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Ideas/Section-3
It seems like every mail
order publication has at least one ad
in it promising hundreds of dollars a week, just for stuffing
envelopes. Some even promise to pay $4 or $5 per envelope
stuffed! So, many people send off their hard earned money for
the "registration fees" so they can get started on this
easy
work. Then they are disappointed when they discover they've
been duped.
Here's why the envelope stuffing programs
are nothing more than
scams. First of all, the idea of paying someone to stuff
envelopes is ridiculous. Why pay someone even 50 cents to stuff
an envelope when you can get an envelope stuffing machine for a
few hundred dollars? There must be more to what you'll have to
do then simply putting a paper in an envelope.
In fact, there's more. The most prevalent
envelope stuffing con
game goes like this. You pay your "registration fee" _
usually
around $30.00, pure profit for the scam operator.
The operator will then send you a copy
of the ad you originally
responded to, along with the wording to a classified ad, telling
people about how much money they can make stuffing envelopes,
and to send a self-addressed stamped envelope for information.
When you receive someone's SASE, you send them a copy of the ad.
You have just "stuffed an envelope."
If the poor sucker sends
in the registration fee to the operator (like YOU did), the
operator will send you $1 (or whatever was promised in the ad)
for "stuffing the envelope." The operator is left with
expenses
of around $2 and a profit of $28.
Basically, you are doing all the advertising
work for the
operator for extremely low pay. You should expect a response
rate, if you're lucky, of 1/4% to 1/2%. At 1/2%, you'd have to
get 200 responses to your classified ad to get $1. Good luck.
The other most common scheme goes like
this. You send the usual
registration fee in, and the operator sends you a package
containing all the components of the operators mailings. You
must assemble them, fold them, and stuff the envelopes according
to the operator's very exacting instructions.
Then, you send the stuffed envelopes back
to the operator. You
will be paid for each stuffed envelope that "meets their
standards." Of course, none of the envelopes you stuffed will
meet their standards. They will find some reason not to pay
you. Of course, that doesn't prevent them from still sending
out the envelopes you stuffed...
So, you can see, that joining an envelope
stuffing program is a
bad idea. Save the money you'd send in for the registration fee,
and put it towards a legitimate mail order business, and you'll
be happier and more successful.