From: Josh Gilbert To: "xxxxxxxx@doj.state.or.us" Cc: "xxxxxxxx@yahoo.com" Sent: Wednesday, August 2, 2017 2:07 PM Subject: Case: FF4642-17 Ms. Wood, I am responding to your request of informatioin involving Case FF4642-17, Virginia Ranken. My name is Josh Gilbert. I am the owner of "American Disabled & Disadvantaged Workers". Ms. Ranken is one of our customers. She has been a supporter of ours for several years. In her letter, she states she has only ordered one other time but the fact is, she has ordered 8 times in the last 4 years and paid each time without incident until the most recent order in which this complaint is regarding. I have attached PDF copies of each of those invoices. We hire disabled workers to package products like trash bags, light bulbs etc. We are not a charity. We are a company that employs disabled people. We are a real company with real disabled people working here. We have customers like Ms. Ranken that we ask to skip a trip to the store once or twice a year and order from us so that our disabled workers will have work. We send out our products that ordered to the customer before any money is paid. That is done for our customer's protection. We know people are leery of being scammed so this system let's people know they are safe. We never send anything unsolicited, product or sales advertisements, and many customers even contact us to reorder. I wouldn't pay for a product I did not order and I would expect that would be the same attitude of others so sending a product unsolicited would be a horrible business model and quite frankly, is unethical. Our customers contact us or we have representatives that call our supporters once or twice a year depending on the customer's preference. Customers can order online as well. Customers are given the total price several times by our representative and we even have a supervisor come on the phone to verify each order to ensure that each customer knows what he/she is ordering and the amount. Trying to mislead someone or sending out an order without a person's permission would put us in the situation we are in now which is not productive or helpful to our cause. Ms. Ranken placed the order in question. The rep, who speaks with her each time, says Ms. Ranken donates the product to another organization sometimes after she receives her order. Once this most recent order was received, we received a call from an unidentified man who was rude and would not give his name or what customer he was even referring to. He wanted to have a one sided conversation and not listen or become informed of what actually occurred. He said we were a scam and made several other ignorant, uninformed statements. He insisted his grandmother only received 3 rolls of trash bags which we now know is false based the pictures of the heavy box that was sent to you and you forwarded tome. He wasn't willing to return the product and insisted his grandmother didn't order, which in fact, he would have no way of knowing this. Just a big mouth, blow hard. We have had to deal with situations like this in the past where a third party, not involved in the transaction and ignorant to everything about the situation other than that there is a package that arrived. These types always want to report you to someone or act like a big shot. This might frighten or intimidate someone who has done something wrong or has something to hide. I have nothing to hide from. You won't find anything online about "American Disabled & Disadvantaged Workers" out of Indianapolis scamming people. If we sent out unsolicited packages like the ignorant man claims, with our information enclosed, you would find a litany of complaints and we wouldn't even be able to conduct business with the amount of complaints we would receive. The only complaints you find when you correctly Google our company name are related to another company in Arizona who does not have the same name as ours but does have the word "American" and "handicapped" in it. We do not have the word "handicapped" in our name and we do not use the word. I am very interested in hearing from "Elders In Action". I have never heard of them or been contacted by them. I was eventually able to determine from caller ID that the call from the rude man was regarding Ms. Ranken. I assume the ignorant, cowardly man who called is Brian E Wilson, who helped pen Ms. Ranken's complaint. I have no way of knowing how old Ms Ranken is just by talking to her. She has been a good supporter of ours for a long time and has never given us reason to doubt her capability to remember. If any customer we talk to gives us any indication that they may be some how incapable of paying for an order or incapable of understanding or remembering placing an order, we certainly or not going to send out that order, which is why we have the supervisor verification system in place. No one has suggested to me that Ms. Ranken to be incapable of making decisions. She has paid for every thing she has ever ordered from us. I told the ignorant man who called (Mr. Wilson) that the product could be returned which he refused as an option. He was basically impossible to communicate with and unless Ms. Ranken is mentally incapable of comprehension or remembering, I have no need to talk to him anyway. We have even been contacted by a news organization (KGW.com) from Oregon regarding this situation. That is a first in four and a half years. I don't mind being questioned about our business but in this day and age, I cannot control what they report or how they might edit what I say and if they try to do a hatchet job thinking they have caught someone doing something wrong, even when that is not the case, then that stays on Youtube or in print on the internet and could cause my company damage when potential supporters do use Google properly to investigate a company they are potentially going to patronize. We are in a generation of headline readers and most people don't take the time to get facts and just read a headline or a sentence or believe the first thing that shows up in a Google search. I gain nothing by talking to a news organization over the complaint of one ignorant person. As I told the ignorant man, we would gladly accept the product back. However, we already paid to ship the package that Ms. Ranken ordered once and I am not going to pay to have her ship it back. Until we receive the payment for the order that was placed, or the product returned, we will continue to contact Ms. Ranken as any other company would be entitled to do over a past due payment. Once we receive the product back or the payment, we will no longer contact Ms. Ranken as she is either having problems remembering or is untruthful about placing orders with us. I hope that my straight forward response on the matter is not offensive to you. I see no point in sugar coating the matter. Sincerely, Josh Gilbert American Disabled & Disadvantaged Workers 511 National Ave Suite C Indianapolis, IN 46227 or P.O. Box 17035 Indianapolis, IN 46227 www.americanddw.org