Is ONEamerica a scam?

Paying for College
1

<p>[Home[/url</a>]</p>

<p>Congratulations (myname)!</p>

<p><strong><em>You have received an honorable mention</em></strong> </p>

<p>Your photo & essay submission for the ONEamerica “Diversity of America” Photo Contest has been selected for publication on our website. We’ve selected your photo for publication and awarded you with an Honorable Mention in our photo contest!</p>

<p>Your work will be noticed by students, colleges, and financial aid representatives from the colleges that YOU may want to attend! Having your photo & essay published will allow you to include your personal-page on OneAmerica2012.org in college applications, scholarship applications, graduate school applications, and a whole lot more. If you are looking to get ahead of the competition, having your work published on a major editorial website is the first step!</p>

<p>You will have your own page on OneAmerica2012.org with your published photo and essay. Your link will look like this: <a href=“http://www.oneamerica2012.org/(myname[/url])”>http://www.oneamerica2012.org/(myname](<a href=“http://oneamerica2012.org/Home.html]Home[/url”>http://oneamerica2012.org/Home.html))</a>
(Here’s a preview - your page will look exactly like this: [Kayla</a> Steffens - Mountain Home, Arkansas (This photo/essay was chosen for publication by the editorial staff of ONEamerica)](<a href=“http://www.oneamerica2012.org/kaylasteffens]Kayla”>http://www.oneamerica2012.org/kaylasteffens)) </p>

<p>YOUR ACTION IS REQUIRED: In order to have your photo published on OneAmerica2012.org, there is a one-time administrative fee of $14 to cover the time that our editors put into editing and publishing your work. </p>

<p>Click Here To Pay The $15 Admin Fee -></p>

<p>Once we receive your administrative fee, your photo will be published shortly and we will send you a link to your personal page on OneAmerica2012.org.</p>

<p>We look forward to publishing your Photo on OneAmerica2012.org! </p>

<p>Unsubscribe (email replaced)■■■■■■.com | Update your profile | Forward to a friend
You are receiving this email because you recently applied for the ONEamerica Photo Contest / Scholarship
ONEamerica 2012
6652 Overland Drive
colorado springs
Colorado Springs, CO 80919</p>

<p>Add us to your address book
Copyright (C) 2011 ONEamerica 2012 All rights reserved.</p>

<p>I paid 15 dollars, would it be too late to take it back if it’s a scam?</p>

2

<p>A scam? Not sure if I would go so far as to call it that, but anytime they are asking you to pay money for the privilege of showing your work its not really an ‘honor’ in my book.</p>

<p>Its like getting a letter telling you that you’ve been chosen for inclusion in “Who’s Who” and now please pay $50 for the book to see your name in it.</p>

<p>Honestly, if you’re looking for your work to be noticed by colleges you’re interested in, I would think a good portfolio submission will go a lot farther than having a web page with one picture on it.</p>

3

<p>Did you enter the contest, or was this an unsolicited email? Hadn’t heard of it before, but it looks like they collect that $15 from every peson, then take $500 of all those fees to award a “scholarship.” So while the company may legitimately give a scholarship to someone, they seem to be taking in more money than that. Scam? Dunno…reminds me a lot of those “Whos Who” type books that people pay for – yes, your info is in the book, but no one really looks (nor does it make an impact to be included, but it doesn’t hurt anything, other than your wallet). I would be curious to see if you start getting offers from them for “a beautiful hardbound book with your work in it for only $XXX dollars”…but it’s up to you to decide what further interaction you have with the company.</p>

<p>BTW, a quick search for “OneAmerica” got me to a financial company in Indianapolis, a poster company on the west coast and a group in Seattle supporting immigrants. No hits for that tag and Colorado Springs.</p>

4

<p>Smells of something that borders a scam. What’ll it get you, a photo on a web page? So what. I have never heard of them before. I would be leery.</p>

5

<p>I paid the $15 for the honorable mention thing because I didn’t think it through. Seems like they send that to everyone who enters though. </p>

<p>Plus there is no link whatsoever to ANY kind of honorable mention pages to view students’ photos anywhere on the site. </p>

<p>An interesting thing to note, the oneamerica2012 site’s domain has expired and so have the honorable mention pages. So it seems like you are basically overpaying for a domain name that will expire at the end of the year.</p>

<p>Don’t know if it counts as a scam because I have no clue what they do with the rest of the cash, but I’m not going anywhere near this one again.</p>

6

<p>If you have to ask the question “is this a scam” then 99.9% of the time you know the answer. Trust your instincts.</p>

7

<p>It would be a scam if they made a practice of charging people money and then not putting their photos on a web page, or perhaps putting their photos on a web page but then stealing their identities.</p>

<p>What you’re seeing here, I suspect, more likely falls under the heading “poor value.”</p>

8

<p>I especially like how the “administrative fee” goes from $14 to $15 in one paragraph. I think the term “scam” applies because of their out and out fraudulent representation: “Your work will be noticed by students, colleges, and financial aid representatives from the colleges that YOU may want to attend!”</p>