I spent 8,000 yuan on a high-end recruitment platform to buy a “president assistant targeted headhunting service.”

The page is written more moving than a college entrance exam essay: one-on-one service from a senior consultant, a candidate pool of 100,000-level candidates, with an average of three days for precise matching.
On the third day, the match came. A PDF—seven pages—the cover retouched to look like a magazine photo shoot. It even included a SWOT analysis of whether I would drink pour-over coffee. On the back page, the quotation section boldly lists: candidate expected salary, starting from 300,000 yuan per year, unconditionally willing to cooperate with the boss’s schedule.
When I read the four words “unconditionally willing to cooperate,” my heart skipped a beat. I sent a tentative message. Sure enough, the other side was an old-school headhunter. He spoke at top speed, saying the candidate’s overall qualities are extremely high; the reason the previous employer left was that the boss emigrated; and they are absolutely stable. I asked if we could chat on video first. He said the candidate is currently on vacation abroad and will return to China next week. I said okay.
After I hung up, the more I thought about it, the more wrong it felt. Somehow the tone sounded familiar. I flipped that PDF to the last page—the education certificate—zoomed in, and saw a blurry watermark: some overseas diploma mill. When I traced it back, I found that this “senior assistant” had, years ago, been doing the rounds at a nightlife venue in Macau.
I blew up on the spot. I took screenshot comparisons of the finely retouched images in the PDF and the nightclub promotional photos, then called the platform’s complaint phone number. The person on the other end had a very cold voice. They only asked for the order number, then dropped this line: a specialist would contact you. Click—hang up.
The next day, the specialist really returned my call. They admitted there was a lapse in the verification and were willing to compensate with an equivalent points package, which could be directly deducted from my next purchase. I said I don’t accept points; I want a full refund. The specialist was silent for three seconds, then said a refund was possible, but I would need to sign an agreement promising not to disclose to any third party the consultant information involved in this service.
I said okay. The agreement was mailed over, and I read it word for word—down at the bottom, in tiny print, it said that if I violated the agreement, I would need to return the full refund and pay compensation for the platform’s reputation loss fee.
I smiled. I made three copies of the agreement, mailed one back, circled that tiny-print line in red, and wrote two words next to it: Guess.
As for the other two copies, they are now in the file cabinet at my law firm, and in the complaint letter mailbox of the local consumer association.