Reports of frauds, deceptions and scams keep appearing, weekly even daily, on
major news channels and newspapers. Some of these frauds seem just too big and remote to be of immediate, direct relevance to our daily lives. But, we will eventually pay for the consequences and damages, in taxes, costs of goods and services, regulations, copy-cats etc.

I hope we can collect, in one thread, frauds and scams, reported or heard. We must become more aware and more educated to guard against frauds and scams
which impact upon the health, well being, and wealth of ourselves and our families.

axdpc - do you live in spain?

goforit, nope. Not yet. Why?

Welcome to the thread :-)

"The fact is that a man who wants to act virtuously in every way necessarily comes to grief among so many who are not virtuous." - Niccolo Machiavelli

We should be less trusting and less willing to give unconditional charities to everyone.

axdpc - its just this comment you came out with

These companies are giving the Spanish people a bad name they do not deserve.

Seems a pretty corrupt place from what I see, all nationalities seem to be here and lots of people getting ripped of, particularly in the property department. Lots of vice, drugs etc. They arrested about 20 local planning officers afew months back.

Bit of an eyeopener for a country boy from Devon but I'm surviving!

goforit, glad to hear you are surviving :-) Why not post some more of the local frauds and scams? I tend to get too serious with my off-trading discussions, so why not tell us about some local interest - sites, customs, restaurents :-)

"These companies are giving the Spanish people a bad name they do not deserve."
Agree. IMO, decent, innocent people are often used as cover for the otherwise.

Perhaps you could suggest to Greystone to organised a Spanish get together for the expatriates?

Take the quiz. Are you a scambuster or will you be scam-busted?

To cut a long story short - Several years ago I lost a large sum of money(jointly with 2 friends 450.000) because a solicitor (sole practitioner) lied to my solicitor, having given him an undertaking. CPS would not prosecute because it was an ongoing case with connections in America, SFO were willing to testify if I took out a civil action against him ( to initiate action needed 50,000), Law society struck him off giving him 28 days to pass his clients on to another firm,Law Society compensation fund would not compensate us one penny because he was a sole practitioner.
I understand he was instrumental in laudering over 1,500,000. and he got clean away (except for being struck off)
Since this time I believe the rules have changed regards how solicitors practice but I am always wary when transfering sums of money through solicitors -I thought undertakings between solicitors were supposed to be reliable.

crockham :-((( Would you get into trouble if you publicise his name?

I don`t see why as the Law Soc. striking off would presumably be publicly listed.
Bran Lindsay Thomas formerly with an office in Wimbledon and I believe still living in Surrey

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uklatest/story/0,,-6017250,00.html

22 held in major VAT fraud probe
Press Association
Tuesday August 15, 2006 9:08 PM

Twenty-two people have been arrested as part of a major investigation into a suspected VAT fraud worth hundreds of millions of pounds.

Police and customs officers swooped at addresses in London, Manchester and Glasgow in the early hours.

More than 60 search warrants were executed during the operation, which is the biggest ever undertaken by HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC).

About 400 HMRC criminal investigators are being supported by 100 officers from Strathclyde, Greater Manchester and the Metropolitan Police in the inquiry.

Gordon Miller, deputy director, HMRC Investigation, said: "Organised criminals are attacking the tax system, with the aim of stealing huge amounts of revenue. The scale of the problem across Europe is unprecedented, and HMRC has significantly strengthened its response to this serious fraud.

"The operation, the biggest ever undertaken by HMRC, is part of a large-scale, international criminal investigation into frauds that may run to hundreds of millions of pounds."

Police made 15 of the detentions in the Glasgow area, five in the Manchester area and two in London. The investigation is focused on a highly sophisticated scam known as "carousel" fraud. It involves importing small high-value goods such as mobile phones free of VAT from EU countries, then selling them with 17.5% tax added in the UK.

Instead of handing the VAT to the Government, the importing company, run by criminals, is hastily shut down and they pocket the cash. This loss of tax is often compounded when the new owners of the goods export them again and can legally reclaim VAT they paid.

Goods go round in a "carousel" via bogus supply chains within and beyond the EU as they are imported and exported again and again. Mr Miller added: "We are committed to tackling carousel fraud and to showing the criminals behind it, wherever they operate in the world, that there are no safe havens."

Carousel fraud is estimated to have cost the UK Exchequer up to 1.9 billion in stolen VAT revenues between 2004 and 2005.

Travel agents warn of holiday Web scam

" LONDON (Reuters) - Travel agents warned holidaymakers on Friday to be careful about booking trips online after an Internet scam was uncovered that has left nearly 3,000 people out of pocket.

A number of fake holiday Web sites, thought to be operated by the same individuals, have been set up and then quickly closed once people have been conned into paying for non-existent holidays, the Association of British Travel Agents (ABTA) said.

"We understand there are six or seven Web site names that have been defrauding people," said ABTA's Dee Byrne.

She said about 3,000 people have been hit by the con.

"Unfortunately many will have lost their money unless they paid by credit card, in which case they should be able to recoup their losses," she added.

The Metropolitan Police, the Fraud Squad and the Office of Fair Trading (OFT) are all investigating the scam which is thought to have netted hundreds of thousands of pounds.

Byrne said ABTA's advice is to check its own Web site or that of other affiliated organisations like ATOL - (Air Travel Organisers' Licensing) to make sure their holiday firm is bona fide.

"We are saying 'just be careful about booking holidays over the Internet'. Obviously there are a lot of good companies that are perfectly OK, but people need to check," she said.

Byrne said people should be wary of too readily accepting an offer if it looks too good to be true and should instead spend sometime making simple checks on the credentials of the holiday firm."

Cornhill Insurance callback scam 01454 201129

Here's a cheeky little number that someone at Cornhill Insurance dreamed up and was probably paid very well for:

Your home phone rings and you answer it. But there's nobody on the line.
You do 1471 and get the above number. Naturally you ring straight back to find out who wants you etc.

Surprise, surprise. It's a recorded announcement from Cornhill stating that they've tried to contact you re an insurance quote.

I don't know what the rest of the message says as I hung up.

This just sounds like what happens in a telemarketing centre. The computers are programmed to dial the next few calls ahead to keep the throughput up, and when you answer the call is put through to an available agent. If there is no available agent, you will hear nothing on the line. Ofcom recently made these companies provide a calling number and limit the percentage of these failed calls to a certain amount. The number 01454 of course is just a normal geographic number, they are not making any money from you.

Watch out for a bogus BT call

"Con artists have come up with a new scam for getting bank account details from the unsuspecting public.

Beds Police say householders have been conned into giving bank details to someone pretending to be from British Telecom.

Victims have been phoned at home and told they owe BT a small amount of money which, unless it is paid immediately, will lead to their phone being cut off.

In spite of arguing with "BT" for several minutes, the latest victim was eventually persuaded by the caller to use her debit card over the phone to "pay" the 14 he claimed she owed.

As she normally pays her bill by direct debit, she then called BT's complaints department about the mix-up and was told they had not in fact contacted her at all.

They also advised her to contact her bank when she subsequently did this she found that 1,932 had been removed from her account.

Other victims have lost amounts ranging between 30 and 2,173, where their account details have subsequently been used for purchases.

Victims of the scam say the caller is very plausible and even gets a "manager" to call back later in the day to confirm that the payment has gone through and the bill settled.

Police are warning the public never to give personal details, especially bank details, to unexpected telephone callers even if they seem plausible and contact the company yourself to discuss the matter.

The same goes for internet banking. Emails seeming to be from a bank requesting security details are always an attempt by fraudsters to steal money and should be ignored."

What politicians etc don't realise, don't care or even not in their interest to stop is that frauds and scams are clear, serious and present danger to the UK. 7/7 is trivial by comparison.

New data theft scandal rocks subcontinent's call centres

" Conal Walsh
Sunday September 3, 2006
The Observer

Leading British and American companies face being dragged into an emerging fraud scandal at a call centre company in India.

V-Angels, a Delhi-based outsourcing company that handles customer inquiries for telecoms firms in the West, has reported a number of employees to the police for allegedly stealing highly confidential customer data.

Som Mandal, V-Angels' lawyer, confirmed that the firm had made a police complaint. He declined to identify V-Angels' clients, citing commercial confidentiality, but confirmed that they include 'half a dozen blue chip companies in Britain and the US'.

BT, Cable & Wireless and Vodafone all have substantial outsourcing operations in India but each denied this weekend that it had any contracts with V-Angels.

Although nobody has yet been found guilty of wrongdoing, the affair will raise fears about cyber crime and data protection in India.

Earlier this summer a worker at HSBC's data processing centre in Bangalore was charged with using British customers' personal details to raid their online accounts. Last year staff at another call centre were accused of stealing thousands of dollars from Citibank customers.

Numerous banks and utility companies have moved their call centres to India, where labour costs are cheaper. The trend has been criticised by the Amicus union and some customers who have complained about poor service."

Lloyds manager jailed over fraudulent bank loans plot

"A former Lloyds TSB manager has been jailed for two years and three months for passing customers' personal details to criminal gangs who then used the information to set up fraudulent bank accounts and obtain loans.

Seevaratnam Sivathasan, who was an assistant manager at a Lloyds branch in Putney, west London, had already pleaded guilty to 18 counts of corruption and three of theft against the bank's customers.

Passing sentence at Croydon Crown Court yesterday, Allen Gore QC told Sivathasan that the jail term reflected the fact that he had "grossly abused" the trust of Lloyds and its customers.

The Sivathasan case is the latest to be brought in a two-year investigation by the City of London Police fraud squad called Operation Horizon. It is looking into bank staff suspected of working with external gangs who have stolen collectively more than 3.5m from customers' accounts. To date more than 30 people have been arrested and over 30 search warrants executed.

..."

KAYAK,

Tonight I have received another call from Cornhill - 01454 201129.

This has to be a scam, if you ring the number, (non premium) you will hear their reocrded message.

Still not sure what the scam is Andy, Cornhill don't make any money from calls to that number, but if you listen to the message it says they tried to contact you regarding an insurance quote, may ring you again, but if you wish you can get back to them on an 0800 number. If it's a telephone dialling scam it's the first with an 0800 number :-)

Kayak,

Ok I have now had a call where they did not hang up!

I mentioned to the guy about the hang ups, and he said a lot of people complained about that!

My take on this now is the following;

They call you for only one or two rings, so most people won't be able to answer in time, cost to Cornhill = 0

You ring 1471 and hear the recorded message, you pay for the call at normal rates, cost to you = 5p maximum.

After hearing the message, you are interested and use the 0800 number, cost to Cornhill say 20p, but they have a prospect that has bothered to ring, so more likely they can turn that prospect into a customer!

Only my theory, but I accept it's not a scam, just an annoyance really.