Readers might think I have had a vendetta against Dave Burke and his Real Talk Network. I truly do not. But in my opinion Burke’s reign of his debt relief enterprise is rapidly nearing an end, and it will be a bloody end.
Dave Burke has been relentless in his bending and breaking of trust and respect in his efforts to sell unsuspecting people thousands of dollars of dubious debt relief help that only landed many in collections and worse off.
What is most disturbing is the dangerous journey he is taking that have left and will leave many financially wrecked as the Real Talk Network spirals in and augers a big hole into the ground.
Like the oil spill hitting the beaches. RTN is going to end in a costly mess.
You’ve got to ask yourself, if Dave Burke’s debt relief approach is above board and honest then why does he have an F rating and 100+ complaints with the BBB (source), numerous lawsuits against him, one investigative television report under his belt (watch here), another in the works and as stated, at least two law enforcement departments actively investigating him?
The people I feel most sorry for are Erik Sale, Matt Pillmore, John Deckys, and the other people that participated in Burke’s enterprise to the detriment of their personal reputations. These men are now all left with attempting to redeem themselves and repair a reputation that was severely damaged when they tied their wagon to Burke’s enterprise.
And then there is Melodie Rose Burke, the wife of David Allen Burke. Melodie plays and has played an active part in the Real Talk Network as an initial director and a registred agent and is leaving a lasting legacy for her family that could unfortunately shame her in the future unless she steps up to take action to stop the Real Talk Network and Dave Burke cold in his tracks to prevent the further abuse of consumers by the Real Talk Network, Real Talk Network Radio Show, and his debt relief enterprise.
On June 1, 2010 I wrote Breaking Down the Misleading and Deceptive Financial Sales Pitch From the Get Real With Dave Burke Radio Show. That article dissected Burke’s recent radio show in San Diego, bit by bit, to show the misinformation and false impressions he was spreading.
By June 12, 2010 he was still at it and just as egregious. You can listen to the June 12 KFMB broadcast in San Diego below.
“You Are Gonna Kill Yourself If You Pass This Up.” – Dave Burke
Now I am told that the latest investigative television report is underway in San Diego as I write this.
At some point Burke should have realized that when his own coaches, cohorts, and employees of the enterprise are running for cover, don’t want to be associated with him and are spilling the beans, he has a train wreck on his hands.
There is NO good that can come from the legacy he has and is creating for himself, his coworkers and one that inevitably and sadly, his children will discover at some point in the future.
The only single hope to prevent a tortured end would be for Burke to fall on the sword right now, cease operations, apologize to all injured parties, stop all collections on past clients and issue requested refunds.
Otherwise, I would not be surprised in the least if he isn’t charged criminally in either California or Colorado and winds up doing jail time.
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Tom (and everybody), I totally feel your pain and I know it is hard!!!
PERSONALLY, I believe Dave Burke & this company (RTN or ICEE – whatever they call it) is a true SCAM !!! And Dave Burke, and Melody or Melodie – however she wants to contort her name is in on it !!!!!!
I saw that it was a scam in October 2009. I told my husband. He heard their STUPID commercial on the radio & signed us up in Jan 2010. When we attended in Carlsbad, CA I did NOT want to join. But their “willing way” – catch you – gotchoo, and we were roped in. In Oct 2009 it was $1,997 (if memory serves me correct). Christmas came & went, and by Jan 2010, it was a whopping $3,497. I wanted to go back the next night in Irvine & negate the contract – we went back, but spoke to the “second in command”, I think it is Jay). He said we could submit to the office to cancel. I knew where that was going – we would get into double talk, and they would claim that we were over the three day cancellation, etc. and then Mr. Dave Burke, his company, representatives, partners in crime, would turn us in and it would affect our credit rating. So, hubby said “let’s give it a try, and go through the “counseling”.” (Oh, and Jay reassured me that I could contact him, and he gave me his email address. I emailed him. Yes, you guess right, no contact back – which is almost the MO for this company).
Where we sit 6 months later:
#1. THEY never told us about Conrad Credit !!! I had NO IDEA that this would be “financed” like it was. I thought payments would go to RTN, as shown on their paperwork.
#2. So NOW, their stupid financed credit scheme is on our Credit Report. Thanks, Dave !!!!!!
This was not disclosed in their paperwork, or murmured in their “talk” after their crummy presentation.
#3. Patrick is NO LONGER WITH THE COMPANY. Our counseling session was in May, and scheduled at end of June. They didn’t bother to call and reschedule – EVEN THOUGH the minion told me “Patrick quit a week later to go back to school”. Pretty funny time to go to school – in the middle of May. (side note: they called the day before the appt & rescheduled, we had some back & forth because she was quoting the documentation about when they called. Pretty suspicious. No msg on msg machine, and didn’t call hubby’s cell – even though that’s what she said happened…uh huh. And, why did Patrick tell us “I’ll be with you until the end.” I think any prior employee would have a best seller if they wrote a book…oh, but Dave probably has some employment condition about this too.
#4. New counselor. Was suppose to call day after counseling 7-1. I raced home to be home by 3 pm. Call was suppose to come at 3:50… NO CALL. Next day, conveniently when I was on a short bus call, RTN called. But by the time I hung up & answered…yep, you got it, they were gone & NO MESSAGE. It is now two business days past Friday, and no call. The strategy here is to see how long it takes them to call. (P.S. New counselor bragged he was Patrick’s go to guy…he didn’t know about the software update). Oh, and customer svc didn’t send a new blank copy of software spreadsheet as I requested. And, hadn’t even reviewed our spreadsheet. Patrick always did. Gosh, I love being treated like dirt.
I’m with you, Tom. This company (can we even call it that) is a SHAM. They are unprofessional, don’t leave msgs regarding information. Or if they do, what they said might be able to happen (like that “Zero Percent Credit Card” (carrot dangle), they immediately email and say “nope, no go right now”.
I attribute any raise in our FICO Score to my diligence in paying more on the credit card. It has (very little) or nothing to do with them telling you in their OUTSTANDING (cough, cough) presentation to Opt Out from credit card offers and that will raise your score. I’d already opted out (by letter) several years back.
This company is a sham. I feel the counselors training is to string you along. I wish I could get out of paying them – but I don’t want our credit ruined/FICO score ruined because of Dave & RTN/ICEE.
Tom, I’m in the sucker club too, because I didn’t put my foot down that night in Jan and say “no” to my husband. And I am seriously upset with myself because that $3,497 could have paid off a credit card – but instead, Dave preyed on people who actually need help. But, we can’t get help from the bankers & other financial institutions because they social engineered us to death and we were stupid enough to fall for it all. I think I’ll just make me a big sign that says “SUCKER” and lick my wounds. Thanks for letting me get it off my chest.
I am one of many of RTN’s suckers. I paid $3,000 to “get out of Debt” and have incurred probably another $1,000 plus in other related wasted money that I could have paid on debt. We have had 4 or 5 “coaches” who contradicted each others recommendations and has resulted in much more interest and advance fees that just resulted in more wasted money. Our current or I guess now last Coach was the best and she provided reasonable directions and was gave much more “guidance”. I assume she is gone at this point. We are/were? scheduled to have our next session on July 13th, 2010, but it looks like that won’t happen and even if it does – I have no confidence in the RTN or the ICEE either anymore. I questioned the reasoning for some of the methods and was assured that we would start seeing progress in our debt reduction soon.
With each coach change, I asked what happened to each and was told xxx retired, yyy was promoted to the corporate office; zzz was moved to another area of RTN, etc. I explained that I was quite concerned about the coach changes, the recommendations and the “tools” they said to do wasn’t making any difference and in fact costing us more money instead of reducing our debt. I didn’t expect that the debt reduction would be fast even hough they said we’d pay off Credit Card Debt with in months and our mortgage in 3 -5 years, but wanted to see some progress for the investment of money and time. We were going @ $400 to $500 a month in the hole when we
signed up”, now we are going $950 to $1,200 a month and our savings are almost gone.
At a second visit to one of Dave Burke’s sessions in Arizona He assured me that he would personally review our spreadsheet and guide me to “success”. I never heard from him and in fact even my next scheduled session the coach didn’t call. When I contacted RTN I was given a different coach, but that one only lasted a few sessions and was gone as well.
If I could get my money back it would be a God sent. I feel like a sucker and have told others that I run into that mentioned RTN to stay away for it!
Tom Conner