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Report: #85995

Complaint Review: Landmark Forum, Nationwide - San Jose California

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  • Reported By: Chandler Arizona
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  • Landmark Forum, Nationwide landmarkforum.com San Jose, California U.S.A.

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While I work out of state, husband talked into Landmark forum Classes, paying top dollar to learn what is needed, to enrich his relationship with spouse, ME. Instead he is taught that it is quite alright to start new relationships, new life, getting rid of "rackets", they call them, baggage; not having enough fun, go to Landmark Forum and meet someone new who can break up your marriage of 35 years, preaching goodness, what a hype and my husband paying for this service.

He continues today to take these classes paying top dollars, being led by the "leaders", who roped him in hook line and sinker...this company is a bad representation of what it takes to make relationships better. I have asked Dr. Phil for his opinion and I am sure that after what I have been through with my husband joining this "group",(another word I would rather use, but not here today) that I will be a little more skeptical in my NEXT RELATIONSHIP AND MAKE SURE THEY DID NOT ATTEND A LANDMARK FORUM CLASS ON RELATIONSHIP..END OF STORY OR SHOULD I SAY "JUST THE BEGINNING". LANDMARK FORUM OWES ME A GREAT BIG APOLOGY AND SO DOES THEIR STAFF, AND THEY KNOW WHO THEY ARE.

SUZANNE
Chandler, Arizona
U.S.A.

This report was posted on Ripoff Report on 03/30/2004 05:20 PM and is a permanent record located here: https://www.ripoffreport.com/reports/landmark-forum-nationwide/san-jose-california/landmark-forum-nationwide-ripoffhusband-pays-money-to-landmark-to-better-relationship-an-85995. The posting time indicated is Arizona local time. Arizona does not observe daylight savings so the post time may be Mountain or Pacific depending on the time of year. Ripoff Report has an exclusive license to this report. It may not be copied without the written permission of Ripoff Report. READ: Foreign websites steal our content

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REBUTTALS & REPLIES:
0Author
15Consumer
0Employee/Owner

#15 Consumer Comment

Landmark Forum= cult like, very agressive "recruitment" tactics

AUTHOR: Sunny123 - (U.S.A.)

POSTED: Monday, March 17, 2008

I co-worker that I was only an aquantiance with befriended me one day at work at said she would like to "hang out outside of work sometime". I assumed she meant go out for drinks or coffee or something. However, she was most interisted in having me come to sit in on her Landmark Forum class. I didn't really want to go, but said ok because she said it was in a cool part of San Francisco, and that we would go out for drinks afterward in the city. I didn't have a car at the time and enjoyed going to SF so I decided to attend just as a sit in, get it out of the way, and then enjoy our evening in San Francisco. I assumed I would just sit in as an observer, but I was instantly bombarded with people coming up and wanting 700$ for a 3 day class. I took their paperwork and said I would think about it just to patronize them and get them to shut up. However they kept insisting that a special oppurtunity had come for me tonight and that if I just signed up right now they money situation would work itself out ( I would basically be responsible for a bill right at that point). I held my ground and said no ( I was saving money for a car at the time, no freaking way was I handing my hard earned money over to these aggressive brain-washers. At one point I went outside and pretended to take an emergency phone call just to get a way for a moment. I had to come back in and get my co-worker who was still in there involved in their going ons. The people trying to recruit me were implying that I was not seeing through barriers and that I had a closed mind because I felt perfectly happy with my life and saw no need to give these people my hard earned money for classes I did not want. They then implied that I was confused and not seeing clearly and that I only thought I didn't want it but didn't really know and blah blah blah. I am very self aware and self confident therefore these people could only serve to annoy me until I could get away. However, I could see them making people who feel sad or have low self esteem feel horrible about themselves if they don't believe what they are told by the Landmark Forum reps. These people use strong arm tactics and psychological tricks to get peoples money. I could see right though them and they did not get my money, but they sure did try to make me feel bad. Didn't work.

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#14 Consumer Suggestion

I found LME forum very very helpful.

AUTHOR: Al900uhz - (U.S.A.)

POSTED: Monday, December 31, 2007

If one dose not take risks in life using the support offered by Landmark education you can not expect to get what they offer. I find the cores very very helpful they give you a chance for your money back after the 1st day of the Landmark forum.

I think this report suggests the person how filed this has not understood what LME is.

For 2% of people how do go in to the forum do have mental brake downs this is a fact that is some thing the forum leader warns. LME is not for every one such as people with schizophrenia, and or severe bipolar disorders.

I am in the Washington DC LME program and the total cost of there 4 class plus the seminar is less than 1,000.

Please try calling your local landmark with a opened mind and try to work it out there support is grate. The forum is a key to change your life you have to tern the lock.

Life is full of risk Landmark is a guide on haw to use risk to better you life. Some times you fall down don't give up.

Good luck to you!

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#13 Consumer Comment

PROS AND CONS....

AUTHOR: Patricia - (U.S.A.)

POSTED: Tuesday, August 22, 2006

I never heard of Landmark Education, until a close friend entertained an introductory presentation in her home, by a Landmark employee.
I was amazed how a select group of friends could open up to the adversity occurring in there, as well as, ohter peoples lives. Very impressed!
At the end of the presentation, the Landmark employee, specified a three day (all day) and one week day presentations at a cost of $4??.00.
Oh-oh! RED FLAG popped in! Fortunately, with the very small group (potential Landmarkers), no takers.
We concurred, that an open conversation can occur within ourselves at no expense. It is a matter of, who will initiate family/friend get together
Not to say Landmark Education is a bad organization. But, I would be leery of an organization that offer the betterment of one's life for a price.

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#12 Consumer Comment

Landmark concerns.

AUTHOR: Mort - (U.S.A.)

POSTED: Thursday, August 10, 2006

I am not advocating against educational institutions that instruct life enhancing skills. I myself have attended many courses over the years that encourage self empowerment and self introspection. I have been a student of Zen Buddhism for years and have read many books of self realization written by learned men and women.

The one thing that bothered me when my freind approached me about attending the Landmark forum was the obvious deceptions employed.

I asked for some explanatory literature or other media to peruse before I commited myself to an entire evening, there were none.

Do you think for a minute, when there is always a distict threat of cult indoctrination, for the fallible in organizations using an example such as the "Mooneys", that I would succumb to these similar tactics?


If Landmark is attempting to establish credibility, why is it using these obvious ploys?(please refer to my previous letter)
These tactics are also used in pyramid scheme business opportunities, such as Rainbow Vaccum and Amway.


From what my freind told me about the classes he took he took at Landmark, they sound wonderful. It sounds like something I would benefit from.
Too bad Landmarks approach is so malicious. If strong arm tactics are used to convert students, so as to pay the organizations bills, my suspicion hackles will rise every time!

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#11 Consumer Comment

Landmark Education is for Growth and Development

AUTHOR: Elizabeth - (U.S.A.)

POSTED: Tuesday, June 27, 2006

I have participated in Landmark Education courses since 2001. I have also obtained two masters degrees in nursing and in psychology: I am a nurse practitioner and psychotherapist. I was a Catholic missionary for 10 years in Lating America and Iremain a deeply committed Christian. Landmark offers a unique and stimulating access to that which inspires us in life. All too often we are "the living dead" with our past in the future.

What I have learned in Landmark HEALED my 25 year marriage into more than I thought it could be. It gave me the courage to enter the field of psychotherapy and I am now developing my own business and private practice. I have also entered deeper into my personal faith experience. Those are all places I would not have dared to go without the training and development Ireceived in Landmark. What you get from the training, like any other tool, can only be as good as what you give to it. The results for many people have been amazing and extradordinary. If we could all live in the mental space described in the Landmark conversations, this world would be a transformed place.

Also, I am not a Landmark "follower": there is no one to follow. I am learning to follow my inner voice urging me to be all I can be.

Sincerely,
Elizabeth
Texas

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#10 Consumer Comment

Could not have spent "thousands of dollars"

AUTHOR: Derek - (United Kingdom)

POSTED: Friday, June 23, 2006

I did the Landmark Forum four years ago and found the experience very positive, if at times challenging.

My son and my wife have both done it too, and we would all say that our relationships (which were already great) have become even closer as a result of what we learned.

I have seen far more instances of people re-building and enhancing their relationships following Landmark courses than disrupting them.

Mort says that his friend spent "thousands of dollars" on Landmark courses, but I would say that this would be virtually impossible as the courses are in fact extremely cheap. For example the seminars cost 75 in the UK for ten three-hour sessions spread over a 3 month period. That's 2.50 per hour - where can you get any learning of any description for anything like that price?

Rebecca says that "they" are only interested in getting your money, but that too doesn't stand up to any kind of scrutiny. The Landmark Forum Leaders are extremely skilled and talented, and they work a 90 - 110 hour week in return for a modest professional salary. They, and the other staff members, own the company and have never paid themselves any dividends - using the profits instead to deliver courses below cost in Asian and African countries. All the other courses are led by volunteers who deliver them without being paid at all.

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#9 Consumer Comment

An alternative view of Landmark's education

AUTHOR: Carol - (U.S.A.)

POSTED: Saturday, June 10, 2006

I am a graduate of the Landmark Forum my training is in clinical psychology (I was in private practice for almost 30 years but am now retired). I would like to offer some comments about the education that Landmark offers for people.

After the Landmark Forum what is really made available to you is the possibility of being fully yourself. The process you go through to arrive at that is an extended inquiry into what it means to be a human beingand in the course of that inquiry people have many opportunities to look in their own lives and see where their actions, choices and accomplishments do and do not line up with their real values and principles. You transform your relationship to yourself and the people you care about, you expand your ability to produce results in life, and you gain access to greater fulfillment in life.

The access to all of this lies in discovering and examining the assumptions you have about yourself and lifethe contexts from which you make your choices, the automatic assumptions that determine your actions and attitudes, the reactions to things around you that come from experiences in the past. What you begin to realize is that there are things about you that are hidden from your own view of yourself and your life (although they may be no secret to the people who know you well!)and as you begin to have insight into the assumptions you operate from, your view of life alters and what is possible for you to accomplish and produce in life expands.

The Landmark Forum is not remedial work or about fixing anything about anybodyLandmark Forum Leaders do not give advice or impose any particular view of life on you. It is completely possible to leave the Landmark Forum having a brand new experience of life and yet change nothing about that lifeexcept one's view of it. Indeed, the suggestion is that if there are things or even people in your life/environment that are a problem for you, the source of that may very well lie in you and not in them or it.

I don't know if there are any statistics on how many people, for example, get divorced after the Landmark Forumbut most of what you hear from people is how they were able to heal relationships that were damaged, forgive themselves and others for old wounds, and generate breakthroughs in the level of satisfaction they experience in the relationships they already had.

My hope is that both Suzanne and her ex-husband have gone on to find satisfaction in their lives; and my suggestion to anyone who reads these letters is that they go to the Landmark Education website, read the various things posted there, and come to their own conclusions.

Carol
Austin, TX

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#8 Consumer Suggestion

Landmark not your ordinary education.

AUTHOR: Mort - (U.S.A.)

POSTED: Thursday, May 25, 2006

While it seems that Landmark is indeed a form of education, and I do not doubt that some constructive things are taught there, they do not behave like an ordinary educational institution.
There tactics seem very suspicious, and they employ rather strong-arm tactics to there "followers".

A very close freind of mine joined and very soon afterwards the coercive calls began. He asked very directly at first for me to join. I replied, after his description of the classes that it was not for me. Then he tried another approach: He was graduating from a course and wanted me to be present. However, during this ceremony, I would entreated to a sales pitch. I said no again. He then began acting not like the old freind I knew, but more like a hell-fire christian out for conversion. I had no doubt that they were putting him up to it, and he even admitted so. He mentioned some kind of quota he had to keep.

Anyway, he has spent untold thousands of dollars to join the courses, is deep in debt, and I cannot for the life of me see any positive difference landmark has made on him. You would probably be better to spend your money going back to college.

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#7 UPDATE EX-employee responds

Landmark Education is just that- Education.

AUTHOR: Alex - (U.S.A.)

POSTED: Saturday, May 13, 2006

I have taken many of the courses at Landmark Education. I worked for Landamrk Education for over three years and even lead their courses, so I have a serious insider view of their operation.

It is an educational organization. It is adult education on living life. You have to consider that if someone goes to a three day course to work on their relationship which is troubled and then the rleationship doesn't work out - it is a little silly to blame the three-day course.

I know it is easier to look for something to blame, but clealry the relationship was already in trouble when your husband wnt to Landamrk Education. Landamrk Education's courses are just that- they aren't magic. They are just a course on creating a life worth living and living a life you love. The themes of the course include integrity, honoring one's word, and forgiveness. In no case does it advocate moving further from people - it advocates moving closer and being willing to work it out.

Your husband did what he did with the course. I really do feel for your pain and need to lash out at something but I assure you Landmark Education's work is useful and constructive and certainly not damaging. There is a lot of hysteria on the internet and you just need to weed that out with common sense. The Landmark Forum is a three day course that over a million people have taken...

Good luck with this and, although you may not be in a space to hear this, you would be welcome to come to your local office of Landmark Education and register for a course- you would be pleasantly surprised and it might even give you some power and freedom around what is happening with your husband.

Thanks,

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#6 Consumer Comment

Landmark is EST?

AUTHOR: A - (U.S.A.)

POSTED: Saturday, March 11, 2006

I think Landmark is the old Werner Erhardt's EST in 'different clothes.'
They came to our job once to solicit, but were run off by headquarters. LOL!

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#5 Consumer Comment

Landmark is EST?

AUTHOR: A - (U.S.A.)

POSTED: Saturday, March 11, 2006

I think Landmark is the old Werner Erhardt's EST in 'different clothes.'
They came to our job once to solicit, but were run off by headquarters. LOL!

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#4 Consumer Comment

Landmark is EST?

AUTHOR: A - (U.S.A.)

POSTED: Saturday, March 11, 2006

I think Landmark is the old Werner Erhardt's EST in 'different clothes.'
They came to our job once to solicit, but were run off by headquarters. LOL!

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#3 Consumer Comment

Landmark is EST?

AUTHOR: A - (U.S.A.)

POSTED: Saturday, March 11, 2006

I think Landmark is the old Werner Erhardt's EST in 'different clothes.'
They came to our job once to solicit, but were run off by headquarters. LOL!

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#2 Consumer Suggestion

Landmark Forum is a scam

AUTHOR: Rebecca - (U.S.A.)

POSTED: Thursday, May 05, 2005

I agree with Suzanne, Landmark Forum is a scam. If you accept everything they want you to , you deny everything you know. It is called brain washing. They even invent new meanings to words in the English Language. Ridiculous, and very arrogant. The only way they succeed is through clever marketing. Secretive and seductive, they control your every move.

If you disagree with them they say you have a strong suit, and if you debate them, they say you have a racket and if you have a problem, it is a story. Bottom line they just want your money. I know people who have spent in the tens of thousands there.

What a waste of time. Just listen to Dr. Laura on the radio for free, and all your relationship problems will be address in about 3 months. And if you think Dr. Laura is rough, try the strong arm tactics of the Forum.
Run away from anyone who tries to enroll you. Run!

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#1 Consumer Comment

Landmark is an excellent program

AUTHOR: Sean - (U.S.A.)

POSTED: Monday, August 16, 2004

I have attended the Forum and the 6 day course.
The forum is a worthy program. I would recommend it to anyone. I am sure it was your husband who made his own decision to leave his marriage.

While I am sorry for your loss I must say the forum follows certain guidelines of discussion however the attendants also determine the discussion through sharing their thoughts & experiences. The forum leader does not start a topic about leaving your marriage.

I can only assume that your husband realized his relationship with you was not working for him and decided to leave.

I don't think you should blame Landmark.

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