We deal with our clients for a short amount of time, but the lender is in constant communication with them for years. And whenever your customers are asked who their mortgage company is, they will usually answer the name of their lender.

Some lenders are better at stealing our clients then others.

As a real estate investor I have had loans with several different lenders. One of my properties had a loan from a lender called JB Nutter. This was a small bank that did a very poor job of marketing itself to its customers. I would hear from them 3 times a year. Once to send me a coupon book for the year, another to tell me how much interest I paid that year for my taxes, and another to tell me about how much money was in my escrow account.

They never once tried to offer me a refinance.

My current mortgage for my residence is with Countrywide. These guys know their stuff. They mail me a statement every month. And in every statement is an offer to refinance or get a line of credit, or insurance. They are always politely selling something. And if that weren’t enough, they mail me every couple months or so more offers to refinance or tap some equity. But at least they are not as sneaky as World Savings Bank.

One of my investment properties had one of their loans. They now have hooked up with the credit bureaus so that whenever someone with one of their loans gets their credit checked by a mortgage company or lender, they get notified. I like getting my credit checked every 3 months, and with my own mortgage company all it takes is a couple keystrokes of my computer. Imagine my surprise when I got a call at home from a World Savings rep asking me if I was thinking about refinancing. He told me he knew I had my credit checked by a mortgage company and that they were ready to give me a better offer then whatever I was getting,

They have a whole division of telemarketers who do nothing but call their loan holders who are getting their credit checked by other mortgage companies. So even if you get a client a World Savings loan, and that client comes back to you later for a refi, you are now going to have to compete with World Savings for this customer.

Pisses you off doesn’t it?

And you can bet that now that one lender is doing this, others will follow suit,.

So what do we as mortgage brokers do about this?

Simple, we form close relationships with our clients, that basically makes them immune to any sales pitch by any other lender or mortgage company. I call it the “silent force field”. We need to use every tool at our disposal to make sure that once a person becomes a client we never let them go.

I outline the “silent force field’ completely in our Referrals on Demand product, but I will lay out some guidelines for you here.

1. You must stay in contact with them on a regular basis. Once a month minimum The easiest way to do this is through a monthly newsletter. Outsource this to a newsletter company and they will handle the production, printing, and mailing of the newsletter to your clients every month.

2. WOW your clients as soon as you can. Come up with a creative way to make a great impression on your clients. Here’s an example. There is dentist in Australia who was tired of having customers be afraid to see him. So he completely changed his office. Now instead of a regular dentist office, it looks more like someone’s living room. There is the aroma of fresh baked cinnamon buns in the air, (sugar free) that can be enjoyed with coffee or tea. There is no receptionist sitting there with the little window that they keep closing on you. This dentist now has a referral only practice, where the only way to work with him, is if you know someone who already works with him, and they give you a referral.

3. Get to know your clients and let them get to know you. Show your personality. Let them know about your family. Keep them informed about how your kids are doing in school. Remember, you do not want to seem like their bank. You want to seem like a family friend that happens to do mortgages. Have customer appreciation parties. Have house warming parties. Have a grand birthday party for yourself every year. Give yourself excuses to call your clients and get to know them socially.

4. Start a blog and write about whatever you want. Invite your clients to visit often and provide feedback.

5. Become a customer of your clients. If one of your clients owns a dry cleaners, get your clothes cleaned there. Reward them for doing business with you by doing business with them.

6. Get your clients to network amongst themselves. Create a referral club. Your dry cleaner client can go to your dentist client when his teeth hurt. And if you make the referral you look even better.

These are just a few ideas to help you keep your customers. People do business with people they like. By forming relationships with your past clients you can make sure they keep coming back to you.

Your lenders are spying on your clients is a post from: Business Directory for Business Information | Richmondjwj.org

Investigative journalism can move public opinion and instill fear in those treading the wrong path. Slave trade, gun running, terrorist activities, drug trafficking, money laundering and so on are brought to the notice of the world by investigative journalism.

An investigative journalist must be unafraid, determined, patient, watchful, fair, as well as dog minded to be successful. The questions a journalist seeks answers to are: who is responsible for the wrong doing; what methods were employed; what are the consequences; what can be done to correct the wrong; can the wrongdoers be brought to book?

The keys are to dig up the first lead, tip, or hunch. Then sniff around for facts. Form an investigative hypothesis. Next, like a detective, gather evidence that will prove undeniably the hypothesis. This will involve interviews, documents, records, proofs, and intense paper work. Organize the information and write the report. Check facts, check chances of libel, and the laws. To be good at your work it is advantageous if you are familiar with the law, know the procedures, can conduct quick and accurate research, follow the money trail, and dig out facts.

Investigative journalism is a specialized field that uses journalism skills, curiosity, advanced research methods, and a determination to right wrongs. This field of journalism is what helps shape democracy and protects the lives of the innocent. Done correctly it can raise public opinion to such an extent that the way the world thinks and functions can be changed.

An investigative journalist must work within the confines of ethics written and unwritten and the laws. The work could include revealing scandals and tracing infringements of laws, rules, or morals. Bring to public notice the policies of governments, companies, and other organizations. And, institute social change by describing social, economic, political, and cultural trends.

To be effective in investigative journalism the journalist must have high standards of functioning and be above corruption. The principles of truthfulness, accuracy, objectivity, impartiality, fair play, and public accountability must be deeply ingrained in the mind and soul of the journalist. Since investigative journalism involves use of undercover sources and anonymous tips it is absolutely essential for the journalist to double check facts.

Investigative journalism is news with a difference. It is critical and in depth investigations to a happening or policy which will serve to prevent or correct a wrong, prevent crimes, save the planet from destruction, and shape the future of the world in more ways than one. It is reporting the unknown, the hidden, and so, the investigative journalist becomes the keeper or custodian of public conscience.

It is a field where a mere niggling thought or suspicion becomes an expose of wrong doings. It questions actions and decisions and brings to the limelight outrageous acts and in human actions. In simple terms an investigative journalist polices society in the larger interests of mankind.

What Investigative Reporting Entails is a post from: Business Directory for Business Information | Richmondjwj.org

Inside of criminal law there is four major theories of criminal justice:
- Punishment
- Deterrence
- Incapacitation
- Rehabilitation

This form of law is essential in many cases because it can distinguis between crimes from civil wrongs. Criminal law has been around for ages, and is seeing as the fundamental system of regulating the behavior of individuals and groups relatively to what is defined as the social norms. This differs between civil crimes, where the difference is between two individuals and their individual rights and obligations under the law which is ruling the entire society.

An example of a civil law case is a dispute between two individuals over a contract that they made to for example sell an automobile. In that case one individual feels that their individual rights for a fair automobile sale have been breached by the other party. Where as in a criminal case, you would have for example a murderer, who is infringing on the right of safety that we all have. Given those two examples I’m sure you can appreciate how important Criminal law is, and the important role that it plays in everyone of our societies.

Trying to define criminal law is a post from: Business Directory for Business Information | Richmondjwj.org

Many warnings were given, but unfortunately, the warnings were not taken seriously. On April 14th, 1912 Titanic received six warnings that icebergs were present in their perimeter. On the night of April 14th, Titanic struck an iceberg and ultimately sank to the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean.

For other entities, what happened to the Titanic does NOT have to happen to them. Many have learned from the mistakes that Titanic had made.

There are several examples that follow and form a parallel to what happened to Titanic and how an entity can learn from Titanic’s mistakes.

1. The Titanic only had 16 lifeboats, which was not nearly enough to save everyone on the ship.

Only about 60% of the entire lifeboats’ capacity was utilized! Does your company have a disaster plan in place? Are your computers, especially your servers, being backed up on a regular basis? Many servers are now being backed up on a daily basis and sometimes on an hourly basis.

When I was working at a Helpdesk, one of our afternoon gals was named the “Backup Queen” because she took EVERY major server backup VERY seriously. The company was very lucky to have the “Backup Queen” because there were several instances where our most critical server had crashed and lost information. Fortunately, information restoration was quick and painless due to the machine being backed up on a regular basis.

We were very lucky to have someone who took the initiative to handle the server backups. Is your company that lucky? Yes, doing backups can be VERY unexciting. However, losing valuable data can be very exciting, but in a negative way.

2. The crewmen in the lookout tower, or the “crow’s nest,” were not issued binoculars to better search for icebergs.

Employees were not given the proper tools to use to do their job. Is your company using the right software for the job? Are you saving money on upgrading your operating system and software, but are losing customers? If you are losing customers, you’re NOT really saving any money at all.

The right equipment can range from the very basic, such as issuing headphones that are compatible with the phone system to customer service representatives, to ensuring that a backup generator can adequately run due to a power outage.

3. Titanic had a total of 16 watertight compartments. Initially, it sounded fine, but unfortunately, each compartment did not hold water on its own. Every compartment was similar to an ice cube tray. When one compartment overflowed, water flowed into the next compartment. Each compartment did not completely seal off water on its own.

Does your company have a good disaster recovery plan in place? If a flood or a fire struck the premises, would you be able to resume business operations in a matter of days or would it take a matter of months?

Is your information that you have on site being sent off site so you CAN have another place to access your valuable information?

4. The Titanic was going at full speed at night in iceberg-infested waters.

Are your machines at your business running at 100% capacity on a continuous basis? How much is downtime costing you when those machines need to be fixed? Are you REALLY saving money by not buying more machinery? Does the cost of more machinery outweigh the cost of your present machines’ downtime?

5. The Titanic did not heed to the many iceberg warnings.

Titanic received six iceberg warnings on the day it sank! Is your sales force, customer service department and/or helpdesk REALLY listening to your customers? Sam Walton, the founder of Wal Mart, said that the most important person to an organization can be the one who greets that customers. Too many companies don’t even realize just how MUCH each person represents their company!

There is WAY too much competition in the marketplace NOT to heed warnings. Industries like telecom, automobile, office supplies, soft drinks, and restaurant industries, just to name a few, had better take warnings seriously. Some companies might not get the luxury of six warnings that the Titanic got. Sometimes, only one warning can break a company. That’s why companies that DO encourage, and take seriously, customer feedback are invaluable and can be a gold mine.

6. The Titanic only had white flare guns to signal for help.

Red is the standard color for a flare gun used to signal for help. When the Titanic was sinking, white flare guns were shot off from the ship. One or two ships many miles away say the white flares, but did not interpret the white flares as warning messages.

Does your entity use the proper means of communication? Is it ensured that all of the parties involved completely understand what the other parties are saying? Many groups within an organization speak entirely different languages. Sales, technology and management translations may as similar to translating three different foreign languages.

7. Bruce Ismay, the president of White Star, pressured Captain Smith into unrealistic and dangerous goals.

Ismay wanted the Titanic to arrive in New York on Tuesday, April 16th. In order to meet this goal, the ship would have to travel at full speed a majority of the time. The coercion from Ismay turned out to be dangerous due to the ship’s demise.

Ismay’s level was similar to a CEO’s level. Is your company’s CEO and the rest of the management staff setting realistic goals? Are your managers providing bilateral communication? Feedback is vital to any company’s survival because many managers are not involved in day-to-day activities.

8. The two wireless operators’ priorities were not focused on the ship’s priorities.

Many of the aristocrats in first class passage had paid both operators bonuses to wire messages to New York. One of the Titanic’s operators told another ship to “shut up” after being given another iceberg warning. It was a powerful rebuke that may have cost thousands of lives.

Is your customer service department doing all it can to retain and acquire it customers? A polite and knowledgeable customer service representative can save the company thousands of dollars and maybe more! I have had the fortunate experience of dealing with many great customer service representatives. I have told many of the rep’s supervisors that I really appreciated their help as well and that they are lucky to have such great rep’s on their team.

9. The Titanic’s steel construction was never tested in cold temperature.

The steel that made up ocean liners in the early 20th Century was brittle to begin with. Unfortunately, the steel was never stress-tested to determine what stress levels the structure could endure.

Is adequate testing being done on your company’s products? Are your prototypes up to the challenges of customers’ demands? Are an automobile company’s crash tests being utilized to the fullest extent?

Titanic Precautions is a post from: Business Directory for Business Information | Richmondjwj.org

There are many people who are in employment where if they are off work sick, they do not get paid. It must very much annoy these people to hear about the fortunate workers who are still paid when they are ill, abusing the system.

I have a friend who recently told me about a lady he works with. At times she will come to work with a really bad cold or cough, when really she should be at home in bed. By going to work she could be infecting other people with her germs of course. She would be asked why she had come to work when she obviously should be in bed. Her response would be that she did not want to waste her sick days when she was ill. She might as well come to work and be ill there, it would be no fun at home, she would continue.

This woman treated her sick entitlement as extra holiday days. The bosses who were unaware of her attitude presumed that when she did actually phone in sick, that she must be extremely ill, when in fact she would be perfectly fit and healthy.

Another example of abusing the sick entitlement system is a story I heard recently. The company involved had around fifteen percent of its full time staff in one of its buildings, on long term sick leave. The company then announced the closure of that particular building which would include all of the staff being made redundant. The office though would remain open for the next six months, however the only people who worked ninety percent of that six month period would be able to have full redundancy payouts. The amount of people who suddenly stopped having depression and bad backs was astonishing, they called it a miracle.

The Way In Which Some People Abuse The Benefit Of Sick Pay is a post from: Business Directory for Business Information | Richmondjwj.org

It almost sounds like a chain letter and in a way it is. The chain letter is a facetious reference as so many of us have been exposed to them by now and know they are illegitimate scams. Yet the basic principles are: you give before you receive, and you give with the faith and expectation of receiving. A similar modern example can be seen in the film ‘Pay It Forward’. By giving to others, you allow good things to happen to you. And this all boils down to the simple law of attraction.

The law of attraction is like any other law of nature, like gravity. And like gravity, it is not one that has been generally ‘discovered’ yet. As a result, most of us are walking around thinking in a completely disordered paradigm.

Disordered paradigms of thought are displayed over and over in history, and discoveries of natural laws and observations of reality have brought order to transform the mistaken beliefs that had been accepted for fact. You can think of many examples, such as the belief that the world is flat, or the belief that we are at the center of the universe. Or the great changes that resulted as a discovery of the force of electricity and harnessing its natural power.

In this same way, we are able to make a change in our own disordered thought patterns. Right now 99% of us are probably dissatisfied. Dissatisfaction means larger life is seeking to be expressed through us, and it is being blocked. Self-sabotage is a very real process working in the invisible realms of the unconscious mind.

The good news is there are a lot of simple, small but powerful techniques you can use to reprogram that all powerful unconscious mind of yours, to order your own life as you want it. Yes, there IS a way to eliminate the chaos in your life, and it starts within. It starts by eliminating the often unseen chaos in your own mind.

The technique in this article is only one of a vast array that you can use on a daily basis to improve your life dramatically. In this article you are learning how to use the law of attraction to attract to yourself what you want.

The law of attraction, like gravity, is undefiable. You will attract what you are sending out. Your thoughts are real in the world of attraction.

If your mind is resonating with patterns of anxiety, stress, anger, sadness, envy, grief, or any other negative emotion, you will be attracting more of the same in your life.

One step you can take to change this is to focus on giving to others before you receive yourself. In this way you are changing your vibration and your focus. And you open yourself to receive what you had been closing off before.

It is very simple to give. Give of what you have, and everyone has something to give. We all have innate value to offer the world. An abiding philosophy in the law of attraction is to always offer an increase in value, to give back more in value than you receive in money. In this way you continue to give more than you get and attract more and larger life back to yourself.

Take a moment to look within and find something, anything, no matter how small or simple, to give to anyone, friend or stranger. Start the practice of giving, and you will take one step towards raising your level of vibration and enhancing the value of what you attract in your own life. Give something selflessly today, knowing that you will receive it multiplied back in your life, tenfold.

The Quickest Way to Get is to Give is a post from: Business Directory for Business Information | Richmondjwj.org

Reports regarding child labor surface periodically. Children crawling in mines, faces ashen, body deformed. The agile fingers of famished infants weaving soccer balls for their more privileged counterparts in the USA. Tiny figures huddled in sweatshops, toiling in unspeakable conditions. It is all heart-rending and it gave rise to a veritable not-so-cottage industry of activists, commentators, legal eagles, scholars, and opportunistically sympathetic politicians.

Ask the denizens of Thailand, sub-Saharan Africa, Brazil, or Morocco and they will tell you how they regard this altruistic hyperactivity – with suspicion and resentment. Underneath the compelling arguments lurks an agenda of trade protectionism, they wholeheartedly believe. Stringent – and expensive – labor and environmental provisions in international treaties may well be a ploy to fend off imports based on cheap labor and the competition they wreak on well-ensconced domestic industries and their political stooges.

This is especially galling since the sanctimonious West has amassed its wealth on the broken backs of slaves and kids. The 1900 census in the USA found that 18 percent of all children – almost two million in all – were gainfully employed. The Supreme Court ruled unconstitutional laws banning child labor as late as 1916. This decision was overturned only in 1941.

The GAO published a report last week in which it criticized the Labor Department for paying insufficient attention to working conditions in manufacturing and mining in the USA, where many children are still employed. The Bureau of Labor Statistics pegs the number of working children between the ages of 15-17 in the USA at 3.7 million. One in 16 of these worked in factories and construction. More than 600 teens died of work-related accidents in the last ten years.

Child labor – let alone child prostitution, child soldiers, and child slavery – are phenomena best avoided. But they cannot and should not be tackled in isolation. Nor should underage labor be subjected to blanket castigation. Working in the gold mines or fisheries of the Philippines is hardly comparable to waiting on tables in a Nigerian or, for that matter, American restaurant.

There are gradations and hues of child labor. That children should not be exposed to hazardous conditions, long working hours, used as means of payment, physically punished, or serve as sex slaves is commonly agreed. That they should not help their parents plant and harvest may be more debatable.

As Miriam Wasserman observes in “Eliminating Child Labor”, published in the Federal Bank of Boston’s “Regional Review”, second quarter of 2000, it depends on “family income, education policy, production technologies, and cultural norms.” About a quarter of children under-14 throughout the world are regular workers. This statistic masks vast disparities between regions like Africa (42 percent) and Latin America (17 percent).

In many impoverished locales, child labor is all that stands between the family unit and all-pervasive, life threatening, destitution. Child labor declines markedly as income per capita grows. To deprive these bread-earners of the opportunity to lift themselves and their families incrementally above malnutrition, disease, and famine – is an apex of immoral hypocrisy.

Quoted by “The Economist”, a representative of the much decried Ecuador Banana Growers Association and Ecuador’s Labor Minister, summed up the dilemma neatly: “Just because they are under age doesn’t mean we should reject them, they have a right to survive. You can’t just say they can’t work, you have to provide alternatives.”

Regrettably, the debate is so laden with emotions and self-serving arguments that the facts are often overlooked.

The outcry against soccer balls stitched by children in Pakistan led to the relocation of workshops ran by Nike and Reebok. Thousands lost their jobs, including countless women and 7000 of their progeny. The average family income – anyhow meager – fell by 20 percent. Economists Drusilla Brown, Alan Deardorif, and Robert Stern observe wryly:

“While Baden Sports can quite credibly claim that their soccer balls are not sewn by children, the relocation of their production facility undoubtedly did nothing for their former child workers and their families.”

Such examples abound. Manufacturers – fearing legal reprisals and “reputation risks” (naming-and-shaming by overzealous NGO’s) – engage in preemptive sacking. German garment workshops fired 50,000 children in Bangladesh in 1993 in anticipation of the American never-legislated Child Labor Deterrence Act.

Quoted by Wasserstein, former Secretary of Labor, Robert Reich, notes:

“Stopping child labor without doing anything else could leave children worse off. If they are working out of necessity, as most are, stopping them could force them into prostitution or other employment with greater personal dangers. The most important thing is that they be in school and receive the education to help them leave poverty.”

Contrary to hype, three quarters of all children work in agriculture and with their families. Less than 1 percent work in mining and another 2 percent in construction. Most of the rest work in retail outlets and services, including “personal services” – a euphemism for prostitution. UNICEF and the ILO are in the throes of establishing school networks for child laborers and providing their parents with alternative employment.

But this is a drop in the sea of neglect. Poor countries rarely proffer education on a regular basis to more than two thirds of their eligible school-age children. This is especially true in rural areas where child labor is a widespread blight. Education – especially for women – is considered an unaffordable luxury by many hard-pressed parents. In many cultures, work is still considered to be indispensable in shaping the child’s morality and strength of character and in teaching him or her a trade.

“The Economist” elaborates:

“In Africa children are generally treated as mini-adults; from an early age every child will have tasks to perform in the home, such as sweeping or fetching water. It is also common to see children working in shops or on the streets. Poor families will often send a child to a richer relation as a housemaid or houseboy, in the hope that he will get an education.”

A solution recently gaining steam is to provide families in poor countries with access to loans secured by the future earnings of their educated offspring. The idea – first proposed by Jean-Marie Baland of the University of Namur and James A. Robinson of the University of California at Berkeley – has now permeated the mainstream.

Even the World Bank has contributed a few studies, notably, in June, “Child Labor: The Role of Income Variability and Access to Credit Across Countries” authored by Rajeev Dehejia of the NBER and Roberta Gatti of the Bank’s Development Research Group.

Abusive child labor is abhorrent and should be banned and eradicated. All other forms should be phased out gradually. Developing countries already produce millions of unemployable graduates a year – 100,000 in Morocco alone. Unemployment is rife and reaches, in certain countries – such as Macedonia – more than one third of the workforce. Children at work may be harshly treated by their supervisors but at least they are kept off the far more menacing streets. Some kids even end up with a skill and are rendered employable.

The Morality of Child Labor is a post from: Business Directory for Business Information | Richmondjwj.org

The idea was to infiltrate global crime networks but a lot of the money in “Operation Swordfish” may have ended up in the wrong pockets. Government agents and sheriffs got mysteriously and filthily rich and the whole sorry affair was wound down. The GAO reported more than $3.6 billion missing. This bit of history gave rise to at least one blockbuster with Oscar-winner Halle Berry.

Alas, slush funds are much less glamorous in reality. They usually involve grubby politicians, pawky bankers, and philistine businessmen – rather than glamorous hackers and James Bondean secret agents.

The Kazakh prime minister, Imanghaliy Tasmaghambetov, freely admitted on April 4, 2002 to his country’s rubber-stamp parliament the existence of a $1 billion slush fund. The money was apparently skimmed off the proceeds of the opaque sale of the Tengiz oilfield. Remitting it to Kazakhstan – he expostulated with a poker face – would have fostered inflation. So, the country’s president, Nazarbaev, kept the funds abroad “for use in the event of either an economic crisis or a threat to Kazakhstan’s security”.

The money was used to pay off pension arrears in 1997 and to offset the pernicious effects of the 1998 devaluation of the Russian ruble. What was left was duly transferred to the $1.5 billion National Fund, the PM insisted. Alas, the original money in the Fund came entirely from another sale of oil assets to Chevron, thus casting in doubt the official version.

The National Fund was, indeed, augmented by a transfer or two from the slush fund – but at least one of these transfers occurred only 11 days after the damning revelations. Moreover, despite incontrovertible evidence to the contrary, the unfazed premier denied that his president possesses multi-million dollar bank accounts abroad.

He later rescinded this last bit of disinformation. The president, he said, has no bank accounts abroad but will promptly return all the money in these non-existent accounts to Kazakhstan. These vehemently denied accounts, he speculated, were set up by the president’s adversaries “for the purpose of compromising his name”.

On April 15, 2002 even the docile opposition had enough of this fuzzy logic. They established a People Oil’s Fund to monitor, henceforth, the regime’s financial shenanigans. By their calculations less than 7 percent of the income from the sale of hydrocarbon fuels (c. $4-5 billion annually) make it to the national budget.

Slush funds infect every corner of the globe, not only the more obscure and venal ones. Every secret service – from the Mossad to the CIA – operates outside the stated state budget. Slush funds are used to launder money, shower cronies with patronage, and bribe decision makers. In some countries, setting them up is a criminal offense, as per the 1990 Convention on Laundering, Search, Seizure, and Confiscation of the Proceeds from Crime. Other jurisdictions are more forgiving.

The Catholic Bishops Conference of Papua New Guinea and the Solomon Islands issued a press release November 2001 in which it welcomed the government’s plans to abolish slush funds. They described the poisonous effect of this practice:

“With a few notable exceptions, the practice of directing funds through politicians to district projects has been disastrous. It has created an atmosphere in which corruption is thought to have flourished. It has reduced the responsibility of public servants, without reducing their numbers or costs. It has been used to confuse people into believing public funds are the ‘property’ of individual members rather than the property of the people, honestly and fairly administered by the servants of the people.

The concept of ’slush-funds’ has resulted in well-documented inefficiencies and failures. There were even accusations made that funds were withheld from certain members as a way of forcing them into submission. It seems that the era of the ’slush funds’ has been a shameful period.”

But even is the most orderly and lawful administration, funds are liable to be mislaid. “The Economist” reported recently about a $10 billion class-action suit filed by native-Americans against the US government. The funds, supposed to be managed in trust since 1880 on behalf of half a million beneficiaries, were “either lost or stolen” according to officials.

Rob Gordon, the Director of the National Wilderness Institute accused “The US Interior Department (of) looting the special funds that were established to pay for wildlife conservation and squandering the money instead on questionable administrative expenses, slush funds and employee moving expenses”.

Charles Griffin, the Deputy Director of the Heritage Foundation’s Government Integrity Project, charges:

“The federal budget provides numerous slush funds that can be used to subsidize the lobbying and political activities of special-interest groups.”

On his list of “Top Ten Federal Programs That Actively Subsidize Politics and Lobbying” are: AmeriCorps, Senior Community Service Employment Program, Legal Services Corporation, Title X Family Planning, National Endowment for the Humanities, Market Promotion Program, Senior Environmental Employment Program, Superfund Worker Training, HHS Discretionary Aging Projects, Telecomm. & Info. Infrastructure Assistance. These federal funds alone total $1.8 billion.

“Next” and “China Times” – later joined by “The Washington Post” – accused the former Taiwanese president, Lee Teng-hui, of forming a $100 million overseas slush fund intended to finance the gathering of information, influence-peddling, and propaganda operations. Taiwan footed the bills trips by Congressional aides and funded academic research and think tank conferences.

High ranking Japanese officials, among others, may have received payments through this stealthy venue. Lee is alleged to have drawn $100,000 from the secret account in February 1999. The money was used to pay for the studies of a former Japanese Vice-Defense Minister Masahiro Akiyama’s at Harvard.

Ryutaro Hashimoto, the former Japanese prime minister, was implicated as a beneficiary of the fund. So were the prestigious lobbying firm, Cassidy and Associates and assorted assistant secretaries in the Bush administration.

Carl Ford, Jr., currently assistant secretary of state for intelligence and research, worked for Cassidy during the relevant period and often visited Taiwan. James Kelly, assistant secretary of state for East Asian and Pacific Affairs enjoyed the Taiwanese largesse as well. Both are in charge of crafting America’s policy on Taiwan.

John Bolton, erstwhile undersecretary of state for arms control and international security, admitted, during his confirmation hearings, to having received $30,000 to cover the costs of writing 3 research papers.

The Taiwanese government has yet to deny the news stories.

A Japanese foreign ministry official used slush fund money to finance the extra-marital activities of himself and many of his colleagues – often in posh hotel suites. But this was no exception. According to Asahi Shimbun, more than half of the 60 divisions of the ministry maintained similar funds. The police and the ministry are investigating. One arrest has been made. The ministry’s accounting division has discovered these corrupt practices twenty years before but kept mum.

Even low-level prefectural bureaucrats and teachers in Japan build up slush funds by faking business trips or padding invoices and receipts. Japanese citizens’ groups conservatively estimated that $20 million in travel and entertainment expenses in the prefectures in 1994 were faked, a practice known as “kara shutcho” (i.e., empty business trip).

Officials of the Hokkaido Board of Education admitted to the existence of a 100 million yen secret fund. In a resulting probe, 200 out of 286 schools were found to maintain their own slush funds. Some of the money was used to support friendly politicians.

But slush funds are not a sovereign prerogative. Multinationals, banks, corporation, religious organizations, political parties, and even NGO’s salt away some of their revenues and profits in undisclosed accounts, usually in off-shore havens.

Secret election campaign slush funds are a fixture in American politics. A 5-year old bill requires disclosure of donors to such funds but the House is busy loosening its provisions. “The Economist” listed in 2002 the tsunami of scandals that engulfs Germany, both its major political parties, many of the Lander and numerous highly placed and mid-level bureaucrats. Secret, mainly party, funds seem to be involved in the majority of these lurid affairs.

Italian firms made donations to political parties through slush funds, though corporate donations – providing they are transparent – are perfectly legal in Italy. Both the right and, to a lesser extent, the left in France are said to have managed enormous political slush funds.

President Chirac is accused of having abused for his personal pleasure, one such municipal fund in Paris, when he was its mayor. But the funds were mostly used to provide party activists with mock jobs. Corporations paid kickbacks to obtain public works or local building permits. Ostensibly, they were paying for sham “consultancy services”.

The epidemic hasn’t skipped even staid Ottawa. Its Chief Electoral Officer told Sun Media in September 2001 that he is “concerned” about millions stashed away by Liberal candidates. Sundry ministers who coveted the prime minister’s job, have raised funds covertly and probably illegally.

On April 11, 2002 UPI reported that Spain’s second-largest bank, Banco Bilbao Vizcaya Argentaria (BBVA), held nearly $200 million hidden in secret offshore accounts, “which were allegedly used to manipulate politicians, pay off the ‘revolutionary tax’ to ETA – the Basque terrorist organization – and open the door for business deals, according to news reports.”

The money may have gone to luminaries such as Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez, Peru’s Alberto Fujomori and Vladimiro Montesinos. The bank’s board members received fat, tax-free, “pensions” from the illegal accounts opened in 1987 – a total of more than $20 million.

Latin American drug money launderers – from Puerto Rico to Colombia – may have worked through these funds and the bank’s clandestine entities in the Cayman Islands and Jersey. The current Spanish Secretary of State for the Treasury has been the bank’s tax advisor between 1992-7.

The “Financial Times” reported in June 2000 that, in anticipation of new international measures to curb corruption, “leading European arms manufacturers” resorted to the creation of off-shore slush funds. The money is intended to bribe foreign officials to win tenders and contracts.

Kim Woo-chung, Daewoo’s former chairman, is at the center of a massive scandal involving dozens of his company’s executive, some of whom ended up in prison. He stands accused of diverting a whopping $20 billion to an overseas slush fund.

A mind boggling $10 billion were alleged to have been used to bribe Korean government officials and politicians. But his conduct and even the scale of the fraud he perpetrated may have been typical to Korea’s post-war incestuous relationship between politics and business.

In his paper “The Role of Slush Funds in the Preparation of Corruption Mechanisms”, reprinted by Transparency International, Gherardo Colombo defines corporate slush funds thus:

“Slush funds are obtained from a joint stock company’s finances, carefully managed so that the amounts involved do not appear on the balance sheet. They do not necessarily have to consist of money, but can also take the form of stocks and shares or other economically valuable goods (works of art, jewels, yachts, etc.) It is enough that they can be used without any particular difficulty or that they can be transferred to a third party.

If a fund is in the form of money, it is not even necessary to refer to it outside the company accounts, since it can appear in them in disguised form (the ‘accruals and deferrals’ heads are often resorted to for the purpose of hiding slush money). In light of this, it is not always correct to regard it as a reserve fund that is not accounted for in the books. Deception, trickery or forgery of various kinds are often resorted to for the purpose of setting up a slush fund.”

He mentions padded invoices, sham contracts, fictitious loans, interest accruing on holding accounts, back to back transactions with related entities (Enron) – all used to funnel money to the slush funds. Such funds are often set up to cover for illicit and illegal self-enrichment, embezzlement, or tax evasion.

Less known is the role of these furtive vehicles in financing unfair competitive practices, such as dumping. Clients, suppliers, and partners receive hidden rebates and subsidies that much increase the – unreported – real cost of production.

BBVA’s payments to ETA may have been a typical payment of protection fees. Both terrorists and organized crime put slush funds to bad use. They get paid from such funds – and maintain their own. Ransom payments to kidnappers often flow through these channels.

But slush funds are overwhelmingly used to bribe corrupt politicians. The fight against corruption has been titled against the recipients of illicit corporate largesse. But to succeed, well-meaning international bodies, such as the OECD’s FATF, must attack with equal zeal those who bribe. Every corrupt transaction is between a venal politician and an avaricious businessman. Pursuing the one while ignoring the other is self-defeating.

Slush Funds is a post from: Business Directory for Business Information | Richmondjwj.org

It is important to note that temporary employees, independent contractors and workers outside of the state of California are not excluded in the 50-employee tally. Be sure you count every employee before you decide this legislation doesn’t apply to your company.

Scope of the training:
Your company’s sexual harassment training should include “information and practical guidance” about all federal and state sexual harassment laws. The information provided should include:
· Prevention of harassment
· Correction of harassment
· Remedies available to victims
· Practical examples aimed at prevention of harassment, discrimination and retaliation

In addition, the law mandates that “trainers or educators with knowledge and expertise in the prevention of harassment, discrimination and retaliation” should provide the training. In other words, you’ll need someone with legitimate credentials to administer the training.

Other considerations
· Because the law includes language like “interactive,” most experts warn that merely turning on a training video will not bring an employer into compliance. Instead, there must be some interaction between the presenter and those who are being trained, such as a question and answer session, or some role-playing. Interactive Internet training should also be acceptable.
· Keep a record of compliance, including documentation that all supervisors (or anyone who performs supervisory functions) participated. A “roll” that includes the signatures of the participants is one option. For Internet training, require a signed receipt.
· Develop a means to monitor future compliance and ensure that new supervisors are trained within six months of hire/promotion (and every two years thereafter).
· Update all of your current policies, employee handbooks, or other procedures to be sure they refer to the training as an expectation.
· Make sure that all executives are aware of the requirement.For assistance in this area contact AmCheck at 888-AMCHECK.

Source: “New California Law Mandates Anti-Harassment Prevention Training for Supervisors.” Jackson Lewis law firm. October 1, 2004. http://www.jacksonlewis.com/legalupdates/article.cfm?aid=639

Sexual Harassment Training is a post from: Business Directory for Business Information | Richmondjwj.org

With the economy on the mend, a lot of people in the material handling industry are expecting good times without having to make any changes in the way they do business. Unfortunately, that means the continuation of one particular practice that played a major role in getting the economy in trouble a few years back.

When the “dot.coms” were flying high, they experienced rapid growth by the simple method of offering impossibly low prices and constant expansion into markets about which they knew nothing. They operated at a loss for years on end, promising investors that it would all turn around when they had achieved sufficient market share. Eventually, of course, this “lose a little on each deal but make it up in volume” business model blew up in their faces. The balloons popped, one by one, and the economy followed them down the tube.

In the material handling industry, this discredited business model is still very much in evidence. Too many companies have played the merger game, getting themselves involved in markets that they know nothing about. Too many have played the numbers game, moving money from one pocket to another to make themselves look good for one more quarter (this is called managing for stockholder value), totally forgetting about long-range planning.

Worst of all, too many companies have bought into the concept of forgoing profits in pursuit of market share, with the idea of becoming profitable once the competition is eliminated. It’s called “buying a job,” meaning submitting a bid that allows for little or no profit. Theoretically, this has two benefits. It gets you the job, which makes your sales figures (if not your profits) look impressive. More importantly, for some people, it prevents your competition from getting the job.

But let’s look at the downside. Without profits, you have no money to invest in research and development, capital expenditures, etc. Your growth is all on paper, and will disappear as soon as you run out of money to buy jobs with.

With minimal profit margins, you have neither the money nor the inclination to service the sale after it is made. The result is an unhappy customer, and that is never good news for the long term prospects of your company.

Finally, let’s say that your strategy of underbidding the competition works, and your nearest competitor goes bankrupt. What happens? Somebody buys his assets for 25 cents on the dollar and opens a new business. Since his initial investment was so low, he can undercut your prices. You haven’t eliminated competition, you’ve made it worse.

Profit is not a dirty word. Nobody — least of all the customer — benefits when profit is eliminated from the economic equation. I’m not saying we shouldn’t be looking for efficiencies that will allow us to keep prices down while maintaining a reasonable profit margin. Of course the customer benefits from lower prices, but the economy in general and the material handling industry in particular will be much healthier when we all admit to wanting our fair share. If you’re satisfied with a 3% profit, I suggest you buy a government bond. It’s safer.

Profit Shouldn't Be a Dirty Word in Material Handling is a post from: Business Directory for Business Information | Richmondjwj.org