Jones and Co. LLC CDSI: Career Development Services International CDS: Career Development Services Executive Job Scam using LinkedIn Columbia South Carolina

The original complaint regarding this company is very true and any response from them should not be trusted.  I have filed complaints on this company as they have also taken my money, each organization I filed complaints with attempted to contact them and they literally fail to respond on all fronts which allows them to continue operating without having to answer for their actions.  

Seems like the company has gotten some traction on BBB as well. Wanted to provide the link for everyone's benefit:

https://www.bbb.org/us/sc/columbia/profile/resume-services/career-development-services-llc-0663-34144782/complaints

Be advsied I had received response back from every consumer violation board or service out there and the response is all the same, these people do not respond via mail or phone call to any inquiry into their business practices.

 This is clearly a company hiding the truth and stealing from the American people, I will bring these people into the spotlight to answer.  Do Not Use them or contact them.

Although the two other reports on this company validate my original complaint, I still feel that I have to respond to the Company's rebuttal, as it is filled with lies and deception, which is really how the two principles of the company have been treating us throughout the process: With lies and deception.

Not sure why Lisa has to lie about how the original relationship started, but my wife has LinkedIn messages to prove that Lise invited my wife to connect, and as soon as she did, she offered her services. I didn't connect with either of the two principles before quite a while after. We have not been connected to them "for years" as claimed by Lisa, and we did not initiate the request for services.

We also did not expect immediate results from the process, but we did expect that commitments were properly and timely handled. We expected to be working the first month with resume updates and LinkedIn updates. I signed up with the company on February 12th, and I didn't have my working resume draft before mid-April. There was always something medical reason why there were delays: The writer had to go to the hospital for a potential appendectomy, Lisa had to go to the hospital for a bacterial infection, Kelly, her husband, and COO, had to go to the hospital for an issue with his son. There were many other excuses for some delays, but the hospital one was pretty consistent. 

After I had a pretty good draft of my resume, and they kept stalling on getting it finished, and getting to update my LinkedIn profile, I updated it myself. I had seen how they had taken the same information from the resume and updated my wife's profile, and those changes were pretty straightforward and simple. I didn't change my password as claimed, and my expectation was that Lisa and team would go back into my LinkedIn profile and update the final, once they were ready and back from the Hospital. I didn't change the password until it was clear that they were not going to deliver on any of the other commitments and that they had stopped responding to us completely (late May). It is also not true that I "decided I didn't want the LinkedIn profile work", nor is it true that they had requested that I didn't update my LinkedIn profile myself. There were no instructions that I ignored.

Then Lisa has to get into a whole section of "they were not qualified". I.e. they couldn't find positions matching our requirements, and the ones they found didn't have the salary level or something else was wrong. THEY NEVER SHOWED US A SINGLE POSITION THAT THEY HAD FOUND FOR US!!. They constantly talked about how they were working on the search terms, they were going to work with us on "our thermographic" and our "board of advisors evaluations". They were going to have a "deep database search", and then work on our opportunities etc. They never mentioned any problems with salary or anything else regarding the searches. But they constantly claimed that they couldn't share any information with us on the opportunities, as they wanted to work with the company recruiters until they had for sure nailed them down. They even claimed they had a couple of positions lined up for my wife, "but because of the issues with NAFTA, the companies had put hiring on hold". Now that was very interesting as my wife was looking for a local job in Healthcare ... not Manufacturing.

Basically, they were constantly full of s**t. Especially the husband kept touting their relationship with government and military, and that meant that they had some restrictions on how they could do business, i.e. how we had to pay them etc. We knew from the beginning that it was a bunch of baloney, but we assumed it was just a way that he could make himself feel a little more important. As long as they would deliver on the commitments to us, we didn't care about a white lie about his "powerful connections".

The rest of Lisa's rebuttal is also mostly lies and deception: they don't own the addresses listed. It is true that they offer a 30-day refund. Had to evaluate that when it takes more than a month to get the first delivery from them. Etc Etc.

Basically, if anyone is considering services from Jones & Co. (or what they are going to rename it to next year), understand they offer resume generation and LinkedIn updates. Within the initial 30 days, they have a pretty believable process of getting data assembled about you and gives you an indication that they would deliver on their commitments. But don't expect to get any further than a resume and LinkedIn profile. We never got any opportunities presented to us within the 3 months we worked with them. You will start to see some of the delays, and excuses right after the first 30 days, and then gradually it takes longer and longer from them to respond, and every time you finally get them on the phone or get a call scheduled, you will find that you are no further than you were the 2 weeks before. 

I will recommend you find someone professional to work with instead of Lisa and Kelly Jones at Jones & Co.

I have heard back from the BBB this company has an F rating and has failed to respond to any complainbt ever filed, they have also utilized 1-800 numbers and PO boxes to hide from any attempt to contact legitimately.  

I have experienced a very smiliar interaction with this company, after approximately three weeks the company cancelled the conference calls and communications began going dark.  I attempted to call the phone number numerous times which would never be answered, after completing the forms they sent out and providing the information they requested commiunications did not improve, as a matter of fact i received only excuses of being busy with government work, hospitalizations, internet outages, etc.  Eventually I sent emails requesting a refund and in response they stated they had two unlisted positions they wanted to talk to me about, this was obviously a ploy to keep me on the line because after responding to that email communications stopped altogether.  I have heard nothing from them since and see they changed their company name and the COO altered his name on Linked-in. 

Upon reveiwing the BBB website under their old name I found three complaints which reflected the same scenario I read here and what I have been through.

DO NOT sign up with this company!

We appreciate the opportunity to provide the company's side of this issue so that anyone who reads this can see both sides.

The wife of the gentleman who wrote this review is the person who contacted us first. I had been connected with both this man and his wife for years on LinkedIn, and after I posted an article on LinkedIn, his wife reached out to us to see how we could partner to help her find her next career position. A phone call took place between his wife and our COO, and we created a proposal that we felt would best enable the client to achieve her goals. At some point in the negootiation, she brought her husband into the mix, saying that he was also looking for a new job. We retooled the proposal, and negotiations ensued whereby our costs were reduced by more than 50% because both were currently unemployed, and we wanted to help them.

It soon became evident that both individuals wanted immediate results on the job front, even though we state in our client paperwork (which both people signed and returned) that the job search is ramped up in month 1 because we recreate the resume and LinkedIn profile for each client. At the same time, key words are identified which are used to create the client's search code. Both people expressed their gratefulness for our process of digging into their experience to find unique skill sets and accomplishments which would differentiate them from others against whom they are competing for the jobs they want to have. I don't remember exactly how long it took to return our questionnaire, but it took several days. During this time, also, both people had to reschedule 2 phone meetings and we had to reschedule one meeting, so the phone interview process took longer than normal. When all information was received, I assigned their initial resume draft project to my writing team lead, who went into the hospital for appendicitis. When she got out of the hospital a few days later, she immediately worked on and completed the wife's resume first and then the husband's. 

I completed the wife's LinkedIn profile, and the husband was using the information in his new resume draft to update his LinkedIn profile on his own, which we had requested that he not do. He continued to do that work and ignored our instructions. Both the wife and husband signed off on their resume approval form, and the wife approved her LinkedIn profile form. We have those on record. The husband decided he didn't want us to do his LinkedIn profile work and changed the password so we couldn't log in to do the other work that was necessary, such as inclusion in groups that would have been beneficial for him. 

It soon became clear that both immediately expected to begin getting interviews for jobs. Both individuals have unique skill sets; however, the positions they wanted to have were, for the most part, too high for the positions for which they were qualified. We presented positions to both individuals, and we were told that the salary wasn't high enough or something else was at issue. We explained to both that their level of qualification met these positions (with the lower salaries), and that they could always work their way up the ranks once they showed what they can do within the company's structure. Neither were willing to do that. Both individuals had also applied to multiple positions on their own, which is something that we encourage; however, applicants need to understand that when they apply to online positions, we are unable to represent them for unlisted positions because the candidate had already contacted Human Resources. HR keeps applications for 6-12 months, and repeated applications for other jobs are not registered or are automatically thrown out because the companies set up their Applicant Tracking Systems to weed out repeat applications. The couple was not satisfied with that situation, and that is not something that we could control. Two months into their 4-month program, they decided not to move forward.

Regarding the addresses which he indicated in his report, the house was one which we were renting as our private residence. The house has been rented to several individuals before we rented it, which is the explanation for the multiple names associated with the address. We have the lease on file if anyone wants proof. The only other address that we've had is a P.O. Box at the local post office. The vacant lot has nothing to do with us and was completely erroneous. I don't know where or who allocated that address to us. At no time have we ever reported that address in conjunction with our company. 

Given that we do not make or sell physical products (our products are the services we provide), we work from an office within our home and work remotely with those professionals who execute the writing, research, unlisted search, and interview preparation/company intelligence aspects of our company. It reduces overhead costs which enables us to keep our client costs down.

Refunds are given during the first 30 days only. We have multiple people to pay for their services, and since the individuals in question had reduced our fees down to less than 50% of what we started with (which we did willingly because we wanted to help them). At the point of where they stopped their programs, everything that they had paid were used in the course of their programs. There were no unused funds remaining to refund the clients.  

The programs that we create to help clients achieve their career and job search goals require a high degree of collaboration, partnership, and adherence to process. We explain that to each client before they sign with us. We stipulate that in the paperwork that we send to clients after registration is received. There was no deceit, illegality, or ill will in this situation. Unfortunately, these individuals contracted with us as a last resort and didn't have the time to dedicate or allow us to achieve the results they needed in the time frame to which they had originally agreed when they signed their client paperwork.

Thank you for reading our side of the story.