AUTHORS: BEWARE OF TELEMARKETERS

I remember in the latter part of the last century when telemarketers would call us on our phones asking us to give them out bank information so that they could send us a million dollars to hold for them and later reward us with a hundred thousand dollars for our service. The calls were referred to as the Nigerian Scam. The victims who fell for the scam ended up having their  money in their bank accounts totally withdrawn by the scammers.  I haven’t received these kinds of telemarketers using this scam anymore. The scammers probably were aware that no one is falling for their scam anymore.   

The next telemarketer scammers are now calling us and telling us that they clean ducts and offer to do it for a small fee. I learned that they will come and clean your ducts and do a sloppy job of it and demand that you pay their outrageous fees.  If you pay with a cheque, they now have your bank info and that also applies to your credit card’s information. I would get these calls every week from different scammers. Nowadays, I only get one a month. When I do get these calls, I say the following, “I am happy that you clean ducks. We are having guests coming over this evening for a dinner with us. Can you send someone to our home to clean the turkey we ae going to have for our dinner?” Needless to say, the telemarketers hang up their phones within seconds.

Now I will tell you about how authors are being ripped of by telemarketers who phone them and tell them that they can help them by selling their books.

I am a published author.  When I retired from the practice of law in 2006 at age 73, I began writing books and articles in my blog. I spend approximately six hours a day, seven days a week in my study writing. One of my books is over eight hundred pages in length. Seven of my books are published. I have so far published 1,755 articles in my blog in which I have published three articles in my blog every week since 2006.

A couple years ago, a telemarketer scammer called me and said that there was going to be a book fair in Boston and they wanted to help me get my novel The Devil’s Breath (209 pages) sold at the book fair.  The scammer said that they would put copies of my book on a table and have someone with their firm to try and sell them.       

This would mean that they would have to buy the books first. Even if anyone attending the fair didn’t buy any of the books at the fair, at least t would get money from them having bought them from my publisher. I was willing to take a chance and pay the telemarketer $400 (USD).  I never heard from the scammer again and my publisher said the scammer didn’t order a number of books. 

Beginning last year, I have been receiving phone calls from telemarketers telling me that they want to sell my books for me. They even tell me the title of the books they want to sell on my behalf. It is easy for them to find my books on the internet. My books are listed with 28 international book sellers. They can go to Amazon and see what my books are selling for. One of the scammers said it would cost me $2,000 for their services. Another scammer asked for $4,000. Needless to say, I told them that I am not interested and hung up on their ears. 

Alas, I didn’t hang up on the scammer who called me in April 2017. He told me that he was calling from Paramount Books Media. I should point out that they have a site in the internet which is fabulous.   Here is one of its blurbs.

In today’s marketplace, the Internet is becoming an invaluable tool to help you reach out to your potential audience on a grand scale. Internet marketing can help you expand from a local market to both national and international marketplaces. Paramount Books Media has developed a range of services to help you tap this incredible resource.

The telemarketer in this company told me that his firm has read my book, The Devil’s Breath and found the book very interesting. When I wrote the book in handwritten form, and gave the manuscript to  a fellow  employee to read and give me her opinion about the story.  When she returned two days later, she said that she began to read the book on the subway and discovered when she finished reading the book, she was still in the subway. She told me that once she began reading the book, she couldn’t put the book down. After it was published, another person told me that she also couldn’t put the book down once she began reading the story.

In 1902, the volcano, Pele which hovered over the city of Ste Pierre in the Caribbean island of Martinique, exploded and killed all 30,000 inhabitants except one person. The story in my book is about a young French doctor from Paris who sailed to Martinique  and intends to marry a young woman he met in Paris and but who lives in Martinique with her rich parents who own a huge plantation. During those seven days he is on the island, he fell in love with a famous and beautiful dancer who was a mulato woman. Meanwhile he was trying to evade the fury of the volcano  and the brother of the mulato woman who heads a gang of black voodoo cultists who are hunting for him to kill him. He had to decide which of the two women he wanted to bring to France—providing he can get off the island before the volcano explodes.

The telemarketer from Paramount Books Media said that yhey would like my permission to write a screen play of my book and then send the copies of the screenplay to the movie companies

The telemarketer said that companies that make movies won’t make a movie with respect to a book unless they receive the story as a screen play.

This is what they said on the internet.

The Paramount Books Media Hollywood Pitch service includes:

 1)  Review and or creation of up to 60 min. book video for TV and film consideration

 2)  Creation of a full-feature movie script/screenplay submitted to 4,000 TV and film executives.

 3)  Social Media Press Release sent to over 5,000 media partners

How It Works:

1. To register, we will email you an order invoice and our finance department will guide you through the process of placing your order.

2. Marketing Fulfillment Officer receives order and requests our screenplay writers  and professional voice actors and video editors on the creation of your book video trailer.

3. Once approved, your final screenplay and video will be distributed to YouTube and will be pitched to 4000 Hollywood executives. We will take care of registering your content to the US Copyright Office.

Your video and script will be considered for TV or movie adaption. If a production studio or agent is interested in working with you, they will directly contact you to explain their plan of action to gauge your interest. If after reviewing your video, they decide not to engage with your concept, it will then be entered into our Hollywood Database, where registered entertainment professionals can browse and search for new material to adapt into feature films and television series

Needless to say, I was excited because I had often thought about the book being made into a movie. Further, writing a screen play  is difficult to do especially if you don’t know how to do it and since he told me that a copy of the screenplay would be sent to me, I Was even more excited,

He told me that I would have to pay Paramount Books         as much as  $25,500,oo USD that amounted to $32,844 CAD, The telemarketer’s hook was so far down my throat, I fell victim to Paramount Books Media’s scam.

He told me that it would take several months before I would get a copy of the screenplay. 

When I didn’t get the screenplay in May or by the end of June, I began phoning Paramount Books Media.  Their number was 1-888-449-2559. When I called that number, a recoding told me to leave my name and number and they would call me back. They never called me back. All summer I kept calling that number and no one from Paramount Books Media returned my call.  I called the number on February 5^th 2019 and a recording stated the following message. “The number you called is temporarily unavailable.” That number is the one that is still on their internet site. I have come to the realization that that scam company has probably been closed down.  

In September, 2017, I looked in the internet in to see if anyone else has been scammed by Paramount Books Media. I found two reviews in which the reviewers said that they had been scammed. Here is one f them.

I am an author of 3 books. A gentleman named Chris called and said they are willing to partner with me in marketing my book. We agreed that my total marketing fee is $1,599. I just discovered that they charged me 4 times that totals to $26,000. My bank already fixed this but how dare them to scam a 94 year old author. Authors Beware!

Date this was filed is unknown.

In October 2018. I contacted the bank that issued my VISA card in which I used to pay the fee the scammer asked for. The bank is the Royal Bank of Canada. RBC. It is not the Canadian government’s bank. It is a one of several private banks in Canada.  The woman I spoke with said that I complained too late. It wasn’t until hat month that I was convinced that I had been ripped off.    

I then wrote a letter to the bank’s Ombudsman in January 2019 but I didn’t receive a letter in reply.

I sent my VISA card to the RBC bank telling them that I didn’t want to use it any more.  I replaced it with a VISA card issued to me by the bank I generally do business with. 

I got a letter sent to me by RBC dated January 28^th 2019 in which  it said the following in part;

When purchasing goods or services with your credit card, it is only a method of payment and not a guarantee of satisfaction with the merchandise/or merchant.

It seems to me that a bank has a responsibility to assist its customer of they have transferred the customer’s money to a scammer. In the letter, writer added in her letter;

“However, we may be able to provide assistance in resolving disputed

transactions.”

That was a meaningless suggestion because the writer of the letter also wrote that the bank couldn’t  assist me since I canceled their VISA card.

She then suggested that I contact the bank’ Ombudsman again. The ombudsman never replied to my letter so why should I Waste  my time writing another letter to the Ombudsman. However, the Ombudsman did forward my letter to the RBC woman who wrote me on January 28^th, 2019.

I sent a letter to PayPal in Toronto on October 15^th 2018 asking for assistance in this matter.  I received no reply. .That was the organization that transferred my money from my own bank account to the scammer. 

I will pass onto you more reviews re Paramount Books Media.

An agent named Darren Matthew from Paramount Books Media called and  told me they're interested in my book and wanted to market it for me. I researched and nothing bad about them was on the Internet. I told him I was scammed once before from Tate Publisher (Mustang, Oklahoma). He assured me that we'll walk together. I had to pay upfront. Their PayPal service did not take my credit card. That should be the sign for me to walk away!

I then signed a check in the amount of $2,999.00. They took a photo of my check and note and sent it to me, but did not produce any receipt. I insisted to have a receipt. The owner and Business Manager Raymone King finally sent me a receipt after a month of my nagging. After signing the contract saying if there is no service for 3 months, either party can back out of the contract and the customer will get his/her refund in full. His wife/colleague Maine Mendoza called me only once and never contacted me again. Paramount did not do anything for me, not even an email to explain about which service they would do for me.

After 3 months, I contacted Darren Matthew who informed me that he was no longer with Paramount. He regretted that he would lead me on like that, but his apology was too late. I was able to contact Raymone King who told me to give him 2 days to make it right and then he simply hung up on me. Needless to say, he never called me back or made it right for me.

Paramount Books Media and all these individuals should not get approval from the State of California to do anything. Perhaps, jail would be the suitable place for them to work. If I have had some info on how bad this company is, I would make the right decision & not go with them. I hope my report will get the Better Business Bureau in California to investigate and shut down Paramount Books Media and prosecute Raymone King and  their associates to the extent of the law. Also, I pray that my report will be a good warning for all customers to stay away from Raymone King, Paramount Books Media, and its associates. I also ask you to help get my money back if possible.

I doubt that he got his money back. Here is another complaint.

.

 Paramount Books Media/Joseph Neil Guaranteed the sale of 500 books in six months for $500. 500 books not sold and no refund and no recourse.

My mother told me that if is too good to be true, it isn’t true. I should have paid more attention to her when I was a child. 

OK  Mother.  I have learned my lesson.