Review/Critique/Roast of HRB/RLM

[Shadow]

Sexual messages from horny young women attracts all kinds of men? Ok.

I can't believe that you're serious and not just playing devil's advocate. Sorry.  :noidea:

Did you look at their profile ? If yes you were attracted. :evil:
Same goes for all the other guys who tried.

Maybe it seems strange, but if you get such a message as marriage minded man, you just might get the idea that this woman is not directly looking for marriage. I know, hard to tell as it is usual for marriage minded women to send out such messages, but there is a tiny chance you might see the difference.

It would be a lot harder to find if you got 10 messages from 35-year old women telling they would like to know more from you. Then you would actually have to start talking to them to find out if they are interested or not.

To conclude, as lure for men who are looking for marriage, these messages fail. The men reacting on them are not interested in marriage, so no harm to either side.
If the women and agencies involved would be running this to lure men in to thinking they are interested in marriage, they are using the wrong tactics. If they want to make a buck to weed out the horny guys who are just going in to look at young women, it is a clear success.

[Kuna]

Sorry, you obviously are NOT a "domestic" online merchant with a "domestic" (and dedicated) processing relationship. 

First,

1.) The Industry average (in THIS Industry) is in excess of 5% charge-backs!   This is why THIS is "classified" as a "High-risk" Industry.  Therefore, less than 1% would be unbelievable, but 0.01% is outstanding!!!  Period!  We are a highly sought-after merchant account...a low-risk account in a high-risk Industry.  Simply Unheard of...so please don't make light of something you have no understanding of.
 
2.) It is NOT easy to reverse a chargeback.  Quite the contrary!

3.) Furthermore, once a chargeback is "registered" against your account, even if it is ultimately reversed, it DOES NOT change your rating, as it is NOT removed from your "registered charge-backs".  In other words, if you experience 5.1% in charge-backs in August, even if you (over the next two months) were successful in reversing those charge-backs, that DOES NOT change your score for August!  Period!

4.) When someone buys a $30  credit package, and then we receive a chargeback, that $30 is removed from the account, along a with a $25 "charge-back fee", then we can invest more "man-hours" having someone build a "case" by assembling a "case file" of information (log-ins, IP addresses,  usage, emails, sign-in acknowledgements, correspondence between Admin and the member, etc.)  This costs at least $25 per hour to have a case manager perform the "due diligence".  Then after all that, the customer's Bank can STILL (and usually DOES) decline to pay the charge.  So, the $30 is removed AGAIN and ANOTHER $25 is also removed (the SECOND "charge-back" fee).   So, it costs me (on average) the $30 in lost services (maybe $10 profit) and $50 in chargeback fees, and at least $25-$30 (minimum) in "man-hours"...for a total loss of approximately $100 !  And BTW, all this STILL negatively blemished our impeccable "chargeback" record.   Why not just refund the $30 immediately, BEFORE it becomes a Charge-back?   That's right ... "unsatisfied customers" usually charge-back!  Duh!

5.) I know of NO other site in this Industry that enjoys a relationship with the #1 Bank and one of the top three "Domestic" (3rd Largest) processors for "Domestic" (United States) credit card processing.  I would venture to guess that EVERY other site out there is forced to process "off-shore" in "high-risk" aggregate (group) processing accounts through "third-party" processors!  As one of the only "stand-alone" Domestic credit card processing Merchants in this Industry, we jeopardize our processing relationship with the Bank if our charge-backs exceed a certain percentage in ANY given month.  That's why I have always maintained a "refund first, ask questions later" policy.

6.) Anybody knows today that they can "effect" a charge-back through their Bank relatively easily.  That's why it's currently referred to as "Friendly Fraud".  Because it has graduated FAR beyond a valid "safe guard" for dissatisfied customers.  It has become the new way to get 'free services'!  Therefore, these days, your customer satisfaction rating IS premised on your rate of "Charge-backs"..NOT negative rumors and false complaints  (initiated by unscrupulous competitors hiding behind fictitious names) and ultimately perpetuated by members of Forums (with "ties" to the Industry) who have never used your service.
 
7.) Any other site (and I repeat "ANY") in this entire Industry experiences a higher rate of Charge-backs than we do!  So regardless of HOW you decide to "rate" customer satisfaction, you will find ONE thing to be as sure as life itself...  the higher the rate of charge-backs, the lower the customer satisfaction... Period.

In closing:
I know (first hand) most of the Agencies that exist, as such, I have "inside" information as to how ALL other sites are run (not to mention how those Agencies operate).  Regardless of inherent problems (as exist in EVERY industry), ours is (by far) the "safest bet" regarding Customer Satisfaction.  That's why we're available 24/7 by "LIVE Web-Hostess", and 1-800-customer begin_of_the_skype_highlighting              1-800-customer      end_of_the_skype_highlighting begin_of_the_skype_highlighting              1-800-customer      end_of_the_skype_highlighting service number...NOT some obscure email (like EVERY OTHER site out there)!   Stop simply "bashing" and do some actual research. 

Also, stop looking for perfection everywhere else, it doesn't exist.  Nowhere, no Industry, no family, no marriage, nobody! 

Look for the good in things, make the best of a situation, don't throw stones when you live in a glass house, don't bear false witness, etc., etc.  Anyone, who is unhappy with our service has ALWAYS been no more than a simple FREE chat, toll-free phone call, or an email away from "satisfaction".  However, we can't make a woman love you, and we can't convince all our customers to re-examine their expectations.   Sometimes, all we can do is refund your money (so that your "experience" was at MY expense)!  Just try to get a refund (or even a timely response) at ANY other competitor's site  :-)

That was an incredible, well rehearsed rant from a man who obviously had many opportunities to refine the defence of his business model.  It's obviously shabby as proved here in the posts between yours to me, and my response now.

Of course you'll have more tried and tested rebuttals to reel off...  but if you have confidence in your 99.9% Client Satisfaction claim you'll be VERY interested to take me upon this offer.

How about we set up a survey on Survey Monkey, I'll pay the costs, and you can gain irrefutable proof that your 99.9% of your clients are happy with your service.

The questions will be fair and structured to get a meaningful result... and you can use the outcomes to further improve your business.

I don't mind if we agree on 100, 500 or 1000 names,  you supply the email addresses and then we can agree on the question format.

You can be sure the survey will follow Best Practice methods to really understand how satisfied your customers are, what satisfies them, and what improvements you can make, if any. Of course at 99.9% Csat it's not likely you could improve anything, could you?

I provide a similar service for some of my customers, some of whom are in similar fields.  I've got ~50 developers out of group headcount of 3,000 designing, building and supporting eCommerce and eBusiness sites among other things.  Seen a few scams in my time,  of course it'll be refreshing to poll your clients and find such a happy bunch of punters for a change.


PM me and we can get it going pretty quickly. I think Dan should be fine with us posting the results here...

[Jooky]

If the women and agencies involved would be running this to lure men in to thinking they are interested in marriage, they are using the wrong tactics. If they want to make a buck to weed out the horny guys who are just going in to look at young women, it is a clear success.

You're joking right?

At any point did CEO or inspector Tomseau state that the web cam girls on HRB were intentionally planted in order to weed out the horny guys not interested in marriage?

I thought the web cam chats were intended to validate that these women were for real, not used as false lures to distract the non serious men.

If these girls are not marriage minded, what the heck are they doing on a bridal site? If they are not getting paid, they're not looking to get married and they're not interested in the men their luring to chat, why are they doing this? Out of the kindness of their own hearts to help their marriage minded friends?

[Chelseaboy]

Shadow,
              I can confirm i have a real profile,with my real face on HRB.
I have chatted with webcam girls on the site,but there's no point asking them if they get paid to chat,because they're not going to say yes are they ?
At the end of the day,at least you know a webcam girl is real,and HRB have no more idea if she has serious interest in you,than you would have.HRB cannot be held responsible for a girls motives.
A lot of men on these sites are not seriously looking for a wife in FSU anyway,so i guess the sex chat girls are ideal for them.
Personally,my biggest concern on the site,as with other sites,is the amount of online chatters that are not on webcam,around 80% at any given time.To my mind the site should ensure that only girls showing on webcam are allowed to chat,and maybe that is one of the changes the CEO will be bringing in.Otherwise naive,gullible,whatever you want to call them,men,will continue to get fleeced by local agency staff pretending to be the girls in the photo's,which IS a scam.Online chatting is a big earner for local agencies,and the current system of non-webcam chatters leaves it open to abuse by them.

[BC]

14000 marriage minded women on a videocam site?  Yeah probably overrated.
250000 marriage minded women listed on agency sites?  Yeah probably overrated.
100 marriage minded women invited to a social? Yeah probably overrated.
Tens of millions of marriage minded women walking the streets of FSU? Yeah probably overrated.
8 marriage minded women to 1 marriage minded man in FSU? Yeah probably overrated.
Many thousands of marriage minded FSU women in third countries, either working or visiting?

But guess what, it's not the vast numbers being offered but the one woman among them you might be able to 'click' with that counts.

Yeah, we can harp on any entity that comes on board to give it his best shot, but I still fail to see a great difference in results using any one method vs another.

None of the methods offered agree with me at all because they predicate marriage interest on both sides of the table before even meeting- something that simply does not happen in 'normal' life.  I never went out of my 4 walls with the intent of marriage.  I did however wander out to see if an interesting woman crossed my path for a little fun and adventure. 

My vote goes to whatever floats your boat.

[Gator]

I examined the photos of the 40-something HRB women.  Most seem authentic and somehat comparable to the same aged women at Elena's Models.  In contrast, the 40-something women on Anasatasia Web are on average far better looking in their photos. 

I consider that a positive point for HRB.  Another positive point is the fact that CEO is participating at RWD. 

However, I can not find another positive point.  Jooky's observation is especially negative.

Both Manny and TomT seem to excuse the web cam girls asking for sex chat as the ones that 'slip through the net'.

At this moment there are 162 women are online and available to chat. That's out of 14,000 women listed.
Of those 28 are available for webcam chat.
Of those 10 are requesting chats with me (in addition to about 20 that don't have webcams).

Given those numbers, what conclusions do you draw?

For comparison, on a normal dating site, singles.ru, there are currently 618 out of 21,000 women online in Novosibirsk. Of course, none of them are messaging me with the desire to chat.

Where there's smoke, there's fire.  In this case, sleaze. Imagine going to a singles meeting club in your city but having to maneuver around 20 hookers at the front door.

A man has a choice.  Communicate  with women through an agency filter.  Or communicate directly with women with no agency involvement.  Even when dealing with genuine women, the process is loaded with doubt and obstacles.  Why add more?

I look forward to reading about CEO's plans for making this better.

Anyway... I told you (already) ... the entire problem has been solved/resolved, once and for all.  All the Industry "woes" (along with the Industry) will pretty much disappear!

Again..... "stay tuned"  :-)

[Sabina]

Hello…this is my first post here and hope I am doing it right:- )
I've been searching the net and got on this page

To  HRB/RLM SEO

Well, I am sorry to disappoint you, but if you think the problem was solved, I am sorry but you are wrong… I am not accusing you or supporting…. We are in the same boat, just like all website owners… I came across this page and couldn’t help but register here
I run my own site, I will not mention it here… and for me the biggest problem is local agencies…. I don’t believe that any site owner would like to have scammers in their data base… the problem is that you can not really check them out….

Local agencies, for biggest part, are like locust that move from one site to another destroying everything. I’ve become a paranoid lately checking the local agencies we work with….
 
But its getting more and more difficult…. We have about 40 agencies in our database, and you have I guess thousand:- ) …if you deleted 700 and still have so many girls on your sites… so, I can not imagine how you control them…

Their scamming schemes become more and more complicated…

As an example:
A Few months ago I’ve deleted an agency --their translator pretended she didn’t speak English, invited men to her town and came to the meetings with her girl-friend who was a translator. Men paid for translation and the money was shared.
One of the guys she met, wrote me a letter. He said that somehow he found out that she speaks English “like an American” but in her profile it was stated that she knows only simple words. I started “digging”. I even registered on a Russian network site to find her. ( as I said, I’ve became a paranoid:- ) I found out that the girl studied in the Gorlovka university of foreign languages, but the agency owner tried to convince me that she studied Ukrainian language there. I called the girl and she was so offended by my accusation. A couple of days later the agency deleted her profile, as they explained she was not interested in Internet dating anymore, she was offended, insulted, bla-bla-bla. I checked other sites, and her profile is still there!!! To make the long story short, I made a request to the Gorlovka university and received confirmation that she studied English there!!!...and then I got to find out that she works as a translator in this agency. The agency was deleted…but they work on other sites…

If the agency scams, the site goes to the black list for this, the site deletes the agency from their database, and the agency goes to many other sites…. or some time later tries to register with you under different name...


it happened that I deleted an agency for dishonest work and several months later I received a note from an agency with different name that wanted to cooperate…of course “they were honest and brought many people together”…. I recognized them only when they started registering new profiles…. I recognized the girls and deleted them again.

After all these stories I stopped registering the new agencies…. I am just afraid of them… and to be honest, I am stuck… I really don’t know how to solve this problem. If you think that agreement between you and the local agency is enough, I am sorry, but you are wrong…fines? - doesn’t work! Deleting them- doesn’t work…
 

[Chelseaboy]

Hello Sabina
               Welcome to the forum,and yes the translation scam is one of the commonest scams run by these local marriage agencies.I was due to meet a girl earlier this year in Ukraine,and as soon as i told her i had an interpreter for us,she started making excuses for not meeting in the city we had agreed on,suggesting we should meet in another city,with her interpreter,so i never flew to meet her.
Another very common situation is where men go to meet an agency girl they've communicated with for months,and when they meet the girl knows nothing about them.Strangely,the interpreter does know everything about the man,so i think it's safe to say who has been reading and writing the letters,and chatting without webcam.So,the man has flown thousands of miles,and spent a lot of money,basically to go on a blind date,with a girl who probably has no real interest in him.
It will be interesting to finally see the changes in the industry,mentioned by the CEO of HRB/RLM,which will solve all these problems with corrupt Ukrainian marriage agencies.
If you think about it,would one of these corrupt agencies want to see their popular girls getting married to a foreign man ? Of course not.Think of the revenue through letter writing, chat,translation fee's etc they'd lose,so they have no interest in seeing these girls getting married.

[Chelseaboy]

Oh,by the way,the girl i was going to meet is on HRB/RLM,among other sites.

[facetrock]

  Sabina. HRB claims to have dumped 700 agencys and has about 140 they use now. I didnt think there were ever that many agencys in the FSU.
   My question to you is what does it take to become an agency? Do you go out and recruit 50 to 100 goodlooking women then contact someone like you or HRB or yourself to get signed up?
   I would say most of these new agencys are strictly set up as affiliates for the bigger agencys. If what I think is true going on over there these people wouldnt even need a website. They would need a stable of good looking babes that are available to chat and write a few letters. Easily done from your flat. Get signed up to all the bigger agencys and it could be very lucrative for a local person especially if you paid the girls to pursue anyone online to chat.
  We always thought pay per letter was just inviting yourself to get taken for a ride which proved to be true in many cases. Now we have live video where you pay by the minute. IMO it involves a lot more money and the temptation is very high to pay girls to chat. HRB claims to have suspended 700 agencys. Thats proof enough that its a huge problem.
 

[Admin]

First of all, if HRB is primarily an entertainment site and the customers understand this and are enjoying it, I have no problem with it.

However, we're on a board that caters to men seeking wives.

A few things for Dan and others here to consider.

Considering that at any given moment approximately 20% of the online ladies are attempting to initiate chat with a single man online, what overall percent of the women online are doing so? This would be easy to determine.

If a man's initial experience with a site like this is to be bombarded with requests for light sexual chat, does this encourage sex tourism, discourage it, or have no effect?

If the site's core product is web cam chat, and the web cam chat involves prodding men into sexual talk, should this site even be discussed here? Should we also discuss more hard core porn cam sites?

Do you think that a site that floods men with messages from apparently hot and horny young women attracts the type of men that has resulted in the passage of IMBRA and further regulation of this industry? Or does it attract serious men looking for a wife?

Just some things to ponder.

Jooky,

All good points to ponder. Thanks.

Re: hard core porn. You might get a kick out of this post over at PL -- http://www.planet-love.com/forum/index.php?topic=5758.msg71090#msg71090 - where I have been battling whore-mongers since the day I took over the site.

RWD, just as you stated, is a site for men and women who are serious about finding, marrying, and staying married to - a partner from the countries of the Former Soviet Union and its 'satellites.'

As I was reviewing the comments from you guys that registered accounts at HRB, it seemed a replay of a topic I linked upthread, and here again -- http://www.russianwomendiscussion.com/index.php?topic=12304.0.

I *really* urge you all to review that topic. In it, the conclusion was reached that A-web's practice of bombarding new registrants with 'emails' and chat requests is NOT scamming behavior. There may well be scamming behavior by A-web, as indicated by Chelseaboy upthread where the lady he believed he had been communicating with knew nothing about him. That, to me, seems pretty scurrilous - but this other - the unsolicited chat requests and emails?!? I still place that in the same category as the unsolicited Nigerian scam emails I used to receive.

At the time I posted that topic, it was an outgrowth of several previous topics, one of them found here -- http://www.russianwomendiscussion.com/index.php?topic=7756.msg150354#msg150354 - that sought to explore the same fundamental issue - and that is; What constitutes scamming behavior by an agency?

So tell me - ANYONE - what do we (RWD) need to do to be able to:

(a) adequately define the constituents and the composition of a "SCAM" so that it will be understood by all? Is that possible - or not? We have made several 'runs' at it - and it continues to be a point of endless debate.

(b) investigate these reported SCAM agencies to determine if they cross the letter of the upcoming definition of a SCAM?

I look forward to your thoughts and comments.

- Dan

[Shadow]

You're joking right?

At any point did CEO or inspector Tomseau state that the web cam girls on HRB were intentionally planted in order to weed out the horny guys not interested in marriage?

I thought the web cam chats were intended to validate that these women were for real, not used as false lures to distract the non serious men.

If these girls are not marriage minded, what the heck are they doing on a bridal site? If they are not getting paid, they're not looking to get married and they're not interested in the men their luring to chat, why are they doing this? Out of the kindness of their own hearts to help their marriage minded friends?

There is always a difference between intnention and reality. You should know that.  
Lets face it, the majority of men who dwell on to the large agency sites are not exactly the cream of the crop. Now lets suppose that you are a legit agency, and you have connected. After a week your staff tells you that half of the women want to quit because of men who ask them to show their body on cam. What are you going to do ?
You can either refuse paying clients because of their behaviour, or provide them with something that will take their attention meaning your real candidates can get valid contacts.

Now I do not know directly how agencies or HRB handles those things, but I am trying to look at it from a business point of view, not forgetting that we all know a large majority of men are just enjoying to pay for their fantasy and will never be able to live it.

[BC]

So tell me - ANYONE - what do we (RWD) need to do to be able to:

(a) adequately define the constituents and the composition of a "SCAM" so that it will be understood by all? Is that possible - or not? We have made several 'runs' at it - and it continues to be a point of endless debate.

(b) investigate these reported SCAM agencies to determine if they cross the letter of the upcoming definition of a SCAM?

I look forward to your thoughts and comments.

- Dan

First, objectivity is needed.  Members at RWD represent only a very small subset of of the overall RW 'thing'.  What applies here may not necessarily apply to the 99% of folks (both men and women) out there using such services.

Second, create a baseline of activities and practices of the industry so that attempts can be made to measure abnormal activity.  Remember though it's not about what we at RWD agree with or not, that's irrelevant in the overall scheme of things.

Last, activities or practices of individual industry providers need to be measured to see if they exceed the baseline or if the practices are outside the norm.  Only then should they be evaluated to determine if they are clearly deceptive or construed to separate the client from his/her money without any value in return.

Take as an example the instant email responses Jooky and others experienced.  Certainly an annoyance or 'red flag' for the experienced around here, but does it have value for the 99% of others 'out there'?  Lets take the worst case scenario, a couch bound individual lacking the social skills and self image to initiate any type of interaction with the opposite sex.  Lured by RW related hype he/she signs up to this video site.  Isn't it logical to think that a little motivation will be required to overcome this individuals inhibitions and actually participate in a webchat?  Remembering that the number of such individuals vastly outnumber the posting membership here, does the practice of sending initial unsolicited responses truly constitute a scam and presents no value to the customer?  Is this practice unique to a single or small number of service providers?

Another example. An individual signs up for VidWebFSUSeriousRelationships.com.  When initiating a chat session, the customer is redirected to XXXVidWebFun.com where a number of partners offer explicit sex shows and honor the tokens the customer bought at the other site. This occurs several times. The customer emails the provider for a refund and is refused because the Terms of Service were not violated.  The practice was noted only at a small number of providers offering relationship introduction services.

I am not endorsing the services of any service provider, but instead provoking broader thought as to what a SCAM is or not.  How many times have disappointed men shown up at RWD to have their 'My wife SCAMMED me!' story picked apart, ultimately revealing there was nothing close to a SCAM involved?  Shouldn't we approach this subject in the same objective and informed manner?

[ECOCKS]

Like many, I don't care what services some individuals seek on the Internet. My sole concern lies with the portrayal of sites like HRB/RLM and others of their ilk as legitimate sites for those pursuing serious relationships. They do nothing illegal (as far as I know) yet they are not focused on the subject which (supposedly) most of us are interested in on this forum.

My username and ID seem to have been deleted after I began posting what I was encountering. My wife laughed and said she thinks we're all pretty silly for even remotely considering this site as being intended for serious individuals in search of serious women to date and developing a relationship.

[facetrock]

 I actually have nothing against Hot Russian Brides other than the word Brides in their name and what it implys. They serve a good purpose keeping the keyboard Romeos busy playing with themselves. But seriously guys does anyone really think this is a good place to look for a wife? I mean you really do get bombarded with very young chat girls everytime you sign on. Not to mention the chocolate To the naive bride seeker this will reinforce some stereotypes and can do a lot of harm to some people. Little wonder people looking for wives get pissed when they go to meet a gal they've been chatting with just to find out she has no clue who he is.

  If they changed their name to Hot Russian Babes, got rid of any pretense that this is a good place to find a wife all would be ok with me. If they want to call it a great meeting place fine with me. But for gods sake dont imply that all these young hotties are really serious about old horn dogs like me.

 Manny said it was a simple case of a few prodaters up late at night swamping me with chat invitations. Total bullsh1t and he knows it. Why is it that on LuckyLovers, RussianEuro, UkraineDate when I sign in I dont get flooded with chat invitations and there's more women online there than on HRB?  We all know why.

  On RUA this was discussed to death. I read the thread and there were more guys than Scuplto bitching about the site. But you had TomT and Andrewfi pushing for HRB. They both got a trips to Florida and after they came back it was like they had a religious experience. CEO admitted he was trolling for investors on RUA for another business which could possibly make a person 250k per month. Anyone like carrots?
  Personally I think the trips to Florida were more about investment than they were about investigating HRB. I have no problem with that and hope the guys involved make millions, I really do. But please guys stop the lame arguements why HRB is a good place to find a wife. Good place for meeting young FSU hotties, absolutely. Good place for entertainment, one of the best. Good place to find a wife, no how no way.

 

 

[tim 360]

Like many, I don't care what services some individuals seek on the Internet. My sole concern lies with the portrayal of sites like HRB/RLM and others of their ilk as legitimate sites for those pursuing serious relationships. They do nothing illegal (as far as I know) yet they are not focused on the subject which (supposedly) most of us are interested in on this forum.

My username and ID seem to have been deleted after I began posting what I was encountering. My wife laughed and said she thinks we're all pretty silly for even remotely considering this site as being intended for serious individuals in search of serious women to date and developing a relationship.

Your wife is right.  HRB is an aggregator with all kinds and all flavors and I'm sure they take in wads of money from tens of thousands of guys.  I've read a few guys who have admitted to spending 1,2,3,4 grand chatting on HRB/RLM and they must have enjoyed it because they kept on buying tokens.  Were they scammed--they were enticed for sure.  I see it more of a soft core porn chat site designed for lonely men and it is very cleverly designed and I can see some guys getting hooked on it.  There are worse "scams" out there afterall these guys paid and kept on paying for a little private fantasy...a little titillation.  They got the entertainment they paid for.  Sure they were sucked in but they'd get sucked in by something else 'cuz they are so needy. :evil:  Suckers are born every minute.

HRB does seem to fill a need for some guys and I'm sure plenty of FSU chat girls are making a good buck fulfilling fantasies.

No guy with brains would be looking/spending time at HRB looking for a wife.  On the other side of the coin I'm sure that not ALL the women are paid chatters and some are probably very nice.  Yet,  here at RWD, with it's specific mission focus of marriage, I find HRB to be sleazy and doesn't belong.    Brides?????

Its sites like HRB/RLM that give FSU women a bad name.  People get the impression that ALL FSU women are soft/hard/porn fantasy girls.  Certainly portrays FSU women in a negative way.

[Manny]

First, objectivity is needed.  Members at RWD represent only a very small subset of of the overall RW 'thing'.  What applies here may not necessarily apply to the 99% of folks (both men and women) out there using such services.

Second, create a baseline of activities and practices of the industry so that attempts can be made to measure abnormal activity.  Remember though it's not about what we at RWD agree with or not, that's irrelevant in the overall scheme of things.

Last, activities or practices of individual industry providers need to be measured to see if they exceed the baseline or if the practices are outside the norm.  Only then should they be evaluated to determine if they are clearly deceptive or construed to separate the client from his/her money without any value in return.

Take as an example the instant email responses Jooky and others experienced.  Certainly an annoyance or 'red flag' for the experienced around here, but does it have value for the 99% of others 'out there'?  Lets take the worst case scenario, a couch bound individual lacking the social skills and self image to initiate any type of interaction with the opposite sex.  Lured by RW related hype he/she signs up to this video site.  Isn't it logical to think that a little motivation will be required to overcome this individuals inhibitions and actually participate in a webchat?  Remembering that the number of such individuals vastly outnumber the posting membership here, does the practice of sending initial unsolicited responses truly constitute a scam and presents no value to the customer?  Is this practice unique to a single or small number of service providers?

Another example. An individual signs up for VidWebFSUSeriousRelationships.com.  When initiating a chat session, the customer is redirected to XXXVidWebFun.com where a number of partners offer explicit sex shows and honor the tokens the customer bought at the other site. This occurs several times. The customer emails the provider for a refund and is refused because the Terms of Service were not violated.  The practice was noted only at a small number of providers offering relationship introduction services.

I am not endorsing the services of any service provider, but instead provoking broader thought as to what a SCAM is or not.  How many times have disappointed men shown up at RWD to have their 'My wife SCAMMED me!' story picked apart, ultimately revealing there was nothing close to a SCAM involved?  Shouldn't we approach this subject in the same objective and informed manner?

A very well written post BC, if I may say so.

But please guys stop the lame arguements why HRB is a good place to find a wife. Good place for meeting young FSU hotties, absolutely. Good place for entertainment, one of the best. Good place to find a wife, no how no way.

How do you explain all the married folk that met through HRB then?

[Shadow]

Actually I believe that on any site you can meet serious women, even on those made out to be a complete scam site. Apart from being married, I am too greedy to spend the amount of money needed to find needles and preferred a hay stack in open field.
On the free and semi-free sites I used I also got contacted a number of times by women that I would not expect to be interested, and most turned out to be dubious in nature.
So what is the difference ? I guess the main difference is that on sites like HRB and A-Web men pay to check out dubious contacts, while on a free site it is not considered negative due to the free nature of the site. One would think that when spending money people choose more carefully, but the opposite seems true.

[facetrock]

  Where are all these married couples? I see far more complaints than marriages. The claims that have been made how well policed HRB is there should be more marriages coming from that site than anyother. CEO himself says they are the leader of all the big agencys as far as keeping things honest.
  Manny would you honestly send someone that is seriously looking for a bride to HRB? If you answer yes then my next question would be how much money are you investing?
  

[ECOCKS]

I know a guy engaged to a woman from RLM. We'll see how it turns out. However, that's just one example so not really a definitive answer as to their effectiveness.

In the end, the site is what it is. Look at it and make your own decision. Our "discussion" isn't really going anywhere now and all it really does is keep their name up.

Those of us who are serious know better than to recommend it. Those that aren't will continue to use it and recommend it to their buddies.

I'm letting it go.

[Manny]

I'd like to dredge up something Dan wrote on (what is now) another topic.

Over the years I have seen many MANY *MANY* guys who come to RWD (and/or elsewhere) screaming at the top of their lungs about how bad agencies are because they charge a 'fee' for a taxi or an apartment or a cellphone or . . . you get the idea. The simple facts are - a bunch of guys, and I do mean a BUNCH, are cheap. Pure and simple - they are CHEAP. They expect to get something for nothing - and they scream bloody murder if a service provider charges the most modest of mark-ups. This happens ALL THE TIME. Get a clue. There is probably nobody in this business who is in it for altruistic reasons. Everyone is in it to make a $$. Everyone. That is really bad news for the cheap bastards who count every penny and agonize over every dime. While there is nothing wrong with being frugal and responsible - the ones I am referencing (and like I wrote - there are a BUNCH of them) take this way over the line and are irrational and unrealistic about the financial aspects of this pursuit.

He is bang on the money there. Time and time again I see people agonizing over spending a few dollars. Guys used to book my wife for a 30 minute three-way-translated-call and try and take 40 minutes.  Many of the guys who arrive on forums soon become obsessed with free sites. The thought of spending a few bob pains them. A guy told me a while ago that our book was too expensive at $29. Ye gods, $9 of that is postage!    My wife laughed her head off when I told her and said "Another greedy-free one? I won't work for him"

Believe it or not, women are not obsessed with free sites. Most sites are free for women. Most women are concerned with keeping the whack jobs at arms length. That is best done using an agency of some kind. Whack jobs abound in this industry. That isn't a secret to the women y'know. They know that! Women don't want greedy (read cheap-assed) men.

Now look at the HRB model as it is discussed here. We know already that only about 5% of men ever get on a plane. That leaves 95% as wannabes and Keyboard Romeos. These women discussed above vacuum up the 95% and syphon off those who have money to burn to discuss licking chocolate off their popka. Why not? Go on any free site and the professional women are there too. Are those men who enjoy that happy with what they get?

they must have enjoyed it because they kept on buying tokens.

That says HRB are giving most paying clients what they want. That isn't just a theory; correlate it with the low charge-backs they get. Numbers don't lie.

Sensible men can see past all that stuff and go and find the marriage minded women there. Again, the numbers tell us there must be some because many people seem to be married. TomT saw the scrap book he described to be "like a telephone directory".

5% of serious men will do their homework and understand how this stuff works. Many of those will end up married.

Many men will agonize over spending a few dollars. I would be surprised if HRB even wanted those guys as clients. No business wants screamers who cry "scam" after spending $50. Those guys should stay on the free sites dreaming and/or spouting their stuff here. Its cheaper than actually getting on a plane eh guys?

Another group who have actually been on the plane, yet remain perpetually single, will lecture us all about how it "should be done". It didn't work out too well for some of them, but here they are with a four figure post count pecking at their keyboards slamming people who own these sites. Can they do better? Can they develop a better platform? Can they design a scam-free system where every knuckle shuffler hiding in Momma's basement gets himself a size zero supermodel wife? Of course not; or they would. Its easier to try to peck holes in others' business models from behind a keyboard isn't it?

People who run these sites are not running Sunday Schools. They need to pay the hosting bills, the translators, the staff in two (or more) countries, property costs, fund their systems and future development, pay taxes, card processing fees, every level of bureaucracy that is fired at businesses, and then seek a profit on top of that. Anyone who doesn't run a business really doesn't know the half of it.

As I said up thread, if you don't like the business model, use another service provider. There are several models to choose from. Simply because you don't like the business model doesn't make a site a "scam" site. It simply makes it not a site for you.

[facetrock]

  Actually Manny I agree with almost everything you said. Plenty nutjobs out there and lots of cheap men. How would I create an agency with full services that would appeal to most of the seriously searching 5 percent?  Simple, I wouldnt and cant and neither can anyone else for the plain fact there really is no profit to be made. Many have tried and no one has really had much success. Some survive but I bet its really a tough pull.
  What I am simply saying is that sites like HRB do serve a purpose to the 95 percent of men who dont get on a plane. But to the five percent that do make the trip and do some research it becomes very evident these sites cater to the 95 percent and lean towards the whatever percentage that enjoys hot chat with cute young gals. I have no problem with that.
  Most of the 5 percent end up on pay by month sites like Elenas, RussianEuro or free sites like Mamba or Freepersonals.ru. They dont want the hassle of 60 requests for chat and a 100 emails in one day from girls 30 plus years younger. Or they might find some small mom and pop agency in the middle of Russia. I do believe these tiny one town local agencys have a lot of value for a guy.

 The thing is no one knows who the 5 percent will be when they start out. Many men try it for a month or two just out of curiosity. Thats how I started but got lucky when I stumbled on the old RWG forum. I believe the men who end up traveling has a lot to do with the way they start out.  They get on a good site with few scammers and make a connection that 5 percent could turn into 15 percent.  If they get taken for a ride in fantasy land buying credits til the cows come home most in my opinion would give up.

Then there is the man who does the research before he commits to an agency or site. I would say these guys have at least a 50 percent travel rate and I wouldnt be surprised if most of them learned from places like this.

[Jooky]

Paying more should come with extra value.

What's the extra value with HRB? They claim it's a better monitoring and policing to enough a dating environment safe from scammers.

The evidence reveals the opposite. Their system encourages feeder agencies to mislead men in order to profit from them. You can call that a scam or not, up to you. Apparently some of you think it's ok to take advantage of someone if in your opinion they are 'knuckle shufflers' or 'losers'. For me misleading someone is misleading them, regardless of who they are.

The real extra value is false attention from young girls for men some of you label as 'not the cream of the crop'.

For serious men, this is not extra value. It's an additional hurdle.

So why pay more to add the additional hurdles of 'separating the wheat from the chaff' and not being able to directly communicate?

These hurdles hardly exist at other sites such as bride.ru, luckylovers, Elena's, Russian dating sites, freepersonals and many other small agencies and sites discussed here. For the serious man, why pay more for less value. It's moronic.

I remember the days when guys like Manny and TomT would insist that direct communication was key. After Manny became part of the business and TomT interacted with HRB, they've been 'enlightened'.

Now if RWD is a site for so called 'sex tourists' and guys that want to have fake soft core sex chat, by all means let's recommend them HRB and AWeb. I have nothing against that type of entertainment. I have nothing against strip clubs. I have nothing against prostitution either and I'm glad that it's legal in my State. If the CEO would admit that his site is primarily a charade for entertainment, like a strip club, I have nothing against his business model.

But to claim that the purpose of the web cam girls is so that men can validate that they're talking to real (implied sincere, not just physically real) women is pure bull. Do any of you honestly believe that?

If the RWD is a site for serious men, I don't see how anyone here can recommend sites that restrict direct communication.  

Sure, you can find a wife anywhere. There are guys here that have met their girlfriends or wives on actual porn sites. I had a smoking hot tall blonde model type, highly educated, 17 years younger than me fly to California on her own dime to meet me after a 10 minute phone conversation. I could have married her in a heartbeat. When I flew out to meet my girlfriend in person she had never even seen my photo. I don't relate or recommend what happened to me because it's an extreme long shot. So, sure, 'anything is possible', but it's not helpful to recommend that men to go directly for that long shot. This search is is hard enough as it is.

When guys are here prodding men by calling them cheap if they don't use long shot methods that add additional hurdles, don't allow direct communication and cater directly to the guys seeking cheap sexual fantasies, we all know why. It's all about the pounds. Ka-ching!

[TomT]

TomT, reworked version? I have no idea as to what you are referring. Didn't I quote you directly from you own post? Did I miss one some place?

Please Tom, point it out if I did. I mean, you made the statement, didn't you?

My statement refers to my frustration with critical non-thinkers who find some scammers on a site and assume that there is nothing of value there. Just to be clear, I didn't bother to look for scammers because there are scammers everywhere. Finding a few dozen or a few hundred on HRB would be neither surprising nor remarkable. Y'all know that the whole friggin' FSU is corrupt, don't ya? (If you don't, you're dumber than dirt.)

I have no intention of wasting my time opening letters from girls, or chatting with girls, with chocolate-covered boobs and butts. If anyone thinks that it's productive to do so, however, then knock yourself out.

[Misha]

Most women are concerned with keeping the whack jobs at arms length. That is best done using an agency of some kind.

Most women are perfectly capable of recognizing whack jobs on their own and are equally capable of keeping them at bay without the help of an agency.

Whack jobs abound in this industry. That isn't a secret to the women y'know. They know that! Women don't want greedy (read cheap-assed) men.

This again 

Those guys should stay on the free sites dreaming and/or spouting their stuff here.

Free sites worked fine for me 

As I said up thread, if you don't like the business model, use another service provider. There are several models to choose from. Simply because you don't like the business model doesn't make a site a "scam" site. It simply makes it not a site for you.

Sure, but there is no reason to whitewash potentially questionable practices