said he would not eat that too. I could care less, so I and my wife ate. He was also hungry, but he told he gave a promise to his wife that he would not eat outside and spend money anywhere outside the business! Then we drove and reached our home couple of hours later. Then we cooked for him and he ate at our home after midnight! Then he gave a lecture about how much we spent in the restaurant and how he could control his hunger and not waste those 10 bucks. He told he would have invested that money in business!

This fellow was giving me advice how to save a few bucks here and there, when the main drain in my bank account was the stupid business itself!

You don't know how relaxed I and my wife were when we ate our dinner today. That feeling cannot be simply put in words! We ate nice, hot Indian pancakes happily and cherished every bite of it... The peace of mind that no one is looking over our shoulder to see what we are eating!!!

If you were not in my upline's team, you would not know what kind of value that freedom has! Real freedom - from my sponsor and all my uplines! Priceless!

Tips for Amway IBOs

I have been thinking what I would have done differently, had I known all the things I experienced with my upline, before I joined the business. Hindsight is always perfect and if you are an active, excited Amway IBO like how I was, then you can learn from my experience. You may not fall into the same traps and flawed thinking like I did, but overall, you may find some of these tips useful. You can think of me as your anonymous upline, if that may help :-).

See if your upline is really concerned about your overall success in life or only for success in your Amway business.

For example, is your upline giving you right advice about job? Does he/she feel good when you succeed in other arenas of life or do they feel threatened? If you get a job promotion and a salary hike, do they feel threatened that you may not be motivated to build your business anymore? If you change to a better job, do they feel threatened? If they do, then you need to be careful about taking their advice on such matters.

If you are in a software engineering profession like me, then are you keeping up with what the industry needs and increasing your skill set? Or are you super-confident that you will go diamond in the next 5 years and do not care about updating your skills? I had to put in almost a year after I quit Amway to upgrade my skill set and get new job offers. It was tough, because for 6 years I was under the false confidence that I would go diamond in 5 years and did not care to upgrade my skills! Yes, it was my mistake, not my upline’s. Don’t make that mistake - Do not be over confident until you are making more than $100,000/yr in profits through your Amway business and have very solid groups. Even then there is a chance that it may not last, but at least until then, don’t think you can goof up at your job.

I had an upline who told in his BBS (maybe it is on his rally CD too) that he worked only for 3 hours in a month (not in a week or a day; yes, a month) in his consulting job and make a six-figure income. This was good to hear. Who wouldn’t want that kind of a job? But can you do it and do you want to do it?

Does your upline care about how much savings and investments you have? Do they feel threatened if you buy a home or have outside interests in investment opportunities? Do they feel threatened if you are good at day trading?

If you are a student, is your upline encouraging you to finish your degree or asking you to quit it? This could be one big deciding factor about whether they really care about you and your future. Think about this - if you were their own son or daughter, would they ask you to quit college? Will they ask you to take up a mediocre job so that you can “focus” on your Amway business more? I remember one diamond, Vinnie Pappalardo (BWW), whose daughter wanted to quit college and he was OK with that. Maybe she is successful at Amway and is making enough money. Good for her! But is that right for you? Why can’t you succeed at both college and Amway? They are not mutually exclusive.

Is your upline using your job/educational qualifications as a promotional tool? It will feel so good to you when your upline talks about you, telling what a great person you are, especially in front of your downline and crosslines. The message for other people is that if such a great person needs this business, then the others (who are not as good as you) definitely need it. You get a false feeling of pride, but don’t let that flatter you too much. Your past success is just one more promotional tool for your upline!

What about your health? Does your upline encourage you to work out at least 30 minutes a day? Or are they telling nutrilite will take care of you?

If Amway really makes your overall life better, then they cannot just give lip service. Majority of the IBOs need to succeed in all areas of life. So far, I have only seen people goofing up with several areas of life, thinking they will succeed in Amway, only to realize several years down the road that the profits are not enough and they have also missed out on life... some like me have a very tough time to quit, because we are over confident. But the numbers don’t lie - I mean the numbers that show how much you got in your bank account. You need to be honest with yourself and bite your ego to quit, if you are not happy looking at how much you got.

Ultimately, you are responsible for your own life, so be wise and do not fool around in other areas of life until you are making substantial income through your Amway business.

Another Amway Milking Success Story

Hei! I got news for you!

My upline just confirmed this month that they will NEVER change!

Even after people like us quitting and their reading our blog and following it actively, they do the same thing all over again. And this time it is one of my front lines who goes silver. And guess what? That IBOship looks exactly the same as how our IBOship looked when we went silver - one downline SOT and 5 people at the last function (including my front line)!, not a single new pin this month and he has bought almost 7000PV himself. The 20 SOTs for silver is just stage talk.

This just reconfirms that this Amway thing does not work at all. You either stay at the same level or buy your next pin, especially when you are in my upline's team.

Had my downline built a group of 40 or 50 IBOs and broken a whole bunch of new pins, I would have been wrong. BUT that did not happen! I am so glad that I walked away from this! I would really like to thank them for reconfirming my fears about this business!

Ok - my cross lines who are actively following this blog can clap for that new silver in your next function! My upline RR will most likely be there to "support" that huge group in the next function! My front line bought products for about $22,000 - you should congratulate him for that! Now he needs to find garages to store the nutrilite, artistry and gift albums he has stocked up.

I just think that this front line of mine could have been smarter. I told him several times that buying a pin won't take him anywhere. He saw us right in front of his eyes for 4 years, struggling even after we went silver and then finally quitting. I discouraged every time he came to me and told he wants to buy his way to silver. It has become very convenient for my upline to suck our down line, since we are also gone now!

When my upline RR gets you hypnotized, you can't do anything! The way he brain washes you is like this "You get silver done and come to 'go diamond'. What you learn there will help propel your business towards platinum in the next 6 months. The information you will get at 'go diamond' is something that you haven't learnt at functions." Next month there is a 'go diamond' happening at Kumar level in seven springs. My front line will go there excited for the first time. But when he gets back, he will see his PV drop all the way back to 300 or 600 PV! The information learnt at 'go diamond' is nothing special. Over half the people come there as fake silvers or fake platinums, so you see more sad faces there!

I hope at least our other two legs do not qualify silver this way, taking this front line and us as an example.

You should watch out for these new exciting CDs from your line of sponsorship soon:

If you are not a marker man, I will be your milk man

Milking success stories

Milking your way to diamond

5th basic: Making your first milking work

Join The Milker-of-the-Month Club | Foundation For Ultimate Milking

Proper Use Of The Milking Tools

Balanced Milking

Milking Fundamentals | Cardinal Rules for Milking

Do watch snippets of these talks and more such talks on exciting ways to milk on your system's TV and get inspired to do what??? "Milking", of course.

There is a whole new galaxy inside the GALA galaxy. It is called the

MILKING WAY GALAXY

which could go all the way up to my upline double diamond!

Here is a pretty picture of our "awesome" uplines for all those curious folks:

Tool Refund policy as per BSMAA

Just wanted to post an email conversation with an employee at BWW. When we decided to become inactive, I emailed BWW asking about what the tool refund policy was. I was not aware of refund available for tools for upto 6 months when I sent this email. I later searched online and found out about the tool refund details specified in BSMAA about it- That is the awarness level of rules among active IBOs.

The person at BWW who responded to my email, did not give out any information on tool refunds and wanted us to deal with uplines -So much for following rules.

I do also have an email which I sent my upline asking about tool refund and him replying that tool refund was available for only new IBOs who are trying out standing order for the first time- So much for following rules. Talking about rules, I am totally amazed how my upline broke a "vital rule" by responding by email (usually real email conversations are avoided as much as possible, expect for the usual "fired up" kate emails, to avoid written trails)

Anyways, here is the conversation with BWW:

to: bwwna@bww.com
date: Thu, Oct 22, 2009 at 9:02 AM
subject: Regarding Tools return policy


Hello,


I wanted to know about the tools return policy.

Is it full refunded on unopened tools purchased within the last 90 days by the person from whom you bought the tools (Immediate upline)?

It would be great if you can get back to me on this. Also wanted to know where I could find more information about the BWW tools return policy. I could not find them on BWW website.

I would appreciate it if you could get back to me at the earliest possible.

Thank you

from Danny Hill
date Thu, Oct 22, 2009 at 9:33 AM
subject RE: Regarding Tools return policy

Hello,

you will need to consult your upline about returns. They should be able to let you know any guidelines.

Danny


to Danny Hill ,
bwwna@bww.com
date Thu, Oct 22, 2009 at 9:44 AM
subject Re: Regarding Tools return policy

Hello,

How can you send a vague reply like this? So, you are telling me that BWW has no tools return policy of its own and every upline has their own policy.

If I contact my upline about this they will tell me, that I should check with BWW about the return policy.

What about the disclaimer message at the end of very CD that “it qualifies for refund”- so that message is not of BWW’s?

Can you please let me know, if BWW has a tool refund policy or not? Please provide me a Yes or No answer and if Yes, can u let me know what that is.

Thank you very much




from Danny Hill
date Thu, Oct 22, 2009 at 9:47 AM
subject RE: Regarding Tools return policy


Hello,

BWW return policies are for IBO’s that purchase directly from BWW. You are not a direct customer of BWW. That is why I suggested to go upline. Please have your first upline who orders from BWW contact us if there are any problems. We will be glad to assist.

Danny

Of course, this is an isolated event and it does not happen to other IBOS. I should follow up with IBOAI etc etc on this and not be posting anonymous posts.

Downline's NUGGETS of Wisdom

1) If you are talking to your downline, don’t start the conversation with the excitement that is supposedly going on with you other legs. Believe me it ticks off people, and does not motivate them
( please go back and read again “How to win friends and influence people”, a book which you have been promoting to everybody). If growth is happening in your other legs, people will find out from kate messages and from seeing those people at the associations. It is mildly amusing to see the people about whom you were gushing so much, vanish in a few months.

2) On one hand you are totally fine with people spending 10’s of thousands of dollars to stock up products, to fly and drive to different parts of the country to help build ???teams(one IBO is according to you TEAM) and invest thousands of dollars in old tapes and cds- but when you go to your downline’s house, you criticize them for spending $3-4 on pickles or some spice powder- your downlines might not argue with you when you criticize them for such small things- but inside they are seething with anger.

3) It is OK for people to go on a vacation, honeymoon, go on a trip to India. You don’t have to be a mother- in- law and tell people how you did not go on any vacation or your upline did not go on any vacation, you went to India for 1 week for ur marriage, you did not even attend your own brother’s wedding etc. We know that your real reason for this advice is you are scare out of your lives that when people are out of system for 2-3 weeks, they will fade away. You would rather have people invest (spend) in tools and products rather than spend that money on vacations.

4) It is OK for people to return products. Amway says so. You don’t have to come up with theories like, “If we bought it , we kept it”. I am stuck with sooooooo much jewellery , which looked nice in catalog but did not look good when I actually got them and kept them with me anyways, because you once said not to return products, because your upline was in sapphire qualification and they needed all the side volume that they could get. Not to mention extra sets of icook, Genesona etc etc etc.

5) You do everything against people’s skills, but later remember people’s birthdays, anniversaries etc and wish them and expect that people are going to turn around and appreciate your thoughtfulness. In fact it feels like you want to use every possible occasion to intrude back again into people’s lives.

6)On one hand you expect people to buy world class products from Amway and expect the same people to shop for non-Amway products from dollar store, Food for less, Ross etc. What happened to your wonderful lines about, " People know the cost of everything but value of nothing"???? Please remember that even Amway wants people to eat real "fruits and vegetables" and "real food", in addition to the "Concentrated fruits and vegetables supplement" and food bars and shakes.

7) Please don’t give theoretical advice like so and so sold so went Q12 by putting up a jewellery display in hospitals or so and so spent $1000 for putting up a stall in bridal shows and are getting tremendous results- and expect your downlines would go and do the same). Why don’t you do these things yourself and produce some results, before expecting your downlines to do the same things??

8) Don’t advice people on what kind of jobs they should get, whether they shld continue their education or not, just because according to you people should have a certain job profile to build the business). According to Napoleon Hill, put other’s interest ahead of your own interest. For somebody who can quote pages of pages of Napoleon Hill’s book to prove your points, I am really surprised you do not pay ANY attention to this particular line. Can you ever put other’s interest ahead of your own interest and please you don’t have to decide what is the best decision for others.

9) Most importantly don’t give your expert advice on how and when and where people should get married. Don’t cite examples of people who are moving on(according to you), because they got married and urge/encourage people on your team to get married. Don’t play with people’s personal lives.

End of the month- Miraculous orders

I do agree that not all the orders placed at the end of the month are not necessarily- “nefarious orders”.

But how do you explain “Miraculous orders” at the end of the month , in all 3 legs for 6 months for a Emerald in qualification or in atleast 2-3 legs for a diamond in qualification(assuming first time diamonds atleast have 3-4 solid legs- who qualify month after month).

The person I pity the most is not the new platinum who qualifies to be in the backpocket of his upline- but the PLATINUM (and his team) WHO HAS TO RE-QUALIFY SO THAT UPLINE CAN GO EMERLAD/DIAMOND WHATEVER. No wonder these guys have to talk abt delayed gratification forever.

All the miraculous orders sometimes do not necessarily also happen at the end of the month-For eg: When we went I think 2500 PV for the first time, we bought about 600-700 PV in the middle of the month. Upline's logic- when you are like halfway through your goal,you get the belief that you can accomplish it. Also how can you retail e-spring, icook, atmosphere- if you dont have them??? If you buy it by the middle of the month- can you imagine how many you can retail by the end of the month,(IN MY DREAMS FOR SURE- I NEVER RETAILED ESPRING, ATMOSPHERE, ICOOK as long as I was active in the business), imagine how you can promote these products to your team (NON-EXISTENT TEAM- oh Sorry, I shld be speaking right- UPCOMING FUTURE TEAM). And then in the next month of qualification- you would hear things like- oh you have only one Atmosphere in your home?? You shld have one in the living room, one in the bedroom.

Why do Amway wait until somebody completes platinum qualification for audits? 1 or 2 months of such miraculous orders at the end of the month is not quite enough for them to do audit?

See auditing after somebody completes Platinum is such a win win situation for everybody. A guy finishes platinum qualification by pushing himself and his downlines. End of 6 months –including the bonuses(which is nothing compared to money spent on getting the pin), he gets the pin, his uplines get pin ( and in case of Emerald and Diamond- significant system income from then on). Amway gets to report atleast the same or a little bit increase in sales in that fiscal year– Then I guess they will proceed with their audits, and in the meantime the story repeats itself with some other new Emerald, Diamond and so on.

Why cant they send an automatic email say for eg: like a congratulatory email to all newly qualified 1000PV and above and in the email also let them know if the IBO has any faced any situation with stocking up of products, they shld contact Amway.

Well, I guess all these are all toooooo tough to implement and the easiest thing is to expect all low level IBOs to act right ( while of course being bombarded from the system abt submission to upline, not questioning upline, being part of upline’s goals inorder to grow, etc etc etc)

Taking advantage of downline's friendship and trust- for FAKE RECOGNITION

I do hope there are people who build the business with right values, because as far as I knew-my upline's way of building the business was/is- GETTING IT DONE ONE WAY OR THE OTHER. There was a new platinum last year in his team and God only knows how much they stocked up- as they dont have a team big enough to support platinumship and my upline himself, one of the PATHAGAN BROTHERS ;-) said-THEY GOT IT DONE ONE WAY OR THE OTHER.

Whom do u go and complain to - when more than 1 upline calls you on 30th night to get you to 7500PV knowing fully well that we had a grand total of 2 STANDING ORDERS, not a single retail order in that month and knows that ur credit cards are maxed out and loans you money so that u can get 7500PV done.

Whom do you go and complain to when the theme song for Ajmani team at that Go Diamond event was - "You got to Move it, move it"- Implying that you got to move the products you stocked up.

It wont be very surprising when one of the Pathagan brothers talks from the stage in a future function..abt "How their passion for the business does not diminish one bit inspite of silvers on their team, in whom they invested so much time, money and energy quits and how this business is all about helping and Impacting people...blah blah blah." We are not the first silver to fade away from their business and we wont be the last.

After doing all this, the sad/funny part is they will claim that intention was always right, that they believed that it is for our good (qualifying for go diamond event no matter what was supposedly for our good- dont know for whose good and with what good intention we were made to buy 1500-2500 PV for his other months of qualification.) They will always maintain that they thought that we wanted it so bad and that is why they recommended it to us. That this is how they qualified for first time and with the information from go diamond event- they were able to move on so fast, and they thought that we would also move on fast..yeah right.

These guys who claim that this way of qualifying is the right thing to do in private- if they have guts- they should talk about it in their cds, in their rallies- so everybody else can learn to move on faster. Why make such a passionate glossy stage talk and let the world think so highly of you. In fact I even asked this question to my sponsor- of course- he had no answer.

They have not stopped and will never stop. After we became inactive, my downlines are now stocking up products, so that they can reach new pin levels.

I guess this is the legacy/intangible values they will leave their kids- that cheating is perfectly OK, as long as your intentions are right.

Has Amway done anything about the orders they miraculously get on the 30th of the month- especially the 30th of August and March?? I guess in the world of Amway all of a sudden on the 30th of March and August and in the in between months- "God's hands miraculously starts moving in the IBO's lives" (that is IBO stage code word for stocking up products;-)). When Amway really does something about the miraculous orders they receive at the end of the month- there might be a possibility for lesser abuses.

If they want to do somthing about it, why dont they openly write against miraculous orders on their website and ask IBOs to contact them anonymously about abuses?? They can decide to take/ or not take action against the upline IBO based on the number of miraculous orders the upline has had in the past.

Month of March is almost here and there will be new diamonds, emerlads, platinums etc this year and there will be newer abuses. I think in stead of saying "Pledge for the flag" at the beginning of the seminar rallies, speakers should be asked to pledge from the stage in front of everybody that not a single person on their team- bought even 1 PV extra for their goal.

Why exeagle blog?

Guess many of you have read my Amway story. There are facts in there and then there is my view point. If my upline reads it, they will definitely have a different view point. If my cross line reads it (as some of them have already read) they will have a view point as well. Since this is a blog I am writing, of course, I will have the last say on this blog on anything. Many (like IBOFB) have linked to my blog and have the last say in their blogs about me, which is fine with me.

Yes, like some of you say, this blog should have been titled "exfakeeagle" not "exeagle" :-). I agree! In fact, the first time I went to my eagle leadership, I was a flamingo, so you can call this blog "exflamingo" blogspot too.

Why take so much pain to write this blog? Here are my reasons:

(1) I cannot go to my upline and ask for justice.
I tried several times, but they were deaf ears. In fact, my upline emerald once told me: "What I realize after going emerald is that, what works for me, does not work with everyone. I assumed that you guys are also like me, in trying to get to some pin level and then fixing it. I am sorry that I have hurt your self image in the process, because now I realize that I might have made a mistake." It sounded very honest to me and I decided to stay with the business. But two years later, when he wanted to start founders emerald qualification, he again did dishonest things. I personally lost one of my downlines and close friend from business (and from life) because of that, because I could not go to my down line and tell that my upline emerald is a crook. My upline emerald had lot more people in his group and lot more credibility than me.

(2) I cannot go to Amway for justice.
Because, on paper, nothing can be proven. In fact, they can say that since every order was placed through my login account, I am the one who willingly did it. Moreover, if I were Amway and I see that one guy qualified fake silver and is actually bringing 600 PV to 1000 PV per month business to me every month and he is griping about some big pins who are bringing thousands of dollars of business to me, why would I care?
I do not have anything to say negative about Amway itself. They are a wonderful company and they make great quality products, which I still use. (Some of the BWW-promoted product demos are simply lies though.) Their compensation plan is clean and I never missed one bonus check. They are THE best company when it comes to customer satisfaction and money-back guarantee. That is what attracted me to the business and kept me in. And they do everything they can to prevent cases like mine from happening, but they do not have any influence over how a specific individual does his business.

(3) I cannot go to BWW or IBOAI for justice.
Before I go there, I need to get a pass from my upline diamond. In fact they have told several times in leaderships never to contact Amway or IBOAI for any issues and first check with upline diamond. Even for product return, my upline would say "we never return any product to Amway. If we bought it, we keep it." (Think about XS protein pudding on first dibs auto shipment... even my upline diamonds' kids were telling "YUK!!!") In fact, I did contact my upline diamond about my upline emerald anonymously once about a few things. He responded telling he will take care of them. But it was not taken care off. Same problems erupted back after a year.

(4) I do not want any guy in Amway to think that he can do dishonest things and can then take BWW's teachings as alibi and get away with it.
My uplines broke several cardinal rules and thought they could get away with it. They represent BWW as well, since one of them is in BWW executive committee and is a dynamic speaker and the other guy talks in BWW open meetings as well. Trust me: my upline emerald is a great speaker and can keep you motivated.

(5) If some other IBO is in a similar situation like me, he can learn from my experience and not do the same mistakes we made.
I guess no one else has revealed as much as I have about what happened, along with my identity. If you know me, you can easily guess who I am.
In our situation, we could not fight our uplines and at the same time, we could not follow them as well. I could not follow the usual advice "You pass them and you do not need to listen to them anymore." We could not promote them to our downline with excitement, since we never felt any respect for them. So we decided to only follow what is taught from stage and not listen to our uplines. We are thankful to all the wonderful cross line leaders who have supported us in many ways. Since they were not my upline, I do not know how they actually did their businesses. Maybe their downlines can vouch for their honesty and integrity. Unfortunately, in our case, after showing about 220+ plans for 2 years, we had only 2 more proper IBOships added to our group of the original 3 IBOships. (I know core Amway IBOs are justifying our poor results telling I missed out on the other 8 core steps, which was not the case.) We once had about 15 people at a function, but many of them were dragged in and my downline who dragged them in quit as well.

(6) Never spoil your career or education for Amway.
BWW does not ask you to stop your career progress. They initially say it helped them advance peoples' career, which I agree with. They teach soft skills, which is valuable for life.
But sometimes you hear some diamonds and EDCs make some statements that can confuse you. I have heard Vishal Jain telling "once I knew this is it, I never looked for any pay raise. I would wait for 5 PM and will run home and get ready to build the business. Once I lost my job and found that I could not find any job, I decided diamond is my deal. " Yes, it worked for him. Hats off to him! But will it happen for everyone? Now hard-core IBOs will say "If you have faith like him and work like him, you will also get it." Then go and get it done. What are you doing by reading my (negative) blog here? You can hear Kanti telling: "If you chase 2 rabbits, you will miss both" - Great analogy, but what are the 2 rabbits? In what context does he say these things? Taking things out of context and trying to apply them to your life can be disastrous.

(7) If you really believe in Amway and your teaching system, then for God's sake, do not waste your time reading blogs.
I am NOT the guy you are looking for. I am NOT the guy who can help you. Don't do the stupid things we did. Go and get the job done and achieve your dreams. Even though you won't care what I think, please do it honestly. Do not cheat your way to pins.
Guys like IBOFB: if you are really an IBO who wants justice and want to fight back, you are fighting in the wrong place. Don't be like my upline to your downline. Fight to build your business properly. I never read a single blog like this as long as I was actively building my business. You could not have argued with me telling Amway does not work when I was active. I would not have participated. Even after not reading blogs, I still could not build it to the level I wanted. Do you think you can take all this junk in and still build your business?

If you are my upline:

At least from now on, do not build your business like the way you built it. Build it honestly and really help your downline make money.

Really CARE about your down line and their lives.

Do not recommend them on things you are not qualified for.

Please do sell the 50 PV minimum required customer sales and do not fake it. If someone is selling 50 PV then do not tell them "you know your cross line sold 400 PV. 50 PV is nothing." Of course, we know that you did not sell even 2 PV, but we have to keep quiet because you are my upline.

Please do not use all the guilt trip, accountability fear, comparisons, sarcasms, indirect messages at kate conferences and leaderships and total indifference as techniques to motivate people. It is OK to acknowledge and uplift people for simply who they are, not for what they could accomplish in the last 6 months in their business.

When your downlines are going through tough times, give them room. They need not qualify for leaderships. Not everyone can handle crap like you do.

If a downline comes and asks you for counseling, do not tell them how many other bigger pins are waiting for counseling and you have only 30 minutes. Recall John Maxwell "people do not care how much you know until they know how much you care". Really sit down with them and spend some time helping them.

And most important, NEVER force a downline to stock up products so that you can achieve your goals. Have the guts to call people and discourage them from stocking up products even to reach their own new pins. I would have stayed with you, even if one of you called me telling "It is OK for you not to qualify silver now. Build it right and you will have a lot more fun later" instead of telling me "I will make sure you go platinum in the next one year, if you go silver this month." You just cut open the goose that could have laid the golden egg every month for you! (I know you are calling me as a weak fellow to make yourself feel good...)

To my downlines:

I like your guts. Many of you know all of this and still are going ahead. I hope you do not become like how my up line was.

I feel ashamed for motivating many of you to stay in when you wanted to quit and then finally quitting myself. I am sorry! I just could not fake it after 5 and 6 years of failure.

If we have hurt you in any way, we are sorry. Only you know what we did wrong; we do not know, since my view point is what I did at that time was right. At least we did not push you to buy extra products so that we can qualify for a new pin. When we qualified for a new pin, we bought it all ourselves... But we kept quiet when my up line might have pushed you. Since we kept quiet, you are justified in thinking we were part of the scheme as well.

And as they teach you - "today is the first day of the rest of your life." So I decided to subtract 6 from my age and re-start my life. (BWW PMA teaching to the extreme, huh?)

Amway Income Summaries for 2009 and 2008

I saw that a new feature on the Amway website is that- income summary is now available online. I don't know how the diamonds and above allowed this to happen as the income summaries also include "Purchases". Earlier we used to get W2. It would not have the information about the purchases made in that year.

Most of the IBOs who during the year don't pay any attention to income and expenses are sure in for a shock when they get to look at these income summaries.

According to the online income summary my earning for the 2009 was around $3600 and Purchases around $9000. I stopped being active in the last quarter of 2009, otherwise my purchases would have been easily more by another 3K. Doing 300Pv every month is such a small price for your freedom. Yeah right.

Earning for 2008 around $3800 and purchases ONLY AROUND $11k.

This was only the the expenses involved with purchases from Amway. They dont include the system expenses or the expenses involved with actually building the business.

I noticed that nothing much in income had changed between 2008 and 09 and when I decided to leave the business my upline was trying to convince that I was so close to platinumship and would be able to make $2k month after after (yeah right- in my dreams)

We would have thrown up if we had received the income summary with "Purchases", the year we went silver and were a "Strong part of Upline's platinumship."

The system Thrives on Negativity

For the group of people, who claim to be positive all the time, it is very surprising and many times irritating to see the system focus so much on negativity.

For eg: When you go to a open meeting - the first 45 minutes is spent on emphasizing the negative things about economy, job market, world in general. I really cannot comprehend how these people can talk so much about avoiding newspaper, internet news site but still have all statistics about divorce rates, unemployment rate, the percentage of foreclosures, etc etc in their finger tips. When the economy meltdown started happening the Amway IBOs were almost rejoicing. Speaker after speaker kept saying “ WE TOLD YOU SO…WE KEPT TELLING NOT TO BUY HOUSES, SEE WHAT HAS HAPPENED NOW” and so on. Their goal is by the end of the presentation to create such a hype to make you think nothing but doing Amway is good.

Have you seen any other professional claiming to be the best by justifying that all other professions are utter waste of time. Have you seen a doctor insulting a computer consultant to justify that his profession is better or vice versa?

But that is exactly Amway IBOs constantly do. If you are a computer consultant- they call you insult ant. If you are a doctor- “you still have a bucket, it is just that you have a golden bucket” (meaning- a doctor has to show up at work every day to make money, just that his hourly rate is higher- as if Amway IBOs are making money in their sleep).

If you are a very senior executive in a company- then you have sold your soul to that company to be in that position, if you are a priest- then they say that cannot comprehend a broke person teaching “God wants everybody to be prosperous” etc. If you own conventional business- “then these conventional business owners are time broke and don’t have employees but headaches.” (Yeah Right Amway is a sure way of becoming even more time broke and getting a much much bigger headache called upline). Basically if you are an employee, then you nothing but a slave. Even Bill Gates or the President of United States is not spared from their ridicules.

They make fun of everybody on the earth- If you are planning on doing Master’s they make fun of you saying- “you know that jobs don’t work and now you are after masters and do what- go back to job”. If you have a Ph.d, you will have to suffer much more ridicule- like it erally takes a Ph.D to figure out how to make a living with that salary (I don’t know what it takes to make a living with the Amway IBO income). Yet, these same idiots will claim at the end of the plan abt how Amway is such a great corporation which employs many Ph.D scientists to conduct their research.

The speakers on the function stage who put down education so much will gush about their children have gor admitted to top schools and will tell you that only because of the business that their children were able to achieve that.

Bill Britt when he gets on stage and irritates so much by saying that the stage is set up by broke people, flowers, audio is set up by broke people and that he needs about 40-50 broke people to conduct his daily life- everybody who is doing something other than Amway- according to him is broke. Talk abt humility.

All their claims abt people are being laid off and the employers not caring for the employess- Just stop your standing order for a few months, your uplines will really show you how much they care about you.

Their so called night owl after night owl is nothing but, hours and hours of laughing behind people’s back- putting down the prospect who did not get it, putting down the new IBO who does not want to continue the business anymore, putting down people who are just working their jobs, putting down people who laughed at them. But these same people claim from the stage - “Average people only discuss other people”.

Go Diamond Leadership- Should it be called "Go Broke Leadership?"

Why don’t the qualification for these events be- Should have achieved atleast 7500 PV once in the past 6 months or atleast in the past 1 year?? Or have a qualification that only people who made so much money "Through the business"in the previous year are allowed for these events??

Why should they let all the people who qualified 7500PV once in their lifetime in the business and that too you know how from my previous post.

The sad truth is if they had these qualifications even most of the platinums would not then qualify for these events. It is no fun right only the bigger pins meeting each other- they would miss the joy of thrashing all the low level IBOs who are supposedly not moving on

I must say that for the claim in these teaching systems that they are the most positive people on the face of this Earth, they take tremendous pleasure in pointing out the negatives in everything else (except the Amway business ) and in putting down every single profession.

I checked the hotel rates for the go diamond event this year. It is “only” $250/night. The go diamond expenses would easily add up to more than $1000 or more – adding up flight tickets, parking, rental car, hotel for 2 nights, food not to mention the function ticket, baby sitting expenses- if you have kids.

Not to of course mention- the cost of actually qualifiying silver- I have a cd which was made in one of the Go diamond events, one of the EDC talking about how the water quality and the air quality of the new silvers neighborhood has tremendously increased- Implying that they have stocked up E-spring and ATMOSPHERE to qualify.

Why should the system torture the IBOs who are as it is not making money and bleed them financially and call them losers if they are not “willing to pay the price”
( very expensive price I must say). If you tell your upline that you don’t think you should go to the diamond event this year, because you have not qualified in a long time (I MEAN REALLY LONG TIME), be ready to receive an earful of thrashing as to “How you are not a team player”, “How you are losing faith”…etc etc etc.

You see you can "Go Diamond" only from the nuggets you receive from the night owl after night owl at 4 a.m that happens at the "Go diamond events" and that is why you should go- to learn to "Go Diamond" (yeah right).

Eagle leadership and other PV based leaderships

Despite being a system pin, why are downlines encouraged to fake the qualifications for eagle ledearship?? One thing I can say is downline has no real monetary benefit by faking eagle qualifications. Infact it adds up to an already heavy expense involved with being a committed IBO and the downline who fakes such qualification feels like a mosquito- because he knows that everybody else knows that he is not actually an Eagle. The fake qualification in no way helps the IBO’s self image or his bank balance.

Uplines have to verify eagles in their team by sending eagle verification sheets to their upline diamond. It would be very foolish to think downlines come up with the brilliant idea to fake eagle qualifications without their upline platinum, emerald – whoever they are working with recommending it and fully aware of it. The upline diamond is very well aware of such things. You have to listen to the jokes that are made the speakers in these leaderships that imply that they are aware that most people have faked the qualifications.

In my upline diamonds team there would have been anywhere between 200-300 people who qualified for these leaderships. In kate conferences prior to these leaderships and in many associations, there is constant programming that once you get eagle done, you will start platinum qualification in 3-6 months. If this is true, my upline diamond shld be breaking atleast 100 new platinums every year( considering the rest of the people at these events are already platinums and above). Well, that is not the case, he breaks at most 5-10 platinums every year. One year was exception and he broke I think 20-30 platinums- coz there were so many new emeralds.

Who could be actually benefitting from such leaderships?

1) I cannot deny the fact that some people because of the leadership work extra hard and get all the parameters right. Some fly to different conferences to different parts of country to take one person to atleast one session of the function- so that he gets the function parameters right. These people are put in such a high pedestal and are made out to be such heroes in the eyes of other IBOs. I don’t know if flying to all the different functions to get that one new person to that one session is of any benefit- atleast by qualifying Eagle the IBO’s self image is so high now- so I think it is a god thing, depending on how you look at it.

2) Most of the emeralds at the most qualify as q12s every year. These leaderships are such a boon for them as they can get in a couple of months of their qualification (7500PV for that month) because of these leaderships. Many of the eagle leaderships, PV based leaderships- the qualifications are for eg : you have to be an eagle or 1000PV( in case of PV based leadership) for Jan and Feb and there are other recognitions like if you have a downline IBO eagle for a couple of months then you get to spend with upline diamond- to soak in more nuggets(read: to learn more how to rip off people). I know for a fact that there were so many fake eagles part of my upline emeralds team. My sponsor himself has told me that in their open people wonder how come there are so many eagles who have only a couple of locally associating IBOs. If the upline emerald say for eg: gets even 10 eagles for a leadership and if each of their PV level is atleast 1000PV because of fake PV cheques- he gets atleast 10,000PV that month. Some of these pv cheques could be from inactive ibos doing volume for that month- since the ibos qualifying for such leaderships would have pleaded/begged their inactive IBOs to buy products for that month- which the downline would not have done if not for the leadership. So many emeralds talk abt how they have qualified for all the q12 trips straight for so many years. I do know how they actually qualify.

3) Of course the system income for the UPLINES associated with the surge of tool order- atleast a surge in their income for that particular month.

4) Most important I think- If only people who had all the parameters right were allowed into these associations- only platinums and above and a handful of non-platinums would be there at the event. The platinums and above are all already indoctrinated with the system’s philosophies. They need a new bunch of IBOs whom they can indoctrinate with their theories and ideas of honesty and integrity and who can continue on their legacy of ripping off people in the name of “being part of inner circle, intangible values and all bunch of crap” . In such leaderships you are clearly told- “THERE IS NO GROCERY STORE APPROACH ANY MORE. YOU HAVE TO TAKE IN EVERYTHING THAT IS TAUGHT TO MOVE ON.”

In these leaderships they have separate men and women leaderships and men are taught they need to have vision and should not give into wife’s complaints of not making money. Women are taught to applaud their man coz they are showing they plan and not to interfere with their husband’s investment in the system and most importantly not whine about lack of results. I cannot even write many things that are taught in these men and women leadership and you are not even allowed to record things.

5)Getting the heat from below: If the upline works with a downline of yours and gets them to Eagle or 1000PV, then all the uplines above now are in pressure to qualify for these events.

I have had so many many moments of hating myself for giving into my upline’s advice and faking these qualifications – like the red dog(Tape/CD positive talk) and white dog (Ur conscience) analogy of Kumar. The white dog’s voice would soon be drowned out by the much much louder red dog’s voice through the cds, books and the twice weekly associations (open, pase). Only when you are totally away from the system’s influence for some amount of time, can you ever think rationally and really make decisions by yourself. I am in no way blaming uplines entirely for whatever happened to me and I know that I allowed these things to happen to me and I keep asking myself how come I was so dumb, so weak, such a coward for not standing up to them?

AS the system keeps saying “TRUTH WILL SET YOU FREE”, I hope by sharing my story, “TRUTH WILL SET ATLEAST A FEW PEOPLE FREE.”

Our Quixtar/Amway Global Story

I had never posted our Amway story and thought I should make a post about it. I had dreamed countless times about the glorious story of achievement, I would tell from the stage to a crowd of eager IBOs ready to soak in the nuggets about my achievements in Amway, but that was not the case to be.

We started in 2003 and were active till around end of 2009. By active I mean being out there more than 5 nights a week, showing 3-5 plans a week, attending all associations, flying/driving miles, doing more than 300 pv per month.

I was sponsored by my best friend whom I had known for around 10 years. I was new to the country. I had been in the US for only a month. My friend invited me to a FED in Minneapolis. He told me in no less words that I can forget our friendship if I was not willing to come to the FED and start the business. He in fact paid for my flight tickets, function ticket, starter pack and even paid for me to complete my 100Pv in my first month. Of course, I did repay all of this money, but this is how I got started. I went to the FED reluctantly but a lot of things talked about from the stage appealed to me and I decided to start the business.

Our woes started when my upline Emerlad decided in 2005 that he was going to get Emerald done no matter what and be a part of the upline diamond’s inner circle. So as a part of my upline starting emerald qualification, my sponsor started platinum qualification (Silver)- So we committed (Made to commit) 2500PV to be a part of upline’s goal. When we went 2500PV , we had no associating IBO. We bought more than 2000PV ourselves. We must have done retail about 100PV at the maximum and a few non-associating IBOs bought some big ticket items like e-spring. We bought a lot of jewellery. My wife who is a medical graduate and has a Master’s Degree was encouraged by upline to go to Nail spas and talk to the ladies there and sell jewellery. We had a long distance upline. So she had to do this on her own. When I think about my wife going to spas and selling jewellery for my idiotic upline’s goal-my blood boils even today.

Then we qualified for Ajmani Eagle leadership for the first time in 2005. We had 1 associating IBO who did 100PV and who was on standing order. The rest of the PV cheques we created by buying products and transferring the volume to inactive IBOs to create 5 more PV cheques. We were 8 SOT short to complete our Eagle parameters- So what did we do??? Our upline told us to buy just 8 Standing order CD for 4 weeks and 8 books for a whole month. BWW was not sitting there at the eagle leadership and checking who had 10 SOT or not or if we had 6 pv cheques or not- to this day, I wonder why the heck we were made to buy those extra standing orders and do extra volume to create PV cheques. For this we had to fly to the east coast- so more money had to be shelled out for flight tickets. There we realized many people had qualified like us, since many of the speakers kept saying that now that you have put your grandmother on standing order and have qualified, we want you to go back and fix your structure.

Most of the group my sponsor had put together at this time had vanished and he had decided to complete platinum qualification in 05-06 and be his upline’s third leg for his emeraldship. This meant more trouble for us as being my sponsor’s close friend and the system’s constant programming we were to become the scape goats. So the first month when he restarted platinum qualification we again did more than 2000PV. As soon as we did it, a big fight erupted between me and my wife due to me doing everything upline was telling without any concern for our future. When I talked to my upline emerald in qualification about why he was doing this to us- making us buy so much for his goals, he was so angry that we were questioning him and not being thankful for all the help he was doing- flying to meet us, and did a lot of guilt trip and made it clear that if we question uplines- we would not grow.



Our trust with our uplines had greatly reduced but we still believed that if what we did as told by the system, we will still win. We later realized that pretty much in all lines of sponsorship, the same thing is being done, but the system portrays itself as honest and full of values, so that the IBOs being exploited get the feeling that uplines may be bad but if you follow the system you will still win.

For the next few months there was no pressure and we thought that the uplines had dropped the idea of going platinum and Emerald. We did not realize that they had given us breathing space for a few months. It all started again from April of 06, when you had only 5 months to complete qualifications that year. April and May we again stocked up 1500 PV or more. June 06 was a big month as Kumar Go Diamond event was coming up in July 06 and we were highly encouraged to qualify for that event. At this point of time we had 1 active associating IBO who was on standing order- so the grand total of our standing order count was 2, including ours. In system they always teach from stage that you should have 20 Standing order when you start platinum qualification.

But in close quarters, in night owls uplines used to always tell that you cannot wait till you have 20 standing order and the perfect timing to start platinum qualification. So, finally in June 06 we qualified as Silver by BUYING MORE THAN 6000PV OURSELVES. At this point of time, our credit cards were maxed out because of stocking up products and all the other regular expenses involved with being a 100% core IBO. So what do our honest uplines do - My sponsor loans us $10,000 so that we can stock up products and qualify Silver. My up-upline emerald SMR calls me and this is what he told me verbatim - "You go silver this month and I will make sure you go platinum within the next one year". Guess how many calls I got from him after we went to Kumar go diamond? ZERO! He never called me even to just enquire how we are doing!

All he made sure was that his downline and brother RR qualified as emerald! My upline Emerald had the nerve to even call me in his last month of qualification if we were willing to buy 1000PV worth of jewellery. I still have my BWW calendar from that year, in which all the last days of my upline's emerald qualification were marked "PV deal", meaning my upline was convincing me/making me accountable for the goal we committed at the beginning of the month!

I still don’t know why I stayed in till this point or beyond this point, knowing fully well what crooks my upline were. I can attribute my staying in only to the bombardment of the teachings of the system and some cross line leaders, who seemed genuine and honest!

My sponsor did complete his platinum qualification and my upline his Emerald qualification in 2006. My upline Emerald cut a wonderful cd in where he talks about how he has made it in Amway. Sadly, his wonderful cd with a beautiful story does not tell the ACTUAL story about how many trusting IBOs he has exploited on his way to Emerald, how many IBO's bank balance he has wiped out, how much of a crook he actually is and how low he would stoop to achieve his goals.

Another big thing was our wedding. According the "system" you need to be legally married for people to trust you, so you cannot hang around for too long telling this is my fiancee, girl friend, etc., Since we had some resistance from our families for our wedding, we could not get a traditional Indian wedding done in India when we wanted it. So our uplines recommend us to get secretly married here, which we did. Everything was fine after our wedding, except for the fact that we both were feeling guilty. So we wanted to go to India and get a traditional wedding done. Whenever we talked to upline about this, my upline emerald RR would say "If you want to go to India, you can go for 10 days and come back. But if you want to go platinum in the next 1 year, then forget about it. You cannot go to India for 10 days and then expect to go platinum within the next 1 year. Your platinumship will be delayed by at least 6 more months." The truth was actually not that - it is to keep us here until he qualified emerald. Every time the wedding topic would come, he would pretty much black mail us with the same lines. So we were forced to stay here until he qualified emerald. But after that, he never really cared. The ultimate turn-around was when he told me a few years later he and my sponsor friend were wondering why we did not go to India and get our traditional wedding done any sooner than we did.

Next two years, no pressure to stock up products, though in 2007 in a major fight with uplines, we let them know what we really thought about them. We still believed that if we did what was taught by the system, we could still be financially free.

In 2008, my sponsor decides to start q12 qualification and his upline founders emerald qualification. This time they knew we would not buy a single extra product for their qualification. So, they come up with such a brilliant idea. At this point of time, Amway was giving 20% Pv/BV uplift for all online customer orders worth $75 or if you reported any customer order that you made from your inventory more than $75. My upline gets password for my Amway account and all our downlines and reports everybody’s personal purchase as customer order, so that they would get this 20% uplift. So this way, they exploit Amway’s promotion to get extra free PV. This happened for a couple of months and a few IBOs decided to drop out not wanting to be part of this team. One of my close friends and downline IBOs quit at this time. He at least had enough integrity in him to quit as soon as my uplines started the "real deal" on him and his downlines! I lost a good friend from my life! When I confronted my upline and asked him why he is being so dishonest, he said “Why would Amway have such a promotion if they know that people would misuse it. He said Amway wants people to take advantage of this 20% uplift promotion”. How could you ever argue with somebody who is hard headed and believes what they are doing is right?

Finally towards the end of 2009, when we had a chance due to our international trip to not be a part of system for about 3 weeks, we finally started asking ourselves why we are in it, when we are not making any profit, when our relationship was so sour due to the arguments about this business, when we were made to feel like losers by the system for not making it inspite of all the HARD work that we were putting in with no results to show for, when we were not winning in it and when we were not seeing any chance of winning in the next few years?? We decided we had had enough and not to be active with the system anymore. Even at this time our upline tried to influence us and keep us in the business and we were not willing to agree with him. We are so glad that we made this decision as we are so much happier and we dont have false hopes anymore.

We would have easily invested more than $80K in our Amway journey- with doing 300PV every month- most of these products that we had never used prior to being IBOs and would have NEVER used if we had not been a IBO, with all the flights we had to take to support our long distance groups, all the flight tickets to attend Go diamond leaderships- the money does add up to a staggering number. We had spent more than
$20K just for my upline’s Emerlad qualification. More than the money the time we spent, it pains us to think about the relationships that we had failed to nurture, the careers we had not paid attention to and the mess it created in our personal lives.

We have started our journey back to normal lives and we are glad that we came to our senses atleast now. Life is actually going great now. We took 3 quality vacations, have saved up a lot through our job incomes and are looking ahead for a great future!

And I am not saying you should not join Amway/BWW. Join it and make money honestly. Do not become part of anything dishonest, even if your upline does it and recommends it to you. Just because 100 people are doing something wrong, does not make it right. Have the guts to do it right every step along the way and achieve your dreams!