Glen Ivy Marketing Practices Probed by State Atty. Gen.

Glen Ivy Financial Group, a major time-share resort company with sales offices in Newport Beach and elsewhere in Southern California, is under investigation by the California attorney general’s office for possible violations of telemarketing laws, it was learned Monday.

State authorities began investigating Glen Ivy and an Anaheim telemarketing company after a Culver City man complained that he didn’t receive the Cadillac or $25,000 in cash he was allegedly guaranteed by a salesman.

The complainant, R. Scott Penza, said he came home one night last February and discovered the salesman’s promise of a Cadillac or cash on his telephone answering machine with instructions to come to a Glen Ivy sales meeting to collect his prize.

After trying unsuccessfully to claim his prize, he sent the tape to several law enforcement officials, including the attorney general.

“I’m calling from Glen Ivy Sweepstakes for R. Scott (Penza),” the salesman says on the tape. “This is in regards to an entry form you filled out for a 1991 Cadillac Eldorado or $25,000 dollars in cash. You have won one of these prizes. Get in contact with me, please. Very important.”

Penza claimed he was later told by employees at Aladdin Tour & Travel, the Anaheim telemarketing firm employed by Glen Ivy, that he had won nothing yet and would have to sit through a sales meeting to win one of six prizes.

“This was a clear case of bait-and-switch advertising,” Penza complained.

Senior Assistant Atty. Gen. Herschel Elkins confirmed Monday that his office has started an investigation, saying state law forbids telemarketing firms and time-share companies from enticing customers to sales presentations with false promises.

“Obviously, if this is any kind of pattern at all, then this would be an extremely significant sort of thing,” said Elkins, who is also chief of the attorney general’s consumer law division.

On Monday, Glen Ivy spokesman Lee Smith described the salesman as “a loose cannon” who failed to follow a prepared script approved by the state Department of Real Estate and the attorney general’s office.

“We would be the first ones to tell you what this guy did was totally improper,” said Maurice Hart, Glen Ivy’s attorney. “Obviously, (the salesman) was functioning strictly on his own. . . . We don’t know why he did what he did.”

Aladdin Tour & Travel refused comment.

Glen Ivy is familiar to many Southern Californians for its aggressive sales practices. The company or its hired representatives call about 100,000 people a month. During the baseball season, Glen Ivy employees hand out brochures or cards at Anaheim Stadium and at San Diego Jack Murphy Stadium.

Between 6,000 and 8,000 people per month attend Glen Ivy sales sessions, Smith said.

Glen Ivy owns a number of local time-share properties, including Laguna Surf in Laguna Beach and the Plaza Resort and Spa in Palm Springs. The firm has about 1,600 employees and expects to record close to $110 million in sales this year.

On Monday, company officials stressed that they are cooperating with authorities.

“We have told (the attorney general’s office) that we are prepared to meet with them as we have in the past and bring the responsible people from Aladdin to such a meeting and do whatever we can to make certain that a situation like this doesn’t occur in the future,” Hart said.