IBA GLOBAL: NOT GO TO THIS COMPANY, EVER!
It started off when I put my CV up on totaljobs. I got a email saying that I have been selected to go to an interview in Wapping. Honestly at first I was thrilled because I’m in desperate need of a job as its hard for me to get one right now as I am in the middle of finishing my last year of college.
Don’t get me wrong, when I arrived, the place looked legit. Posh, beatiful decor, amazing view of the sea from the office. Anyway, so it was a group interview, me and 3 others all interviewed by a man where we talked about ourselves and our work experiences and all that and he told us about being a “Brand Ambassador” and what it included. At this time I was completely oblivious, but he never even told us what IBA even stood for or at least a reminder of it for those who already know. They promised travelling the world and stuff like meeting successful businessman and made it out to be this big opportunity, I was stupid enough to believe it.
So the first day I barely suspected a thing. However my family was curious about how little I knew about it and what the company was feeding us. We looked up IBA and found mixed reviews on google as expected. So they found student room and saw the reviews on here. I honestly didn’t know what to do.
I went to the second interview anyway but I was prepared with questions. I had to dress in business attire and went to this meeting where there were a lot more recruits than expected. 1st red flag. The interview told us more about what they do, which was door to door direct sales. 2nd red flag, I originally signed up for indirect and social media marketing. So make sure you think this through and do your research, don’t make this mistake if this is not what you want to do.
The 3rd red flag hit me like a ton of bricks. We were then individually separated to shadow other workers and travel out of the area, which was not I was expecting and certainly not something they told me about beforehand, they had only emailed and called about dressing appropriately, nothing else.
So I was sent off with this woman and her group of more experienced recruits where we had to take 3 trains (a huge waste of money at the end by the way as I took the train to the office) All it was is knocking on doors and promoting this brand called Gousto. Barely anyone was home, and those who did answer were mostly the elderly, who didn’t order online and barely use the internet (Gousto requires ordering fresh ingredients online and delivers to your door with instructions to cook the dish for those who don’t know.) This kept up for at least 2-3 hours of my life I will never get back and it was freezing cold. I started to ask questions such as the pay, and as suspected, it’s all commission based. In other words, no sales, no money. It all depends on if you even make a sale at the end.
We eventually got a worthy customer to sign up. Whilst we were there, the woman I was shadowing and a 1st day girl on the job were struggling to set up the account. It was just a pointless trip I spent so much money on to just to get there.
Now for the 5th and final red flag: The woman tried to send me back to the office for a final interview whilst serving the current customers when I was supposed to stick with them until 8. I was relieved to get out early, but devastated that I missed the signs of a scam.
At this point I knew the job was all a bust. They expected me to back to the office, spend more money on those 3 trains getting there where I might find out I’m not cut out for the job and then back home. So in the end I made the decision to go straight home as I barely had money left. On the way back home I called the office to tell them I won’t be turning up for the final interview as I thought that the job wasn’t to my liking and suiting. The call literally lasted 15 seconds where the lady on the phone responded, “take care, bye.”
Overall a terrible experience and a waste of time to a unprofessional, unorganised, unofficial company. I take this as a lesson to avoid scams like this in the future. Money and missed college lessons all for nothing. Let this be a warning to those applying for the same or similar company.
Signs of a scam:
1.) It’s for direct sales
2.) Commission based work
3.) The workers don’t even tell you what the company stands for
4.) Don’t even tell you you’d be travelling out for many hours that day
5.) Just shut you down immediately when telling them it’s not for you, most jobs I know would try persuade you to stay, in this case it’s a scam, they can scam many other people to replace you.
You can even skip the interview, they won’t chase you if you don’t show up, or you say you can’t make it on the phone.