GPal (Gunpal) problems?

[ZX-10R]

Thank you for the clarification on my question. If someone where to under perform consistently for several months, generally walking papers are handed out. That is why I asked. You guys are awesome for your patience. That is for sure.

[gunblobber]

I'm trying to say this - if you want to complain about a past sweepstakes, start a thread about it. This thread is not about that. This thread is not about people looking for a reason to come up with reasons to be negative about Ben.

Ben Cannon is GPal. There are no other known owners or employees (if there are any, they are keeping their mouths shut). The company *is* him. There is no discussion of GPal, without it also being a discussion of Ben Cannon.

A lot of people, myself included, have been hurt financially by GPal. A lot of people, myself included, feel that Ben Cannon is being dishonest by continuing to run GPal the way that he does.

A lot of the lying and dishonesty is occurring right here on CGN, in full view of CGN staff and members. Here is but one example:

GPal now has full time phone support M-F 9am-5pm PST. The number is 1-800-813-GPAL (4725). If you have an issue please contact us and we will resolve it as fast as possible. Thank you everyone for supporting us!

Numerous people (myself included) have tried calling the support line but have gotten no answer. Some have remained on hold for 3 hours or longer. (I must admit that I gave up after around 20 minutes.) The support number is a sham and a lie.

My overarching goal is to get it to stop. To make GPal change what they are doing. To stop the lies, to stop GPal from taking in more money when they are still having problems sending out money. I have already taken care of my own interests (credit card chargeback underway) and I have seen many people posting on various forums about law enforcement efforts which are also currently underway. I guess we will see if and when they materialize.

Another way that I can get it to stop (or at least to stop being so bad) is for me to reason with the staff here at Calguns and try to get them to see the need for them to do something about the situation. Calguns is not powerless in this. I know that they don't have control over Ben Cannon or GPal, but they do have the GPal support forum here as sort of a bully pulpit. They can do *something* to alleviate the situation, rather than continuing to help cover-up the situation. If they (and I'm including CGF in this) don't do or say something, then they seem complicit by their silence. At the very least, some sort of disclaimer about the relationship between CGN, CGF, and GPal in the GPal forum would be a good first step!

In my opinion, the current level of blatant deception should be apparent for all to see. But still nothing has been done. I want to achieve my goal of something being done. If that means dredging up past stuff that calls Ben's honesty into question, then so be it. I couldn't care less about the raffles on a personal level, but when mcubed posted new info about the Geovario servers on which Calguns.net is hosted, and the way the raffles were run, I thought that was a serious revelation that would undermine the credibility of Ben Cannon in the eyes of CGN staff and members. I asked follow-up questions to mcubed in the correct thread, but that thread was conveniently locked before he could answer. This thread is the only remaining GPal "discussion" thread on CGN.

My secondary goal here is to act as a kind of amateur journalist: to ask questions so as to hopefully clarify things, and to document things so that the people currently being hurt by Ben Cannon / GPal can find out the truth about what is going on. If I can't stop GPal, I can at least shed some light so that other victims don't get taken in, and I can alleviate the pain by helping them to figure out what is going on.

[eaglemike]

I don't understand why you quoted me. Please read and understand - I don't think a discussion of the sweepstakes/GeoVario/etc belongs in this thread about GPal. If there is any issue there, clear it up separately.

That is what I said. If you want to discuss those other things, please start a separate thread.

[Fot]

I don't understand why you quoted me. Please read and understand - I don't think a discussion of the sweepstakes/GeoVario/etc belongs in this thread about GPal. If there is any issue there, clear it up separately.

That is what I said. If you want to discuss those other things, please start a separate thread.

Guess it comes down to what one thinks the problems with G-pal stem from. If one thinks it's a scam then questions on sweepstakes/GeoVario/etc belong. Should vendors not have all the info available when deciding to continue to use g-pal? The owner of GeoVario has said Cannon ran a raffle/sweep stake for geovario services after he was no longer working/ tied to that company. If true, that is along the lines of multiple g-pal issues.

[eaglemike]

Guess it comes down to what one thinks the problems with G-pal stem from. If one thinks it's a scam then questions on sweepstakes/GeoVario/etc belong. Should vendors not have all the info available when deciding to continue to use g-pal? The owner of GeoVario has said Cannon ran a raffle/sweep stake for geovario services after he was no longer working/ tied to that company. If true, that is along the lines of multiple g-pal issues.

Then start a thread about everything you can think of the MIGHT be wrong that happened some time ago.

I'm willing to bet a $1K donation to CGF that some of the people stirring the pot have zero loss or financial involvement with GPal. I'll also bet that I've made a larger contribution to the sweepstakes situation - and I'm not whining about it. It's done, it's past, and nothing is going to change what happened or didn't happen. Even a small change in wording affects people's perceptions. If you can't afford to contribute to the cause, and take a chance that something might go wrong - don't do it.

[gunblobber]

Guess it comes down to what one thinks the problems with G-pal stem from. If one thinks it's a scam then questions on sweepstakes/GeoVario/etc belong. Should vendors not have all the info available when deciding to continue to use g-pal? The owner of GeoVario has said Cannon ran a raffle/sweep stake for geovario services after he was no longer working/ tied to that company. If true, that is along the lines of multiple g-pal issues.

Yes, that is a good explanation. My reply to eaglemike was an attempt to explain why I thought it belonged in this thread.

For the record, I don't think that GPal "is a scam" or was created to be a scam; but, the way that it seems to be operating right now would definitely appear to be a scam. Taking money in when you can't pay it out is a scam.

I realize that these payment problems are probably due to the actions of banks or other third parties (although, if this is true, IMO GPal was negligent not to have taken care of them before they happened -- but that's incompetence, not a scam). I don't believe that it started as an intentional scam, but an unintentional scam becomes intentional when it's covered up.

[tenpercentfirearms]

I guess some of you still don't get it. There are four separate entities at play here.

Calguns.net, entirely owned by Kestryll and Kestryll only. There is no board, just Kestryll.

Calguns Founation. A non-profit organization with a board of directors. You can find the board of directors here. http://www.calgunsfoundation.org/index.php/board

GPal. Entirely owned by Ben Cannon. It has no board of directors. It had a board of advisors that were just that, advisors. They received no pay, no compensation, and had no decision making process in the company. They were simply eye candy to help give credibility to the company.

Geovario. As has been stated by Michael Miyabara-McCaskey, Ben Cannon no longer has any principle stake in Geovario. Geovario does host GPal, Calguns.net, and a host of other websites related to Calguns.net (I also use Geovario to host my website).

There is no grand conspiracy here. Ben Cannon wanted me on his board of advisors to give credence to GPal. Like the rest of you, it sounded like a great idea and I tried it out. My first transactions went flawlessly.

Now there are some issues with the ACH accounts and we aren't getting our money as fast as we want. The money is there, but it takes a while to process. Unfortunately around three weeks.

Just be patient. The only other thing you can do is sue Ben Cannon and GPal and see if that gets you anywhere.

That pretty much sums up the whole thing.

[gunblobber]

Then start a thread about everything you can think of the MIGHT be wrong that happened some time ago.

I'm willing to bet a $1K donation to CGF that some of the people stirring the pot have zero loss or financial involvement with GPal. I'll also bet that I've made a larger contribution to the sweepstakes situation - and I'm not whining about it. It's done, it's past, and nothing is going to change what happened or didn't happen. Even a small change in wording affects people's perceptions. If you can't afford to contribute to the cause, and take a chance that something might go wrong - don't do it.

Are you calling me out as one of those "people stirring the pot" who you believe has "zero loss or financial involvement with GPal"? If so, I will take that bet. Will a screenshot from my Amex card work?

I had no stake in the raffles, but I can read the threads and see the ethical problems there. (I have no comment on whether they were "rigged," and I think that any such discussion is quite apart from what I'm talking about here.) The problem isn't with the money, it's with what the raffles were supposedly held for. Ben represented that the money was going to be used to buy new servers. Apparently, it wasn't -- it was used to pay Ben Cannon back for servers that he had previously bought.

It wasn't a matter of "something going wrong", it was a matter of the truth not being told up-front. If I had been a raffle contributor, I would have had no problems with the way the raffle money was apparently spent, if it had been disclosed up-front that that was how it was going to be spent. It's a matter of honesty, not money or being able to afford something.

[eaglemike]

No, I'm not calling you out on this. I am positive that some of the people on here are just stirring the pot. BTW - I do have some funds in a GPal account.

Since your join date is so recent, I'm positive you weren't here for the sweepstakes. There's always a whiner somewhere (not referring to you - you weren't here) when they don't win. This is also the internet, and many people hide their identity and are not the same as they would be in person.

You might look up the past threads and see what was really said. I'm fairly sure there was no intent to scam anyone when the fundraising was done at that time - quite a while in the past.

General, not addressed to any specific person - Please don't repeat allegations unless they are known to be true. Spreading rumors is like spreading butter - pretty hard to undo.

[Vin496]

Then start a thread about everything you can think of the MIGHT be wrong that happened some time ago.

I'm willing to bet a $1K donation to CGF that some of the people stirring the pot have zero loss or financial involvement with GPal. I'll also bet that I've made a larger contribution to the sweepstakes situation - and I'm not whining about it. It's done, it's past, and nothing is going to change what happened or didn't happen. Even a small change in wording affects people's perceptions. If you can't afford to contribute to the cause, and take a chance that something might go wrong - don't do it.

I don't know why you can't understand this, but any thread that has been started or any post that has talked about these issues has been deleted. I will not be surprised that if by sometime tomorrow many of the post in this thread are gone. The Gpal Forum has been turned into a ticket only forum and any talk is deleted.

Another thing just because people aren't out money doesn't mean they aren't entitled to question what is going on. So there give your $1000 donation. Just don't send it GPal.

[eaglemike]

I don't know why you can't understand this, but any thread that has been started or any post that has talked about these issues has been deleted. I will not be surprised that if by sometime tomorrow many of the post in this thread are gone.

As was just stated the owner of GeoVario stated that Ben was not even working/a partner of Geovario anymore while the last sweepstakes for going on.

Another thing just because people aren't out money doesn't mean they aren't entitled to question what is going on. So there give your $1000 donation. Just don't send it GPal.

So you are just stirring the pot - you just admitted it, correct?

Since you are just stirring the pot, want to match donations to CGF? In case you didn't see it in my post above......

[Kestryll]

I will not be surprised that if by sometime tomorrow many of the post in this thread are gone.

It will be gone if people like you keep trying to turn it in to a general dogpile and not keeping to the topic of GPal issues.

If you want to discuss business issues, fine.
If you want pillory someone or 'burn them in effigy' do it elsewhere.

[Vin496]

So you are just stirring the pot - you just admitted it, correct?

Since you are just stirring the pot, want to match donations to CGF? In case you didn't see it in my post above......

No I admitted I don't have a financial interest in this, well not GPal anyway. I did participate in a raffle.

I'm not stirring the pot at all, all you have to do is go down to the GPal forum and see whats happening there. I didn't create this problem, the people posting negative things didn't create this problem.

The person who created it was Cannon and he has allowed it to turn into a cesspool here because he did not come forward and be honest about what was or is happening, but I'm sure he has probably been told not to comment at this point as it clearly seems the authorities are about to get involved.

The flip side to that is that CG has been bashed to death in the gun community because of the actions of the administration here.

[gunblobber]

I guess some of you still don't get it. There are four separate entities at play here.

Calguns.net, entirely owned by Kestryll and Kestryll only. There is no board, just Kestryll.

Calguns Founation. A non-profit organization with a board of directors. You can find the board of directors here. http://www.calgunsfoundation.org/index.php/board

GPal. Entirely owned by Ben Cannon. It has no board of directors. It had a board of advisors that were just that, advisors. They received no pay, no compensation, and had no decision making process in the company. They were simply eye candy to help give credibility to the company.

Geovario. As has been stated by Michael Miyabara-McCaskey, Ben Cannon no longer has any principle stake in Geovario. Geovario does host GPal, Calguns.net, and a host of other websites related to Calguns.net (I also use Geovario to host my website).

I am fully aware of all the lines between the companies/organizations and individuals involved.

There is no grand conspiracy here. Ben Cannon wanted me on his board of advisors to give credence to GPal.

And a lot of people trusted that you and other CGF Board members would not put your name to something fly-by-night. I think it's fair to say that a decent portion of GPal's customers would not have used GPal if it had not been for your names on the "About Us" page. I know it had an influence on my own decision to use GPal to pay for a purchase. I knew Oleg Volk's name, and I also was familiar with the good work that Calguns has done in California. You did indeed lend credence to GPal. You are not to blame for GPal's problems in any way, but IMO if you lent your name to the enterprise then you should have some influence over the company in return. That influence may not be formal, but if I were in your shoes, I'd be yelling at Ben Cannon on the phone daily until he changed something.

Now there are some issues with the ACH accounts and we aren't getting our money as fast as we want. The money is there, but it takes a while to process. Unfortunately around three weeks.

"Issues with the ACH accounts" and "the money is there" -- none of us "little people" (GPal victims) have any proof of this, and Ben Cannon's word does not carry any weight any more. (Have you performed an audit on GPal's accounts? Have you seen the statements or logged in to the websites? Have you seen anything substantial to prove that claim, or are you just taking Ben Cannon's word for it? If you can indeed provide some kind of independent confirmation of GPal's solvency, please say so, because it would ease a lot of worrying!) "Three weeks" is a lie -- there are people in the GPal forum who have been waiting for 2 or 3 months to get their money. I personally was lied to by GPal support staff about a check that I should have received about a month ago. Still no check! How are we supposed to believe them when they say "the money is there" when we can't even believe it when they say "the check's in the mail"?

This doesn't even begin to address the fact that GPal is not upfront with what you just stated. The ACH problems are not documented on the site, but GPal continues to take in money.

You are a businessman. Let's say, hypothetically, that you had clerical problems with the ATF and temporarily lost your ability to transfer firearms. You are confident that the problems will be worked out, but due to the bureaucratic nature of the problem, you can't put an exact date on it. But you still have a lot of inventory and run a storefront. You can still sell accessories and other non-firearms items, and you have some customers that come in and make a purchase, get their non-firearms items, and go on their way. Would you continue to sell guns to customers and take their money, and then hold their guns indefinitely until you get your ATF problems worked out, without disclosing the problems upfront?

Just be patient.

People have been patient. And most of them would continue to be patient if there were the slightest modicum of transparency coming from GPal. All that we have is a bunch of pablum that provides no assurance whatsoever. And that's if we're lucky enough to even get an answer -- I have sent several unreturned support e-mails and made several unanswered phone calls to GPal's support line myself.

[eaglemike]

No I admitted I don't have a financial interest in this, well not GPal anyway. I did participate in a raffle.

I'm not stirring the pot at all, all you have to do is go down to the GPal forum and see whats happening there. I didn't create this problem, the people posting negative things didn't create this problem.

The person who created it was Cannon and he has allowed it to turn into a cesspool here because he did not come forward and be honest about what was or is happening, but I'm sure he has probably been told not to comment at this point as it clearly seems the authorities are about to get involved.

The flip side to that is that CG has been bashed to death in the gun community because of the actions of the administration here.

As I said.....

I'm quite confident I don't know everything that has happened regarding GPal. You might have better information than I, might not. I do seem to recall reading that banking institutions had some effect on this situation. I also recall reading on this forum advice from those with legal experience sometimes it's far better to remain silent. From my personal viewpoint I would have liked to see more of an explanation from Ben, but that might not be legally prudent. I don't know what the future holds. From day one I thought the whole situation (developing a company like GPal) would be a huge undertaking. Unforeseen elements can ruin any enterprise.......