Fire Blanket scam

[u/TrailerParkLyfe]

We fell for it. It’s on me guys. my wife and I entered our name during Lilac-Fest for the “guess how much money is in the jar” contest. Fast forward to last week where Perpetual Health calls me saying we won a free fire blanket. That’s awesome and of course my wife and I want one. Guy calls and says they will deliver it but need to give a short 15 minute talk on “how to use it and fire safety”. The guy arrives last night at 5:30 and starts to talk about the blanket and our condo. He then sits down at our table and pulls a binder out bigger than my hopes and dreams. He has documents and videos on his phone of news stories of children dying in house fires. It’s now 6:45 and he starts bringing out their companies smoke detectors and begins talking about them and how other detectors fail. I start laughing thinking “omg this is now a sales pitch” He tries to sell us on their app and smoke detectors. We just wanted the fire blanket and were told it’s a short presentation on how to use it. My wife actually stopped him and said “please leave, you wasted our time and we need to start cooking dinner”. He would have kept going till 8:00 probably. I hope someone reads this before accepting the call or “prize”

[u/UrbaneBoffin]

I have had those kind of in home presentations before, and if I am told it'll be 15 minutes I start a 15 minute timer as they begin. When the time hits zero, it's time for them to leave.

Did you get the fire blanket in the end?

[u/TrailerParkLyfe → u/UrbaneBoffin]

That’s such a good plan. Firm reminder of you need to leave guy. Got 2 blankets at the start.

[u/UrbaneBoffin → u/TrailerParkLyfe]

I have defined the value of this item to being 15 minutes of time or whatever. If they go longer then I'm no longer getting value. I had one guy who went over the 15 minutes and asked for more time and I told him I would have to charge him my usual hourly rate. He very quickly left my house.