Kuoni House, Dorking, Surrey RH5 4AZ, Registered in England No. 395623 is the correct address

The job poster is using this:
KUONI TRAVEL LTD
22 Nettleton Road ,
London , SE14 5UJ
United Kingdom

Dear Rep AP648,

After necessary verification,  (I told them I had a Driver’s License )I am happy to inform you that your application with KUONI TRAVEL LTD has been successful, since KUONI is desperately in need of a Driver for one of our clients in your area.

Please be informed that you will be working two days per week and 3-4 hours each day. Your weekly reimbursement will be $350 which is subject to increase as time goes on and $100 for gas, making total of $450. The working days and hours are flexible, so let us the days you will be available to work.

Kindly reconfirm your Name, House/Postal address and your phone number again so that we pass your information to our payment department for the payment to be made in your name.

Please accept my congratulations while I await your immediate response.

Regards,

Owen Rodney

Personnel Manager

KUONI TRAVEL LTD

I didn’t take this one any further. Were they really going to hire someone sight unseen, just because I have a Driver’s License? I can only guess the next step is giving them my bank account for future payments.

Maybe I’ll tell them I’ve wrecked the company car…

I did receive a call later that day, this time the number was unblocked, and Sheila had called to tell me that ‘they really liked me’ at the interview, and Oh, ‘on a personal note Sheila felt that I would ‘do really well and that I had stood out among the other candidates. That particular comment stuck with me, as it screamed insincerity.
None the less, I showed up as instructed for the ‘training’ for four hours, which were told multiple times, would only be paid if we brought in 15 families in one of our first 3 weekends. I don’t know how that skirts around labor laws, but I’ll bet someone at the ‘PR Company’ figured it out.
We were given an opportunity to ask questions at specific times, but there was little tolerance for interruptions, unless Sheila wanted to commiserate with a fellow actress about how hard it was to get a SAG card, then it was fine.
The 7 other people that were ‘hired’ seemed to all fit comfortable into one type. We were all women, reasonably attractive, ranging in age from 24-45. Certainly safe choices for a company that approaches parents and children in malls. None of the 4 women I talked to currently had jobs, and my guess is neither did the other three, a key component to whom Be Productions wanted to hire. The Desperate.
‘Training’ consisted of explained the company and what they did, with a lot of emphasis on looking for kids for two TV shows, ‘Say What’ and ‘Kids Unlimited’ two shows on a local network that had just gone national. This supposedly meant that there was an unlimited need to ‘fill the barrel’ with talent, as there was a constant need for more kids. She often emphasized that if the kids signed up with the company, there was work to be had.
I was not the only person who expressed concern for the legitimacy of the company. Would we be selling them anything? How does Be make their money? We were told no, we are not selling them anything, but yes, there are costs associated with being an actor, and we were schooled that we could educate them on what headshots, a special bank account, etc might run a family-all service provided by Be Productions, but also available to be referred out.
Anyway, I think we all tried to get down to the truth, but at the end of the day, it was a job, it had potential for money, and my guess is everyone there that day wasn’t interested in looking too closely at the details.
I did a light search of the internet, and only came up with the company website, www.gonnabe.com which is amazing, considering what adding a few words to their name came up with 2 days later. Like the word ‘scam’.

We showed up a the agreed meeting place that Saturday morning, our targeted area was Walnut Creek, and we would be given a list of areas where we would ‘scout’ for potential talent. Some of their more successful ‘scouts’ from LA had joined us for the day, and these girls had the look of not caring whether they were scouting for kids, or rich husbands.
I was paired with a girl who had done it the weekend before, had only brought in 2 families, but was hoping to improve her ability to speak with people, and didn’t concern herself with how much money she was making. I, on the other hand, had bills to pay, so I was hoping to put her to shame in my first weekend.
We were instructed to be very specific about what was happening the following day: this was to be an invitation to a free ‘screen-test’. It was not an audition; it was not a job offer.
The script was as follows:
“Oh Hi! I was just out shopping with my girlfriend and wanted to come over and say hello. She/he is adorable! How old is she/he?”
Well, the reason I came over is we are doing a screen test tomorrow over at the Civic Center (or wherever) and I think she’d look really cute on camera. It’s really simple, they just need to want to be on camera and have fun! She can just learn a little script, we have a few written just here on the invitation like this one: “Mom, Dad what’s for dinner? Mmmm, that smells good!” (turn to child) you can do that right?”
“It’s complimentary, it’s a lot of fun, and it only takes about a half hour. I just need you to wear a bright colored shirt, ’cause it looks good on camera, and bring a small picture of yourself, anything will do. “
“So it’s tomorrow from 1-4, I hope to see you there, and hey, come say hi to me when you’re there!”

And then you give them a fairly legitimate looking ticket, that has just been ‘flown up from LA’ inviting their ‘very special child’ to this event. The locations change every week, and there is a lot of secrecy as to the next location, probably people like myself have started counter terrorism tactics, and it’s cramping their style.

I must say, the first day was a personal challenge for me. I don’t like approaching strangers, I respect the sanctity of people’s time with their families, and I’m not therapist, but in pre-observation, some of these families seemed to be working through a few too many issues, with out adding ‘Hollywood’ to the mix.
But by the end of the day, I had approached about 20 families, with varied results and enthusiasm. Interestingly, many had been approached on other occasions, and some already had agents, so they were not eligible. Some just weren’t interested. As I myself was concerned by the legitimacy of the whole thing, I was not the one to pull someone in who already had a great big doubt on his or her mind.
I tried to leave each situation feeling like I gave them a choice, and not that I had just slimed someone with my overbearing PR pitch.
That night, I struggled with the idea that by the sheer numbers, I hadn’t given out enough invitations to get back the response needed for the tiered commission system. But I forced myself back at it the next day.
As mentioned, I had been paired up with someone the first day, and although I enjoyed her company, I did not enjoy her driving. I did attempt to meet up with her the next day, but failing that, I struck out on my own, completely abandoning the pre-ordained path that was given to me the day before.
The PR Company concentrates heavily on Target, Wal-Mart, K-mart, Toys R US, and anywhere in an area parents would shop with their kids. If you are not already aware, there are a ton of Targets out there. And I wouldn’t buy stock in K-mart if I were you; there is death pallor about it these days.
The following morning I struck out in the tonier shopping area, where I had had some luck at the Mac Store, and liked the idea of Barnes and Noble. It did occur to me that the income level in the area would indicate a higher education level, and a savvy parent, and it slowed me down quite a bit as a certain style of dress and commanding attitude of a mother, discouraged me from making a pitch.
As I found myself wandering around Barnes and Noble, mustering up some courage for the day, I spied one of the seasoned LA scouts, and it spurred me forward to a woman and her son enjoying a book on the floor. And there, it all unraveled.
This woman and her son had been approached before. And they had done it. She couldn’t remember the name of the company, but she recognized the T.V. shows. She told me that they had gotten them in there, in front of their talent agents, and told her if he was serious about acting, he would need to sign up for $5000 in acting classes. In addition, Be Production is a ‘club’ with a membership. And no one gets anything, if they aren’t a member of the club. We talked for a long time, and I wish I had gotten her number, as I told her I was unaware of what the end result was for these kids after their ‘screen-test’.
It didn’t take much to push my off the ship, and this conversation was just proof that that awful feeling I had been carrying around for 2 days had some value.
I wandered back outside, where I ran into 3 more new recruits, telling them what I had learned.
2 were horrified, although they too had suspected a skunk. The other didn’t care. ‘I used to sell cigarettes’ she replied. ‘I need the money’. And to that I make no judgment, I just couldn’t do it.
In returning home, I made a more complete search of the company. Then I found multiple posts and complaints, some of them from scouts, as they hadn’t been paid at all.
There is no way to prove that a family you have recruited has shown up, therefore your numbers are untrackable. Fellow scouts are used for the check-in process, it is considered a priveledged position, and is on of the $30 and hour positions they use to lure people in. Therefore a less-than-scrupled scout could easily ‘reroute’ your families to her own list, or ignore your returns entirely.
We were all ‘invited’ to stop by the screen-test to see how it all worked, and say hello to our ‘families’. I chose not to go. Strangely enough, I received a call the following Tuesday, that none of my families had shown up, but that I shouldn’ t be discouraged, and call for the next weekends schedule. I have mixed feelings about this:on one hand, I am happy to think no one I talked to fell for this scam. But it is more likely that they did, and having figured out that I was not going to continue working for them, Be Productions deleted me out of the process of making any money. Nice, huh?

So a note to parents out there. Yes, it’s a scam. Unless you want to enroll your kids in $5000 in acting classes, in which case there is probably a more straightforward way. As to the membership, look at the website. Those kids are ‘members’. Do you think Hollywood is beating a path to their door with those pictures?
And when Googling for information on something’s legitimacy, use the words ‘scam’ in the search, it