UPDATE: Bromide-Fest, Ripped Music Soundtrack From ‘Celtic Woman’ Mark Apparent Return Of ‘The Achieve Community’
As a hauntingly beautiful soundtrack from a Celtic Woman recording of “You Raise Me Up” plays in the background and various bromides appear on screen, Achieve Community prospects are encouraged in this YouTube promo to buy multiple “positions” for the cycler “program” that lost its payment processor last month. The promo guarantees a return.
“The Achieve Community” money-cycler train wreck has announced it’s back on the rails (sort of) and will relaunch today (sort of), after losing its payment processor last month. The asserted relaunch is occurring on the heels of multiple warnings from regulators about scams spreading on social media.
It’s also occurring against the backdrop of allegations in both the Zeek Rewards and TelexFree Ponzi/pyramid court cases that the operators encountered halts at various banks and payment processors, but moved to other ones to keep the massive fraud schemes going.
Both Zeek and TelexFree purported to be purveyors of a product or products. Regulators say the purported offerings were used to hide the illicit nature of the schemes. Achieve Community also purports to provide products.
Promos for Achieve Community assert that $50 for the purchase of a cycler “position” morphs into $400 in two months or so. Participants are encouraged to plow purported profits back into the system. Over time, according to this purported “repurchase strategy,” the original $50 will turn “into ANY amount you wish.”
As of the time of this PP Blog post, Achieve Community has not announced the name or names of its new payment processors. A Dec. 1 announcement attributed to co-founder Kristi Johnson suggests that Achieve Community intends immediately to start selling “positions” to participants who have debit or credit cards. When payouts to members would resume was not immediately clear.
“Payments will begin once we attach our processor, you sign up for it from your back office, and you are approved,” the Dec. 1 Blog post attributed to Johnson reads in part. “I will update you on the date to begin signing up for our payout processor.”
Naturally this has led to questions about whether Achieve Community was trying to replumb an involuntarily stalled Ponzi scheme by making it convenient for prospects to pay into the system until enough money becomes available for payouts to begin anew.
Achieve Community is said to have more than 9,000 members.
As in many network-marketing schemes, participants either are clueless about the obvious markers of fraud or pretending to be so.
News of the asserted relaunch has been greeted on social media with depictions of a fireworks display and images of champagne and wine glasses. Members of the AdSurfDaily Ponzi scheme in 2008 celebrated purported good news in the same fashion.
As was the case with the Zeek Rewards Ponzi scheme two months prior to its collapse in 2012, members of Achieve Community are being fed bromides. (With Zeek, it was “If you want things in your life to change, you have to change things in your life” and more. With Achieve Community, it’s “If you do not GO after what you want, you’ll never have it” and more.)
One 5:07 promo for Achieve Community on YouTube includes virtually the entire soundtrack of a recording of “You Raise Me Up” by Celtic Woman. Various bromides appear on the screen as the hauntingly beautiful music plays. As one bromide fades away, a panel rolls onto the screen. It claims that Achieve Community “will change your life FOREVER. EVERYONE MAKES MONEY HERE. NO ONE GETS LEFT BEHIND. PERIOD.”
The video, with the Celtic Woman recording still playing, goes on to assert that there is “Never a moment alone” in the Achieve Community.
Another promo — this one on Facebook — shows an image of a U.S. space shuttle blasting off. “Now Anyone Can Live Their Dream!” the promo roars. “Over $2,000,000 PAID Out to Members.”
Another claims, “The Achieve Community Is On Fire.” Members of the TelexFree Ponzi- and pyramid scheme were targeted in a similar promo last year. TelexFree collapsed into a pile of Ponzi rubble in April 2014.
Also see Nov. 17, 2014, PP Blog post.
Quick notes: Based on posts at the Achieve Community Blog, it looks as though the “relaunch” occurred sometime before 5 p.m. ET today.
It’s being spun as a big win.
However, it appears Achieve Community hit some kind of payment-acceptance threshold on or before 8 p.m. ET. If this is the case, today’s action lasted on the order of three hours.
From the Achieve Community Blog in a post titled “Tuesday Update” and dated today. (Note the references to declined purchases and the””Within 24 hours we will be open again” line):
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“There are many reasons for declined purchases – including incorrect information (it’s pretty easy to transpose a couple of numbers), bank security blocks, card limits that you don’t realize you’ve reached, as well as the limits in our system now….there is no way of knowing why you might have been declined.
“Within 24 hours we will be open again – there is no set time for this – meantime you can all access the website, your back office and our updates.”
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I’d also note that the purchase of “positions” today was highlighted to the virtual exclusion of everything else. For now, at least, the purported “banners” product appears to exist only in theory.
The banners apparently are “coming,” based on the Blog post.
Patrick
Now this, in an Achieve Community Blog post titled “Our Most Mind Blowing Update Yet!”:
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“I’ve just talked with our Merchants Accounts and they have informed me that they have verified that we have real people signing up here and so are opening the gates again for us without the same limits!
“We can already begin signing up again – if you were declined please re-apply – and we will be open from this point onwards.”
_________________________________________
Patrick
Well, their new payment processor is iPayDNA.biz out of Malaysia. Someone in TAC already went to their site and they say in their TOS there are no chargebacks, and if you do it is fraud and they will prosecute you no matter where you are located. Almost fell off my chair laughing at that extortion attempt. This is going down faster than the Titanic once the masses figure this all out.
“You Raise Me Up” is generally considered a RELIGIOUS song…
I don’t know where you received your information, but there has been to word yet as to which new payment processors Achieve will be using!
(Quote) from 4th Paragraph at top of page….Promos for Achieve Community assert that $50 for the purchase of a cycler “position” morphs into $400 in two months or so. Participants are encouraged to plow purported profits back into the system. Over time, according to this purported “repurchase strategy,” the original $50 will turn “into ANY amount you wish.”
This statement is so wrong!… “repurchase strategy,” the original $50 will turn “into ANY amount you wish.”
Every $50 purchase or re-purchase earns you $400 period! How much you start with is up to you and re-purchase is not a requirement.
I wish that when people wish to bad mouth something, that they get the facts starting first.
This is from the Achieve Community “repurchase” video:
https://patrickpretty.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/12/achievecommunityrepurchasesmall.jpg
Patrick
Quick note: This is from an Achieve Community video promo in which earnings are extrapolated to more than $1.6 million.
https://patrickpretty.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/12/achieve1638small.jpg
Also from the video:
* “How would you like to afford Retiring in a year?”
* “Every $50 purchase Becomes $400 profit. No Recruiting. No Sales.”
* “If You Can Buy A Position and Then . . . DO NOTHING!! [ . . .] YOU Can Achieve !”
The original video source appears to be the same person who dubbed the Celtic Woman recording of “You Raise Me Up” into a separate promo for Achieve.
A different video by a different person extrapolates earnings to more than $900,000.
Still another Achieve promo by yet another person appears to show the purported earnings of other Achieve members as “proof” of legitimacy.
In the video, the narrator does some clicking. During one click, a Facebook site of an apparent third party pops up. Here’s what it says:
“Watch Son of God Online for Free.”
Whether the person who posted the link has the authority to stream online a February 2014 theatrical release is unclear.
Patrick
The particular version referenced in the Dec. 2 story above was recorded by Celtic Woman as part of a music video. The audio track from that video was lifted and made part of the Achieve promo.
On that same date, I sought to contact the company I believe controls the distribution of that particular version of “You Raise Me Up” to see if it was aware the song was being used to lure people into a money-cycler.
There was a website glitch at the distributor’s site, so I contacted the trade association and asked it to pass along the message to the distributor.
The trade association said it would do so. I’m still hoping to hear back from the distributor.
Patrick
Don’t you mean “I wish you people would stop reporting the truth and preventing us from making a buck on the backs of members who have joined after us
I don’t know……….I think ‘she’ may have been referring to ‘her’ own failure to watch the video that ‘her’ own scam has out there that Patrick references before ‘she’ bad mouthed Patrick’s reporting. In other words……a really lame apology.
I wish your fellow “Achievers” can share your brain as you are in league with such morons and liars.
Don’t blame the messenger for pointing that out…