Just a few minutes ago, we received an unsolicited phone call here at our home from someone calling herself, Debbie. She said she was calling from "Teacher Retirement Services" and she had "The laws have changed and we would like to give you information on a new 403b plan."
She asked for the teacher in our house by name.
I asked her what herlast name was. I heard her say what I thought was "Astro" The teacher in our house on the other phone thought "debbie" said, "Matsua" .
The teacher in our house then asked, "what is your address?" She replied with one word, "Fallbrook" She did not provide an address.
The teacher in our house asked, "what your phone number?"
She replied, "Aren't you interested?"
I asked how she got our name. She replied, "the person I work for, gave me a list"
"Who is that person?" I asked
"Oh aren't you interested?" she evasively answered the question with her same question again.
"Maybe," I replied, "who is the person you work for?"
Click. She hung up with no reply at all
I cannot believe that a legitimate organization would refuse to give their phone number, address or name of their supervisor.
I further object to the way they contact us. They gave the aura of an official call from a government organization. I felt that was their clear intent. They never said we are an independent for profit organization selling 403b plans or anything similar to that. She very much seemed to be trying to confuse us with her opening remarks and with the name of the business that sounds surprisingly official.
Teacher Retirement Services representatives have called us at our home several times in the last month or so.
Last week the representative called asking for the teacher in our home by name and telling that teacher about 'the new laws and the 403b and said that she would be happy to meet with the teacher in our home at our home or at our school.' The teacher in our house said she was not interested.
About thirty minutes later, the same representative called our number again, this time to ask for me by name. I haven't work for the district in about ten years so she is working off an old list.
Unless I hear otherwise from this group, I will consider this group and their product a scam. I suggest you be deeply suspicious of them and any of their products as well.
While I was a teacher in VUSD, I often found post card like "junk mail" from Teacher's Retirement Services in my teacher's mail box and saw that every teacher at the school had them as well--clearly a violation of the use of school mailboxes for VUSD purposes only and not for commercial use.
When I called to complain about the illegitimate use of our mail boxes and their confusing name that sounded like an official State Teacher Retirement System (STRS), i was hung up on. The post cards continued to arrive in our school mail boxes once or twice a month until I retired--years later.
The first time I got their 'post card" in my box, I thought it looked official enough that it was from the State Teacher Retirement Services. I found out later that Teacher Retirement Services is not affiliated with STRS. I recommend that anyone contacted by this organization hang up and refuse to do business with them until this group identifies who they are and where they got our phone numbers from.
I googled Teacher Retirement System and the only response I got was a place in Scottsdale, Arizona
http://www.educatingeducators.com/index.cfm
If any one has additional information on Teacher Retirement Services, I would appreciate hearing from you.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment