<p>Yeah, happens all of the time. Sometimes they might even live in the neighborhood. Our town has a no solicitations law, but we still get these visitors.</p>
<p>I bet it has no connection to a respectable college like Rutgers whatsoever.</p>
<p>Happened to us about a month ago. We’re in Midwest, can’t remember what college the kid mentioned. He was definitely not from the Midwest though I could not place the accent. Fortunately he came during dinner hour and could clearly see everyone at the table eating through the door he came to and I was easy for me to say “no thanks.”</p>
<p>Most likely has NOTHING to do with Rutgers.</p>
<p>D’s high school band were invited to play in England one year. Big article in the newspaper. That weekend, one of my neighbors asked why my D wasn’t out fundraising. Turned out someone (NOT from the band) was knocking on doors in the neighborhood and claiming to be a band member fundraising money for the trip to England. These scam artists don’t miss a trick.</p>
<p>I never donate to any kid who comes to the door claiming to be trying to win a scholarship or whatever. Don’t even open the door…</p>
<p>This is highly irregular, and it is almost certainly a scam. While it is conceivable students are held responsible to earn funds, no faculty member would or could require a student to sell magazines. Did you ask for his student ID, the name of the faculty member and department?</p>
<p>My daughter actually got caught by this exact (or very similar) scam last fall when she first moved into her off campus apartment. Guy came selling magazines and claiming to be related to some campus organization or class. Bought a subscription, never got the magazine, met someone who was actually involved in the organization/class and discovered they were not involved in any magazine sales. Then there was a kid selling candles - never got the candle. </p>
<p>And her best friend got caught this summer with a knock on the door and a sob story about living in the same apartment complex and my wife needs her insulin and we won’t have the money till next week - etc etc etc. After giving the money and then getting nervous about a return visit (the guy managed to weasel info about when they would be and not be at the apartment) her friend called and had a chat with a local cop and discovered that this was a common scam and they targeted college students and the elderly.</p>
<p>One of those lessons we didn’t think to teach them. We covered the big scams - emails from Nigeria, the weird oh I’ll send you this check can you cash it and keep what I owe you and write a check to so & so. Didn’t think of the tug at the heart strings scams, never for a moment though of the magazine one.</p>
<p>Now my daughter just pleads poor student status. A lesson learned at the cost of a few $$$s will probably stick I guess.</p>
<p>Thanks to everyone for your thoughtful replies. We do not live in New Jersey, where Rutgers is located, but in a neighboring state. We live in a suburban neighborhood where it could have been a neighbor ringing my bell. It was a nice day so I had my main front door opened with the screen door locked to let in some fresh air. We do get solicitors periodically, people selling fresh meat from a refrigerated truck, Jehovah’s Witnesses, fundraisers for various environmental groups, etc. The young man looked to be college age and was quite well-spoken.</p>
<p>Two months ago we received a phone call from a student attending U of Michigan. He was going on a mission trip through his church, in Ann Arbor, and wanted us to help fund it. Apparently he got our phone number through his roommate’s high school directory, and he used my D’s name. My D went to that high school. He made it sound like they were friends. He asked about her well being, by name. It was creepy. Although we told him we could not help, he continued to call and send written material. The “minimum” contribution listed on the written material was $100. We did some research and found that the trip was legitimate, but the students were using high school and church directories to solicit funds.</p>
<p>Mom103, That is indeed creepy – and unethical. And for a church trip!!</p>
<p>Wife got suckered (my opinion) into buying 6 Cutco plastic-handled knives for ~$240 (!)
They are not bad knives but are way overpriced as far as I can tell.<br>
Cutco has been using college students to hawk its products for decades (though I think they work more by word-of-mouth, not door-to-door). </p>
<p>I’ve bought so many pricey tools over the years, I was unfortunately in no position to challenge DW’s judgment.</p>
<p>At the beginning of the summer we had something similar where a girl came into our backyard where we all were (we’re on a corner so it’s somewhat easy to come into the back yard) and said she was an Ohio State PR/Comm student who was raising $$$ for some trip abroad type thing. She needed to get a certain amount of people to buy books - I can’t remember the set-up exactly but it was so far fetched it was weird. My D who will be a junior in college this year happened to be home when this girl came (and my D is also a PR/Comm major - ha) so she was all over this girl asking questions and questioning. </p>
<p>First thing I did was go in the house and make sure the front door was locked - figured, yeah right, talk to us all in the back while someone tries the front door.</p>
<p>Anyway, her story had so many holes in it we shook our heads and sent her on her way.</p>
<p>I once had a visit from a young man with a southern accent–I live in Maine–who was selling some kind of sets of books/encyclopedias. I don’t recall precisely what they were, but they were aimed at helping one’s young children excel in school. He had the name of a local first grade teacher who he claimed had bought them. (I doubt it.) When I told him that we already had the Encyclopedia Britannica and hundreds, if not thousands, of other books, and were regular library users, so it just didn’t seem like something we needed…plus it seemed over-priced, he said, “Are you Jewish?”</p>
<p>Cutco requires sales people to buy $200 or so in product and encourage them to sell under fall pretenses to family friends, by saying they just want to practice their routine on them. Their product may be good, but the sales routine is slick. My Ds HS warns about stuff like this in what they call Real Life 101 (also includes not to guarantee debt, not to get too many CCs etc)</p>
<p>I’m not a parent, but this EXACT thing happened to me. They actually caught me with just a towel on when I opened the door. It was this girl talking about some trip somewhere sponsered by Rutgers or something, and then some stupid competition(girls vs boys ***), and then it was for magazine subscriptions. My mom wasn’t home(the mags didn’t look good anyways), and I told her I wasn’t the head of the household. She asked for donations, and I gave her a buck so she’d stop talking and bothering me lol.</p>
<p>I saw her solicting people on my apartment buliding too.</p>
<p>One of my friends saw an overabundance of door to door salesmen. She taught her dog a sign that would keep him barking when she answered the door (and another sign to stop). Since he was huge and sounded scary, most of the salesmen cut their spiel short.</p>