Top World Ventures affiliate violating Norway ban?
A year ago World Ventures lost their Norway appeal, which saw the ruling that World Ventures is a pyramid scheme upheld.
Six months later Steinar Husby, WorldVentures’ “official spokesperson” in Norway, told local media that the company was going to sue Norwegian authorities.
That was June 2015 but to date no legal action on behalf of World Ventures has surfaced.
Today if you try to visit the WorldVentures backoffice of a Norwegian affiliate, the following message is displayed:
At the present time, WorldVentures has temporarily ceased business operations in Norway.
Regrettably, this means that WorldVentures will not accept the enrollment of new Representatives or DreamTrips members in Norway.
If you are an existing Representative in Norway, please cease any activity promoting the WorldVentures business and products in all markets at this time.
Despite this ban being in place since December 2014, apparently it doesn’t apply to Steinar Husby.
If you visit the WorldVentures website, click the orange “sign up” button at the top of the page, enter “11738101” as the affiliate ID and then click any country flag except Norway, the following registration screen pops up:
Note the referring affiliate, “Alfakonsult Ltd”.
Further research reveals Alfakonsult Ltd to be a Private Limited Company registered in the UK.
The address used to register Alfakonsult Ltd in the UK belongs to London Presence, who sell mail forwarding services starting at £14.99 a month.
Steinar Husby (right) is listed as the sole Director of Alfakonsult, with Husby openly citing himself as the owner of the company on his LinkedIn profile (note company name appears as “Alfaconsult”):
Husby to this day also markets WorldVentures on his Twitter profile:
So to recap, since December 2014 WorldVentures have apparently ceased doing business in Norway and ordered their Norwegian affiliates to stop promoting the company.
And here we have Steinar Husby, who lives in Norway and has been a Norwegian WorldVentures affiliate since 2010, openly promoting WorldVentures through his UK shell company, Alfakonsult.
Whether other Norwegian affiliates are breaching Norwegian law and WorldVentures T&Cs by promoting WorldVentures through shell companies is unclear.
Ditto whether the Norwegian Gaming Board are aware their binding legal decision is being openly mocked.
As to WorldVentures, I’m sure someone at corporate must know what’s going on. But uh yeah, continue turn a blind eye so long as that recruitment money continues to flow in I guess.
The administrative decision from the Gaming Board is against the company itself (World Ventures / Rovia), not against Steinar Husby as a person. And the decision is limited to the specific geographical jurisdiction(s) governed by Norwegian law.
Alfakonsult Limited in the UK is probably a correct legal solution. It was registered only a few days after the court decision.
Husby’s promotion of WorldVentures and continued participation in their business opportunity directly contravenes the message WorldVentures put up on their website.
He doesn’t live in England, anymore than Alfakonsult Ltd is based there.
I’m pretty sure that Steinar Husby has discussed it with the lawyers, e.g. that Alfakonsult Ltd is a type of “Plan B”.
Steinar Husby promotes himself as a motivational speaker. It usually means that he has more “motivational drive” than real substance, but it doesn’t mean that he’s plain stupid (he’s only half stupid). So he has most likely listened to lawyers before he made the decision of establishing a UK entity.
Be that as it may, it now falls on World Ventures to enforce their own T&Cs.
Husby isn’t promoting World Ventures as Alfakonsult on his social media profiles, he’s doing so as himself. That’s in direct violation of the Gaming Board’s ruling and WorldVentures T&Cs specific to Norway.
That’s probably correct. But it will be a rather vague secondary issue.
“Steinar Husby marketed World Ventures as himself rather than as the UK registered entity Alfakonsult Ltd” have some missing elements. It doesn’t say anything about in which geographical market he tried to market the World Ventures opportunity.
“Steinar Husby continued to promote World Ventures and recruit new participants in Norway” would have been a clear violation.
The theory is simply too vague. The illegal part is about World Ventures’ business concept in Norway. It isn’t about whether Steinar Husby acts as himself or as Alfakonsult Ltd on social media sites.
Regulation wise it should matter. An MLM company is held responsible for the conduct of their affiliates.
This extends to deception and breach of law.
It’s about consumer protection laws, not about an injunction from a court. So it can’t be extended to be about “anywhere in the world”.
We’re talking about Norway. Steinar Husby lives in Norway.
…
Is WV having any other issues besides in Norway??
I’m in the US and doing my due diligence. Truthfully have heard good and bad things about it??
Sweden, South Africa, Malaysia, Jamaica.
behindmlm.com/category/companies/world-ventures/
September 24 2015
behindmlm.com/companies/world-ventures/world-ventures-under-fraud-investigation-in-south-africa/
June 18 2015
behindmlm.com/companies/world-ventures/world-ventures-under-investigation-in-jamaica/
April 25 2015
behindmlm.com/companies/world-ventures/worldventures-an-illegal-business-in-malaysia/
December 24 2013
behindmlm.com/companies/world-ventures/swedish-gaming-board-file-world-ventures-report/
I’m not familiar with the current status of that last case.
And most of Asia, including China and Taiwan.
The Taiwanese travel industry wants WV banned as a pyramid scheme. There’s even a demonstration not too long ago.
Multiple celebrities all over the world claimed to have been violated when some WV posers with that “You should be here” sign posed next to them and then claimed online that the celebrity endorses WV.
That isn’t prohibited. 🙂
The primary issue was about World Ventures business model, about the part of it where people paid an amount of money to become members and paid an additional amount to upgrade the membership, where they could earn commissions if they introduced other members buying the same membership plus upgrade.
Steinar Husby has most likely changed or transferred his membership in World Ventures from “Steinar Husby, Norway” to “Alfakonsult Ltd, UK”. It means that he is no longer a member of World Ventures’ marketing program, but he indirectly owns a membership through a UK registered company.
Norwegian law doesn’t extend to other countries.
* The only relevant geographical extension is to ferries / air traffic in regular traffic to and from Norway (he can’t hold recruitment meetings on the Oslo-Kiel ferry).
* Criminal law can be extended to “Norwegian citizens, wherever they’re located”.
CONCLUSION?
I have looked at the different elements, but there’s too little substance here for a valid case.
The decision doesn’t extend to indirect memberships in other countries. The law doesn’t allow it to do it either.
Steinar Husby seems to be some type of “self appointed press contact” for the case (“local noise maker”), not representing anyone other than himself and his own team (Viking Team).
He doesn’t have any formal roles, other than as an “affected party who strongly feels that his rights have been violated”. He’s clearly not a decision maker in the case, and he doesn’t speak on behalf of World Ventures or Rovia. But it might look like that because of all the activity. 🙂
It means that his “We will sue Norway!” from June 2015 just are words with very little substance.