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Fraudulent China Job Internships – Is Gi2C A Scam? You Decide…
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I am sounding the alarm on a company called “Gi2c.org” which previously used the alias of “Getin2China.com” which is based in Beijing China and which sells internships to foreign students, and the unemployed abroad. What they do is not illegal in China but is illegal in the countries where they solicit with telemarketing fraud and deception. First the basics of how this company operates…
Ownership & Fake University Partnerships: According to “whois.com” the company website is registered to a person named Yuri Khlystov. Although the website has a .org domain it is NOT an organization, NOT a NPO, NOT an NGO, and it is NOT partners with tope 100 universities in America and the UK as their telesales people often claim on the phone. In fact this group photo of SMU on the web site is a fraud according to the SMU alumni association which claims they have no knowledge of Gi2c.org
Fake Overseas Locations: On the homepage of Gi2c.org it lists many office locations around the world that simply do not exist. They claim they have offices in Tokyo, New York, London, Canada, Los Angeles when in fact those are just virtual telephone numbers leased through RingCentral.com for $49 a month. When you call each of the numbers the same person will answer the phone- in Beijing where it has been call forwarded. I have asked Gi2c management and the receptionist to provide mailing addresses and street locations for these foreign offices and they just hang up the phone. They do have a nice big office in Beijing and rent an apartment in Shanghai that they call their Shanghai office.
15 Employees of 20 Resigned In Last Year: The Shanghai office was recently managed for 5 year by a Chinese girl who goes by the name of “Jane” and “Jean”. She recently “resigned” along with fifteen other employees, including foreigners Paul Dodds, Max Mcauley, Zach Adams, Steven Brown, and others only known as Joe, Andrew, Johnathan, Kaisa, Josh and a slew of Chinese including Cheryl, Abby, Fay, Naomi, Michelle, Henry. Reasons for the mass resignation are cited as “personal” but China Scam Patrol reports that the resignations follow the arrest of a Chinese employee “Tommy” for visa fraud by the Chinese PSB and he is seen in the below photo. Tommy was convicted and served a 9 month prison sentence. Gi2c claims that Tommy is “not really an employee, but helps us a visa consultant” but former employees say otherwise and confirm that Tommy came and worked in the same office almost every day and “ran errands for the owner a lot” . All these people who left the company sill have their photos on the Gi2c website here to give people comfort that foreigners work there not just Chinese who are prone to cheat in online marketing/recruiting programs. http://www.gi2c.org/our-team.html
Terms & Conditions: The company has changed it’s “terms and conditions” three times in the last year in order to avoid claims made by a former Chinese employee who filed claims with the Chinese Labor Board. That case was finally settled. scamfound.com/f2/paid-business-internship-intern-job-china-scams-http-www-getin2china-com-93679.html
Facebook Censorship: If you monitor the Facebook page of Gi2c you will see that most all complaints are deleted within 24 hours of being posted including one from intern “James” who complained the housing he was provided had black mold in the bathroom/shower and the mattress gave him lice. Others complained how they were baited and switched – promised one internship before they paid but then given another after they arrived in China.
The “Refundable Deposit” that isn’t: A big problem is the sneaky way they steal deposits from people that are supposed to be “100 Refundable” but all their fine print exceptions give them excuses to avoid giving refunds, unless someone is actually in Beijing and brings the police to the office like two former employees admitted to me. They get the $300 deposits by promising you that you can get this great internship “with a big brand international company” but you must reserve it or someone else will surely grab it.” People think they will only have to pay the $300 for this program so it looks like a great deal.
The Big Surprise: After the deposit is paid the intern finally learns that they must pay a placement fee of $3,700, their round trip air fare of $2,000, $1,500 two months of apartment rent and security deposit, and $2,000 for daily meals and subway costs – a total of about $8,000! At this point most people want their deposits back, but “regretfully” they are told to “read the fine print”.
Fake Testimonials: The company has been caught using shill testimonials and almost all the online reviews you see for them (gushing with praise) are paid for or self-created on their own websites, blog, or wordpress accounts. How difficult it is it to create an email identity and go post great reviews about your own company as a fictional customer? It was also pointed out at Scam.com and TheBeijinger that once in China, clients are offered $500 rebates if they give a video testimonial. Who is going to say “no thanks” to such an offer?
Schizophrenic Employee: there is the matter of mystery employees who do not exist or in the case of “Mary” & “Merry” use two names and two photos and her true legal Chinese name is never disclosed. See her photos below on the gi2c.org web site. http://www.gi2c.org/our-team.html
Unanswered Mysteries: Other mystery employees are “Zach Adams” and “Haley Gilbert” who the receptionist “Rita” openly admitted “never worked for the company” yet Zach is quoted in the Global Times newspaper article and Haley is quoted in this 2013 post at Scambook.com see below: http://www.scambook.com/report/view/...3185-for-$0.00 The receptionist "Rita" admitted on the phone last week that she worked over 5 years for Gi2c and employees by these names never worked there.
Aliases: The company was originally called “GetIn2China.com” and in fact, the old web site is now forwarded to Gi2c (getin2china.com). That old company had been well-known in China as the place where “black visas” were sold to Russian prostitutes and people involved in various gray and black market activities. When police raided a Luxury Goods company that sponsored a Gi2c intern (the company was selling fake designer handbags, sunglasses, etc) and the arrests were announced on CCTV and local newspapers, Getin2China.com suddenly closed their offices at Dongzhimen location and reopened at the Galaxy Soho building (pictured below) and changed their name to “Gi2c”. Coincidence? I think not. Those who want the intern’s name and contact number that was working at the Luxury Goods company that was busted can send me a PM Read the comments section of this 2009 Article: http://www.examiner.com/article/neve...-an-internship
Gi2C Employees: if you look at the Gi2c web site today at the “Our Team” link you will see a lot of foreign faces posted there yet all but one resigned and no longer work there for months yet the company wants you to believe that they are still there to create a false sense of comfort that you are dealing with foreigners. They even use the videos of these former employees who never gave their permission (according to one that I spoke to personally) The black guy Kris is still there but the others are gone. Just more deception. http://www.gi2c.org/our-team.html
About the internship itself. The big international internships advertised on the web site are fabrications used as bait, including the “Wall Street Company”, “Big 8 Accounting Firm”, “Famous Japanese Electronics Company, etc.” If you check every month you will see that 80% of these internship never change! After they have your deposit in their hands you will see that the companies that actually want you are most no-name Chinese companies or small international start-ups. Too late they have your deposit – and you are not getting it back. When you get to China you will find yourself living in a single room of a shared apartment with 2-3 other interns, although the sales rep promised you your own apartment. At the internship you will usually find yourself making things like copies, coffee, deliveries, sales calls, etc. If you are one of the lucky ones you may end up in a shopping mall passing out advertisements for the company. One intern with a BBA from a top notch university was even asked to where a cartoon costume for a promotion. At thebeijinger, a user named “Queen of Hearts” asked Gi2C to identify their “Wall Street Companies” and to publish the addresses of their “overseas offices” and a copy of the contract. The reply given by Yuri was pretty honest – he admitted Tommy’s arrest and other problems but he did not lists the companies or the contract. He also admits that 25% of his customers are dissatisfied but on the website it claims a “94% satisfaction rate” See: http://www.thebeijinger.com/forum/20...s-are-not-scam
Job Conversion Rate: If you corner the Gi2c management they will finally admit that less than 5% of their interns are offered a job, and because the offered pay is so low, most of those offers are rejected. But their sales reps and advertisements say “almost a third of our interns receive job offers”. http://www.scamorg.com/getin2china-4c#
The Genuine China Internships are all 100% FREE and are offered directly by the international employers in China themselves through their own HR office. THEY ARE VERY SELDOM ADVERTISED and are usually limited to about a dozen interns per month. The top 10 rate companies for interns can be seen at http://chinainternshipreviews.wordpress .com Even less than 30% of the real China interns get offered a full time job. But even the real internships require you to buy your own lane tickets.
Visa and legal problems Gi2c never mentions: Intern applicants at Gi2c are told to lie to the visa officers about why they are coming to China or they would not get a visa. They are told to ask for a “M” visa which is reserved for “Cultural Exchange Delegations” like museum curators, actors, musicians, artists, etc. Gi2c also promotes and sells a 6 month program to Arabs, Pakistanis, Indians, and Africans who just want entry into China and cannot get anything more than a 30 day tourist visa on their own. China law specifically states that no international internship can exceed “90 consecutive days” but that doesn’t stop Gi2C from breaking the law and putting the intern at risk of arrest and imprisonment followed by deportation. http://www.gooverseas.com/internship...2c-group/50371
The above are all the things that Gi2C sales reps will never tell you. So if you want to take your chances and do business with them, be my guest. But don’t say you were not warned. If you Google Gi2C with the words: “Gi2c, complaints, China, scam, problems” you will see they have had issues for a looong time and that they have hired hackers to delete over 30 negative posts about them over the last two years. Just recently 3 different posts about them were deleted from Scam.com going back to 2012. See what "Grace" has to say here: https://uk.answers.yahoo.com/questio...3022806AAMWKCe
Gi2c is not the only company playing all these unethical games. There are 7 more that I found on line and some of them even buy big advertising contracts with famous newspapers to have “advertorials” disguised as news articles written about them. They all join the various Chamber of Commerce, and British Council (If you are willing to pay the annual fee you are a member!). This help lends false credibility to their operations. These are very sophisticated and well-polished scams friends so as always…BUYER BEWARE!
Related Reading & Other Sources:
http://www.realscam.com/f8/warning-g...t-pricey-3928/
http://chinajobinternships.wordpress.co m
http://scam-detector.com/forums/foru...r-u-k-employee