Fake Door to Door Magazine Sales- Don’t get scammed!

Scam Mentoring Programs, Work Programs, Training Programs that bus people from town to town.

I live in a small town in California and on a quiet court where all the neighbors know each other for decades and we look out for each other too.
We all have dogs that bark and no set schedules either so it feels fairly safe. That said we still get the occasional magazine scammers that are brought in from other towns to make illegal bucks off of you!
In my case two blonde girls came up to the door and started pitching some program for “Urban Development Solutions” while they were talking,  I saw the web address on this piece of paper they were holding, urbans.com and made a note of it.

They said this is a mentoring program and that “we be from a bad background”, ( they both looked perfectly fine and actually attractive, well fed and not poor old girls from a bad background) It reeked of BS to me, and they would not shut up, the older one (looked around early 20’s and the other one looked 19 or so) was aggressive and a real scammer type.
She would not let you get a word in edgewise and kept asking me my name, (I hate it when scammers do that-it is so fake and creepy)
They told me they could not take any money or donations. They needed real work they said, and showed me this big block sentence on the form that said “no donations accepted”.
I finally shut the door on them, but I had a bad feeling in my gut about these two, so I looked up the website and it looked pretty rinky dink, so I called the cops.
People are not suppose to solicit around here anyway.

In the meantime they went next door and my neighbor gave them 20.00 just to go away! He said they would not shut up and he did not know what to do.
So there went the supposed “we don’t take donations  line.”
He said they were asking for 120.00 for magazine subscriptions!! ( he was so funny, he said please don’t tell my wife.)

So now I was really mad.
They had my other neighbors trapped in the doorway, so I went over and interrupted them and told them I had called the cops and they were scammers.
I asked them why they took money from my neighbor.

Of course they got really pissed. ( I moved my cars into the garage to avoid damages later)
I googled the name of the company and found a complaint website that had the supposed owners name of the business, who they had also mentioned was their boss, ,when I told them I was going to look up the website.  His name is
Rodney Rankins  and he can be reached at 313-320-3335. I found that number on a complaint website here.
Rodney actually answered the phone with just a hello and I told him my story and then the line went dead.
I wasn’t really surprised. I was surprised I even reached someone who admitted they ran the company.
I thought he had hung up on me because it was definitely on his end, but then he did call me back, (checking on me?)

He asked me if the girls were African American or Caucasian, I told him Caucasian and he said they have no Caucasians working for them at all. (hmmm, really, the website says people are independent contractors in each town so they could hire whomever they want, how would he know?)
Then I asked him if they had anyone in my town and he said no.
I don’t know if that is true, but he said he was glad I called the cops.
By this point the police had arrived and I gave them all this info.
Do not fall victim to these types of scams and people.
Please people beware and be careful.
Update: This is great, the cops caught up with the girls and they came back in a white van being driven by somebody and they gave my neighbor his $20.00 back!
She still claimed to be working with Rodney and said he is her boss. That is what she told my neighbor so that is a bit dicey.
My neighbor was very grateful that I pursued this. He was embarrassed that he gave them money, but they were very aggressive verbally and so pushy.
I dread to think how many people are just like my wonderful sweet neighbor and will  just pay them to go away!
Please people get pro-active, don’t just let people get away with this kind of stuff.
You can make a difference in your neighborhood by being careful and busting people like this.

I did a little more research and here is the whois info on that domain.

Registrant:
Urban Development Solutions

18530 Mack Ave #530
Grosse Pointe, Michigan 48236
United States

Registered through: Tell Vision Networks
Domain Name: URBANDS.COM
Created on: 09-Sep-04
Expires on: 09-Sep-15
Last Updated on: 24-Sep-09

Administrative Contact:
McClain, Maurice jlkyles@gmail.com
Urban Development Solutions
18530 Mack Ave #530
Grosse Pointe, Michigan 48236
United States
+1.3135952360 Fax — +1.5865329207

Technical Contact:
McClain, Maurice jlkyles@gmail.com
Urban Development Solutions
18530 Mack Ave #530
Grosse Pointe, Michigan 48236
United States
+1.3135952360 Fax — +1.5865329207

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