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DOORSTEP CRIME UPDATES Please scroll down to find required alert For Alerts appertaining to Preston Area Please Visit www.pnwa.co.uk |
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Please note: If you do decide to deal with tradesmen who cold-call uninvited, make sure you obtain full name, address and landline details, ask for identification, and do not let them in the house.
Please be aware that you will have a seven-day cooling off period to change your mind, cancel any purchases you have made over £35, and obtain a refund. Also be aware that the contract will not be enforceable against you unless information about your right to cancel is given in writing.
Please refer any complaints to Lancashire Trading Standards Service, 56-58 Guildhall Street, Preston, Lancs via Consumer Direct tel 08454 040506. If there is any threat or fear of burglary contact the police at once.
Doorstep Crime /Scam UpdateScam Update
15 July 2008
Residents are asked to be wary about an unknown white male who is currently believed to be operating in the Chatburn, Ribble Valley area.
He has recently knocked on an elderly lady's door in Chatburn & told her he was Keith from a company called Morbens (a real company who are believed to be unconnected with this man) & handed over the contact details for this company.
The woman bought a mattress for £300 cash and was driven to the bank by the trader who ensured that she used her bank card to withdraw the money. She is unhappy with the product but is unable to obtain a refund since the contact details she has are unconnected to the actual trader who sold the goods.
The trader cold calls and does not give written cancellation rights as required by law, he breaches the Business Names Act requirements, and he is prepared to apply pressure in order to get payment.
6 June 2008
Residents are asked to be wary about two men with Irish accents, who have been recently working in the Aughton area offering to carry out gardening work door to door. They use a mobile number and a number with a 01704 area code, and drive a white transit van with a trailer and the name of the company on the side. The name of the company is believed to consist of two initials followed by Tree Technology. They have a card which states they offer special rates of 35% discount for OAPs, and that will accept payment by cheque but refuse to do this in practice. On one occasion they drove an elderly lady to the cashpoint and charged several hundred pounds to trim a hedge.
Secondly be aware that a Trader called Tree Services, believed to start with a man’s name, who also claim to offer special rates for OAPs but in this case use a 01254 number, recently cold called an elderly lady in the Skelmersdale area and charged her £380 to trim some trees. Despite disagreeing with the price she was intimidated into paying in cash since three men came into her house to tell her the final cost and take the money.
Thirdly, there are concerns about a trader named after a local river valley, who uses a 01524 number and advertises in local newspapers including the Citizen, who has recently taken £9,000 from a Morecambe resident for painting, flooring and guttering work which has apparently been badly done or is unfinished. Two men work together to carry out the jobs, and are aggressive when their standard of work is questioned.
All of the above three traders are believed to cold call and not give written cancellation rights, there are also indications that they are prepared to apply pressure in order to get payment.
12 May 2008
Reports of Roof Cleaning Service in Clitheroe
Lancashire Trading Standards Service has received a complaint about a business offering to clean and re-seal roof tiles. It is suspected that the “re-sealing” of the tiles is charged for but that the work is not actually carried out.
The business is also offering a ten year guarantee that may prove difficult to enforce, as the paperwork bears no address.
9 May 2008
Residents in the PR6 area of Chorley are alerted to concerns about a high pressure sales team selling carpet cleaners and currently operating in their area.
The company is contacting residents and offering to clean carpets for free in return for comments on the cleaning performance. However, once in the house to provide this free service, the salesmen refuse to leave until they have sold one of the cleaners. In one house they stayed for over two hours until the sale was finally agreed.
They are believed to be targeting elderly and vulnerable consumers with hard line sales techniques.
Be warned that if you or your neighbours deal with this company you may end up paying £2000 for an unwanted vacuum cleaner.
25 April 2008
Residents in the FY8 area of Fleetwood are alerted to concerns about a security company based in Southport but currently operating in their area.
The company, known to Lancashire Trading Standards Service, is offering to install or improve security systems, and is believed to be targeting consumers with hard line sales techniques.
The company contacts householders to ask if a surveyor can look at existing security arrangements and assess if the house is vulnerable to burglars.
If you deal with this company you will pay very high fees, typically £200 for a survey and in excess of £1000 for the work.
Under no circumstances should residents deal with alarm companies who cold call.
15 April 2008
Residents in East Lancashire are advised to be wary of a business in a colourful, pink and blue decorated white van cold calling at the door and offering to Powerwash and sometimes re-paint roofs. These men have recently targeted the Burnley area and are likely to be spreading their operations to other parts of Lancashire in the near future.
They appear to target areas with high concentrations of bungalows and elderly residents, and charge £2,000 to £2,500 per job.
25 February 2008
Residents are advised that there are several scams hitting Lancashire at the moment.
A company calling themselves Bureau Reporting of Bradstock appear to be telling consumers that they have won money but that they have to pay to receive it. We are currently investigating a case where an elderly person from Chorley has lost £8,000.
Another scam involves a complaint about a cloned website selling paintings over the internet, requesting credit card details and taking payments for non-existent products, and then vanishing. This appears to be a cloned copy of a genuine site. Always check before buying on the internet that there are contact details for the site, and that the site is secure- look for a closed padlock on the bottom right of the page.
In addition, Lancashire Trading Standards Service is still receiving complaints with inventive new takes on the African-style scams that have been so prevalent in the last few years. One recent story involves residents in Great Harwood receiving a letter stating that an individual with the same surname as the recipient has dies in an accident in Spain, leaving a £19 million fortune, and that if the recipient agrees to pretend to be a relative of the deceased the inheritance will be shared between the Spanish lawyer and the Lancashire consumer. In this case the documentation, which appears very official, claims to be from Victor Lawson Bill & Exchange Manager.
Another currently popular emailed scam involves a man called Foog Young, who claims to be from Hong Kong and giving a Yahoo email address, before asking for assistance with the transfer of his investment banker relative’s funds to the UK.
Any vulnerable individuals should be warned that it is impossible to win on a foreign lottery unless you actually participate in one, and that many genuine national lotteries are only open to a country’s own residents. Never give out your personal bank details in response to an unsolicited call or mailing.
Fascias
14 February 2008
Lancashire Trading Standards Service wishes to warn Lancashire residents about a drive and gutter cleaning company currently operating in the Fulwood/ Preston area. The men appear to be cold calling, targeting the vulnerable, charging amounts of £550 for little work, and not giving the required written cancellation rights. There are five traders driving a white van, they have Irish accents and claim to be from Birmingham. One man and a cleaning machine is left at each property and collected shortly afterwards.
We also wish to warn residents county-wide about a company which is offering window coatings which are alleged to cut down the need for washing your windows. The salesmen use hard-sell tactics and claim there are grants available for the work- in actual fact the ‘grants’ are discounts from their own original inflated prices. The price paid is many times that you would pay for several years work by window cleaner, and we would advise anyone telephoned by a company offering such a service not to make an appointment with a salesman. 22 January 2008
Reports of poor workmanship by G’n’A Roofline Services
Lancashire Trading Standards Service has received a number of complaints about the quality of work carried out by a company of two men, one with an Irish accent, calling themselves G ‘n’ A Roofline Services, and giving an address in Cheshire on paperwork. G ‘n’ A Roofline Services has been cold calling local residents in the Preston, Lancaster and Chorley areas and offering to fit a dry verge cap system for gable ends, which is a system where plastic caps are fitted to the apex of the roof, in order to protect tiles and stop rain from entering.
There are allegations that the trader initially quotes a high price but then offers a reduced rate to make householders feel that they are getting a bargain. Prices may then be increased when other ‘faults’ are noticed, and in some instances the final bill has been £2,000 or more. Work appears to be carried out to an extremely poor standard and the trader is often reluctant to rectify the faults on any of the complaint premises. Some householders have been forced to pay out again for a reputable company to put the work right and fix leaks in their roofs.
The company is also offering a ten year guarantee that may prove difficult to enforce, as the paperwork bears either no address or just an accommodation address.
14 January 2008
Residents are advised to be wary of several men with Irish accents and a white van who cold called an elderly man in the Accrington area on Friday 11 January, did some unsatisfactory paving work on his drive, and drove him to the bank where he was made to hand over £2,500. They are believed to have also worked in the Ribbleton area lately. Any further information on such callers would be gratefully received.
New scams include customers who have placed adverts in Loot being called by an unconnected man who claims to be from the paper, and wants the placer of the advert to hand over personal and credit card details so that the account can be processed manually following a problem with the details given. He gives a bogus telephone number when challenged.
A company calling themselves US Petroleum Holdings have been writing to Lancashire residents asking if they wish to invest in a new oil well, copies of share certificates are provided and a good return on the investment promised, while a company from Frankfurt, Germany seems to be targeting the recent sellers of shares to ask if they wish to invest the money realised. The latter requests passport and driving licence numbers along with a banker’s draft.
In addition, Lancashire Trading Standards Service is still receiving complaints about bogus foreign lottery companies, often giving addresses in Spain or Holland, with either foreign names or names such as ‘UK Lottery’ or ‘Euromillions’. A recent one is Biotonic Nivelle based in France. They all inform customers they have won a large sum of money but that they must pay an initial administration fee, and often hand over personal bank account details or fill in a form authorising banks to release information. Several Lancashire residents have lost large sums to these scams over the last three months.
Meanwhile the usual fraudulent ‘phishing’ emails claiming to be from Nationwide, Lloyds, RSBC etc are still doing the rounds demanding full account details, and despite publicity we are still receiving reports of victims.
Any vulnerable individuals should be warned that there is an increasing number of these types of companies out there, that it is impossible to win on a foreign lottery unless you actually participate in one, and that many genuine national lotteries are only open to a country’s own residents.
No bona fide lottery, such as the El Gordo Spanish National Lottery, would demand up-front fees. And never give out your personal bank details in response to an unsolicited call or mailing. |