Investigating Highdef Nation, Is It a Real Income Opportunity, or a Suspicious Scheme? Does It Even Provide Health Care?

UPDATED 1030PM PDT 03-NOV-2012

HighDef Nation website is now live, more than 48 hours late, and it appears to be severely incomplete, as it fails to say what exactly do people join actually do. There is a lot of flowery language about how great the leaders are, and how the comp plan will pay lots of people, but there's NOTHING about what the company ACTUALLY DOES!

UPDATED 0001 PDT, 03-NOV-2012

Two days after the alleged relaunch of HighDef Nation, but so far the website remains empty, with just an application form where you join this thing that doesn't say what it does.

Furthermore, the new "revised" Policies and Procedures points to yet ANOTHER UPS Store P.O. Box, this time in Illinois, but it claims to refer to laws in Nevada in the "jurisdiction" section.

It appears that HDN, in attempt to go legit, decided to borrow some other company's policies and procedures, and simply did a mass replacement of that other company's name with "The Company" and forgot to fix the rest of the document.

UPDATED 25-OCT-2012

High Def Nation website apparently came back to life when "Lou Gatto" announced on Facebook that they are going to have a new product line and launch on November 1st, 2012.

UPDATED 23-OCT-2012

The website of High Def Nation is now a "parked domain" with no content, as of 23-OCT-2012.

There are rumors that AWIS, upon learning the comp plan of High Def Nation, asked for a few changes for legal compliance reason, and when the High Def Nation principals refused, AWIS chose to sever all ties. This cannot be confirmed as neither party is talking.

UPDATED 19-OCT-2012

Following statement just appeared on High Def Nation's website

AWIS, or "American Worker's Insurance Services" is believed to be the health plan that High Def Nation is selling. Now that AWIS is no longer involved, it is unclear what is High Def Nation going to sell.

HighDef's Facebook page claimed that the site was hacked, but provided no proof.

Any information below is for archival purposes only and represents information from BEFORE the 19-OCT-2012 announcement.

New "opportunities" appear on the Internet every day, and as the recently closed Zeek Rewards ponzi scheme shows, "when it is too good to be true, it probably is". One must do their own "due diligence" when it comes to any and all opportunities, or even on what exact is being offered, lest one "got taken for a ride".

One of the last opportunities is "High Def Nation" based out of Houston Texas, that claims to offer discount health plans and has a MLM compensation structure if you help them sell the plan. However, is it legitimate? Let us find out.

It is very interesting that the products in High Def Nation is marketed exclusive to NAPP members. This means by joining this HDN, you automatically become NAPP members. So are you joining HDN, or NAPP? This is very confusing.

Furthermore, the product itself is stored on a separate URL "highdefplans", which causes further confusion.

The only valid result for NAPP is "National Association of Preferred Providers", or nappassociation.org based out of Houston TX, which was sued by Office of Attorney General of Texas (where Hi Def resides) for deceptive practices. OAG TX then slapped them with a restraining order, back in 2005.

https://www.oag.state.tx.us/newspubs/releases/2005/042805familyhealthpop.pdf

Are we sure this is the same NAPP? The people mentioned in the lawsuit is Mahmoud "Michael" Rabie. Checking CorporationWIKI shows NAPP is still active, headed by "Michael Rabie".

http://www.corporationwiki.com/Texas/Houston/national-association-of-preferred-providers-inc-5060147.aspx

Researching Mahmoud Rabie shows that a Kristopher Rabie (also out of Houston TX) was slapped by FCC for junk faxing, in 2004, also marketing some sort of "health care plans".

http://transition.fcc.gov/eb/Orders/2004/DA-04-784A1.html

However, from there, the trail runs cold. We have to approach this problem some other way.

Searching the HDN website revealed their address in Houston, TX to be

10878 Westheimer Rd
Suite 191
Houston, TX 77042

However, further research shows that the address is a mailbox at a UPS Store called "The Mailroom". (See CitySearch pix to the right)

This is confirmed by Google Streetview, showing "The Mailroom" being a UPS Store at that location, which is a "strip mall".

UPSStore services also confirms that you can refer to the mailbox at their location as just a "suite #", even claims that "it improves your image".

• What is the difference between a mailbox at The UPS Store and a PO Box at the post office?
  With a mailbox at The UPS Store, you get a real street address, not a P.O. Box number. If you’re a business owner, having a real street address as your mailbox can provide you with a professional image for your business. The UPS Store also offers many additional services that the post office does not, services like package acceptance from all carriers, package notification and Call-in MailCheck®, all aimed to save you valuable time.With a mailbox at The UPS Store, you get a real street address, not a P.O. Box number. If you’re a business owner, having a real street address as your mailbox can provide you with a professional image for your business. The UPS Store also offers many additional services that the post office does not, services like package acceptance from all carriers, package notification and Call-in MailCheck®, all aimed to save you valuable time.
• What does my mailing address look like?
  Your mailing address will be the address of The UPS Store location, with either PMB (private mailbox) or the pound symbol (#) designating your individual box. Instead of “The UPS Store,” your name appears first.
  
  Example:
  Joe Smith
  PMB XXX or # XXX
  12345 Somewhere Street
  Some City, Some State Some ZIP

This confirms that this is NOT the real location of HDN. Is there another way?

Punching the Houston address into Google revealed that it's also a listed address for a "Family Care / AWIS"

AWIS seems to stand for "American Workers Insurances Services", and has a variety of domains including awiscard.com, awisima.com, and so on. Note that there are several other companies around the US that also uses the AWIS initials, such as Arrowhead Wholesale Insurance Services out of San Diego, CA. We are talking about this AWIS based in Houston TX.

Comparing AWIS with HDN reveals they use identical web scripts to handle referrals, with virtually identical design elements. It should be safe to say they are ran by the same people.

So who runs AWIS out of Houston TX? According to Corporation Wiki, it's Shareef Rabie.

http://www.corporationwiki.com/Texas/Houston/american-workers-insurance-services-inc/36486644.aspx

We just keep running into the Rabie family name, don't we? Previously we ran into Mahmoud "Michael" Rabie, and a Kristopher Rabie.

Searching PeekYou.com revealed that Dr. Michael Rabie seem to be running the business himself, and confirms that Kristopher and Shareef are his family members.

A letter from Rhonda Rabie / Rabie Law Firm stated that Kristopher is indeed Michael's son, but Kristopher's company is NOT related to Michael's company. This is causing some confusion to the research. See below for PDF from junkfax.org regarding the confusion.

http://www.junkfax.org/fax/profiles/FamilyHealthCareLetter.PDF

Other than that Office of Attorney General injunction back in 2005, their record seem to be clean.

According to Michael Rabie's own profile, his "Dr." is from doctorate in management, not a M.D.

http://www.ryze.com/go/mikerabie

Very interestingly, there's a "Rabie Law Firm" (apparently started in 2002), who was run by a Rhonda Kay Rabie (listed above as one of Michael's family members as "Rhonda K. Robbie") that specialize in health care compliance.

http://www.rabielaw.com/index.php

And they do hold a proper Texas Bar Association certification.

http://www.texasbar.com/AM/Template.cfm?Section=Find_A_Lawyer&template=/Customsource/MemberDirectory/MemberDirectoryDetail.cfm&ContactID=209655

As referenced above, apparently Kristopher Aziz Rabie's compan(ies) was slapped by FCC for junk faxing people, not Michael Rabie's compan(ies). We have no idea who really controls AWIS, but it's clear it's another family member.

Checking the AWIS website reveals that you MUST enter an affiliate ID to access any information. Through Google search, one was found.

It turns out that AWIS does NOT offer insurance, but rather, offers "health discount plans". This is confirmed through a search of AMBest, an insurance rating agency, which has NO listing for AWIS or its full name, "American Workers Insurance Services".

There was a mention on a forum claiming that AWIS is an agent for policies issued by "Texas Fire Insurance". However, this cannot be confirmed.

There are multiple warnings online regarding AWIS and High Def, pointing out that it's basically "prepaid" health plan, NOT INSURANCE. The exact coverage depends on what you end up buying, and it's extremely vague on details and heavy on the upsell.

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20110505215615AAC6KPt

http://www.insurance-forums.net/forum/individual-health-insurance-forum/anyone-heard-high-defnation-health-insurance-t45974.html

http://www.ibosocial.com/amyjacobellis/pressrelease.aspx?prid=146538

So it's probably legal, but whether it's good for you is... unlikely.

The comp plan right now offered by HDN is also suspicious. From their website:

An even more exciting element of the HDN Mega Start Bonus is the fact that HDN will pay you a 100% match for every Associate you personally enroll. The speed with which you achieve each level will determine the size of your pay.

This is clearly in violation of FTC guidelines on pyramid schemes, as you cannot offer to pay on recruitment.

The lack of concrete details on their website is also a warning sign that this may not be what it seems. A lot of terms are left undefined, and the actual "associate agreement" is not available for review at this time, as the company is still allegedly in "pre-launch".

So, what can we conclude about High Def Nation?

Product is iffy... NOT insurance, but rather some sort of "discount plan".

These discount NON-INSURANCE plans are offered through a legal but suspicious provider who had been slapped with deceptive practices many years ago.

AND you have a hidden, pre-launch, vague comp plan on top of it, that has a bonus that is very obviously illegal: pay to join, then get paid by recruiting others who also paid to join.

My personal opinion on this: you can do better looking elsewhere for something that has fewer red flags.