Mobile Phone Insurance Scam (again) - Be warned

cabbage

HI

Just wanted to warn Money Savers that a friend of mine has been scammed after buying a new phone from Car Phone Warehouse. She took out insurance from CPW but was called several days later by someone pretending to be from CPW offering cheaper phone insurance, foolishly she gave them her bank details.

Now she has received documents from phone insurance co. in Doncaster(registered at Companies House in January 09 with incorrect contact details) and it looks like they will be taking £80 out of her account. Even though she already has insurance via CPW. The company are not registered with FSA to sell insurance. They get round this by selling "warranties". The terms and conditions of the "insurance" are grossly unfair and virtually every circumstance involving losing your phone or having it stolen will not be covered by their policy. Their policy looks like it was knocked up on word by a primary school pupil. She is using the cooling off period to cancel and hopefully get back any money they have taken out.

On top of this £105 has been taken via Megapay.

I've searched the forums and this seems to be a common thread. Please, please take note of this scam. It mainly happens to new phones bought on vodaphone and o2. There is differing opinion on whether some information is being taken from CPW's records but if you get a call from someone offering insurance for your new phone ask them to send you the details. If they are genuine they will glady do this. I can hear you say that you never give bank details over the phone but judging from this forum, many have been caught out by a carefully worded call or the caller seemed to have quite a bit of your information so you thought it was legit or you just got caught at a bad/mad/busy moment and gave details.

My friend is taking steps to get the money back via her bank and will be reporting Ebell to the FSA and trading standards.

Please don't get caught out.

Littlemiss27

Really sorry to hear about your friend, hope she manages to get everything sorted.

There's a good watchdog article on mobile phone insurance scams on the bbc watchdog site (cant post links yet), it's under their computers and communications section.

Apparently the way they work is by going into a retailer and asking about a contract on a specific network, they say they are looking for a good number and ask to seem some of those available. Knowing that the networks normally make available batches of concurrent numbers, they then call all the numbers proceeding the ones they looked at and pretend to be calling from that company or network.

FYI there is also a page about insurance scams in the insurance policy booklet your friend should have recieved from CPW; it may offer some further advice.

MandyQue

DS has just got a new mobile phone, his first contract phone. Someone rang him to discuss his insurance and he agree to a one off payment of £95 to save £85 off his insurance cover payments. He then found out that it wasn't Vodafone, but some random who'd rang him up. He had given them his bank details and they have taken £95.

He got his documents today and they look like they've been printed on Wordart, tried googling and came up with nothing. I reported it to Trading Standards, who seemed a bit unhelpful, saying they couldn't give me any details as to whether this company is legit or not.

Anyway, I got a phone call at 10am this morning confirming my fears. We have two pieces of useless paper that cost £95. Trading Standards in Swansea called me up and told me they were investigating and that ours was actually the first one with this particular address, although they'd heard of Elite Cover before. So I've sent them copies of the documents, given them as much information as possible, and DS has cancelled his bank card and reported them to the bank so they can investigate themselves. TS also told us to send a recorded delivery letter requesting cancellation and a refund, I assume that will be so they can get them done for refusing that too.

I suspect he will be a bit more wise from now on, I just hope there's a way of getting his money back.

This company is called Elite Cover, although it seems that this is happening a lot from sources in Swansea, under various different names. If you get a new phone, especially from Phones 4 U or Carphone Warehouse BEWARE!!!!! They buy up handsets, SIMs and phone numbers in batches so they are all in numerical order. All the scammers have to do is buy a cheap handset and work out the numbers 100 or so either side of it, which have inevitably been bought recently. If you get any phone calls to discuss phone insurance DO NOT GIVE THEM ANY DETAILS. I know that's something most of us already know, but ds was young and naive and with the best will in the world, these people know how to confuse you into thinking all kinds of stuff.

AJStevens

cabbage wrote: »

My friend is taking steps to get the money back via her bank and will be reporting Ebell to the FSA and trading standards.

Ah ha! Thank you, finally confirmation that they were dodgy, darn.

Here's my post on the O2 forums. What annoys me is apparently CPW stores are supposed to have warning leaflets an drawing customer's attention to this. I wasn't given this leaflet nor a warning, what's worse is that since having my iPhone I've been bombarded by O2 anyway, SMS messages and phone calls checking if I'm ok with the iPhone and "Top tips" for the Iphone and "Hi sir, how are you getting on with your iPhone", gah! So my guard was down. My other phone I've had with T-Mobile for 10+ years and they never call me. Anywhere, here's my full posts. The charge has appeared on my account now from E BELL UK LTD for £34.99 at least I choose their 3 Payments option instead of the single or two payments, I'd have lost £80 or £105 then.

AJStevens wrote:

I too have just been tricked by these scammers.
I am so angry, at them, myself and to some degree O2 and Carephone Warehouse.
I'm pretty sure they had some info on me and not simply just my number, I'm not normally tricked into giving them all the information. I think from the sounds of it CW have an information leak.
I'm also angry at O2 because they, unknowingly, helped to make them convincing. I've had an O2 iPhone for just over two months, and have had tonnes of SMS's and phone calls from O2, ranging from offering extra services to, am I doing alright, do I know how to use the iPhone... whereas I've had a TMob phone for over 10 years and barely heard from them.
So when I was getting pestered by this blocked number, my guard was already down when they say they are working with O2. It had rung me several times but I'd been too busy or not gotten to it in time.
Why on earth didn't O2 or Carephone warehouse warn me? THAT would have been a USEFUL text message to receive from them.
I am really annoyed at myself though for falling for it, all I can think is lack of sleep being a new Dad dulled my senses for a moment of weakness.
The only saving grace is I had a bad feeling after getting off the phone, I googled, found this and realised quickly. I also went for the 3 split payments instead of one or two, so looks like they'll only be taking £34.99 out of the account. With a new member of the family and the wife on maternity pay, that is £34.99 I can't afford to be conned out of... I hope these people get theirs, this life or the next.
They did all the tricks above... which subdued the tiny voice that did go "..erm.." briefly and quietly while giving my number over. "Martyn" even passed me over to the quality call department where a female confirmed I was happy to go ahead with it... further confusing and reassuring/silencing the little voice.
Ruined my weekend now, this is all I can think about, I'm literally beating myself up over it.

MandyQue

Had another call from Swansea today, apparently Trading Standards are already in the middle of taking them to court and the lady said she can't believe they're STILL doing it! She got the stuff we sent yesterday and hopefully it will be lots of good evidence towards their case to get them stopped. The documents we got match others they have sent under different names, all bogus and worthless.

Just hoping the lad can get his money back now, he's re-instated the insurance with Vodafone on his mobile so he's covered properly now.

Littlemiss27

AJStevens wrote: »

Ah ha! Thank you, finally confirmation that they were dodgy, darn.

Here's my post on the O2 forums. What annoys me is apparently CPW stores are supposed to have warning leaflets an drawing customer's attention to this. I wasn't given this leaflet nor a warning, what's worse is that since having my iPhone I've been bombarded by O2 anyway, SMS messages and phone calls checking if I'm ok with the iPhone and "Top tips" for the Iphone and "Hi sir, how are you getting on with your iPhone", gah! So my guard was down. My other phone I've had with T-Mobile for 10+ years and they never call me. Anywhere, here's my full posts. The charge has appeared on my account now from E BELL UK LTD for £34.99 at least I choose their 3 Payments option instead of the single or two payments, I'd have lost £80 or £105 then.

Carphone Warehouse don't have warning leaflets, what they have is a page in their insurance policy booklet regarding these companies. If you didn't purchase insurance from them then there would be no reason to give you a policy book.

Might be worth popping into the store that you bought it from to advise them that you weren't warned about fraudulent insurance companies when you made your purchase. May just be a case that someone instore needs more training.

AJStevens

Well, they used to according to this article:
Ok as a new user I can't post a link, so simply put www . theregister . co . uk before this: /2005/01/20/cpw_phone_insurance/

I was just trying to confirm that "E Bell" were defiantely one of these companies, as I've seen a lot of names flying around and it wasn't one of them.

"Martyn" gave me a number and I rang it back and the person answered saying "Something House" and I said, "Err, what company is there please?" She said something like "Bell", so... that's a bit surprising. I hid my number and initially had it on mute when I called them, heh.

Don't have the phone number to hand, it's at home, will update this post with the number when I get home, but is there any point to calling them? Since they have all my details including name and address... I'd rather they just think I'm in the "been done" pile and not think anymore of me. Hopefully I can dispute the payment with the bank and get the money back. Last thing I want is them doing anything else with my information because I rang them back and stand out.

AJStevens

Has anyone got anywhere with this?
At first my bank (Lloyds) told me I had to wait for the charge to go through before they could even see who it was from, so I waited...

Then I tried calling, oddly, they've hidden ALL their numbers but the telephone banking.

Everytime I call, I have to go through the checking procedure, understandable, I know it's for my security, but when you've gone through it several times in one afternoon, it's pretty irritating.

Firstly, I have to get past the "robot" to a human, then try to explain it, then be told, ok that's not this department "Err.. I rang customer services! It's the only frickin' number on the site/card.

I'm then passed to (incorrectly) Credit Card, who pass me onto Credit Card Fraud (I have both Debit and Credit with them, and at some point I got send down the wrong path but was told they can handle both).

Next I'm sent to Debit Cards, they pass me to the Debit Card Fraud team, you might think by now I'm getting close, oh and did I mention this doesn't all happen in one call, there are many hangups, engages, or voicemail, or just a dead line (no sound) and I have to redial, redial, redial, go through the security... cause all I have is the Customer services number.

I'm then told I need to go to "Disputes", (I'll be asking for !!!!!!!' "Complaints" in a second), who when I ring them, get an answer phone, continous (for like a solid 5 minutes) hold music, dead line, or hung up.

I go through the above process again, where someone tells me "Yea... they may only be there in office hours" Great, because of course, all Fraud happens in Office Hours, doesn't it?!

Finally after getting someone in customer services/debit card team, I don't know can't remember, to ring them FOR me and not pass me on until they've spoken to them, I finally got passed safely to someone in Disputes (took a while though).

I was given some BS about the telephone banking block I put on interferred with it (which the suggested I do along with cancelling the Debit card and getting a new one at the time it happened).

Then of course Disputes say they'll send out a form for me to fill in, please wait 7-10 days... wel that time is just about up, it was just over a month ago this charge appeared on my debit/current account.

Good grief, the wheels turn slowly in some of these companies. Why on EARTH, Customer services can't send out the form, or tell Dispute to send one out I don't know, instead I have to spend a fortnight trying to get someone on the phone.

halfl1fe

I was called this morning with exactly this scam. A guy called up from EbellDOTcoDOTuk [this website doesn't seem to exist] which he said was britains number one insurer of mobile phones.

he knew that I had recently purchased an iphone from carphone warehouse and had service with O2. i wonder how he gets this information. This is very very shady if you ask me.

he then talked about a special promotion, essentially halving the cost of my phone insurance. This sounded potentially too good to be true, so I was wary. Then he said: just need to confirm a couple of details. I said I did not give out details and was there a number i could call so that I could feel more confident. he did not seem flapped at all by this, and immediately gave me a number@ 0844 335 0424.

I googled for Ebell and came across this forum on moneysavingexpert. So, for sure I'm not calling him back. Thanks moneysavingexpert, you have indeed saved me some money.

I'd really like to know how scammer got my details. This seems a huge lapse of security by carphone warehouse or o2.

for the record: he claimed his name was richard. he called from 07907 087011.

i hate scamming pieces of sh*t like these companies that defraud honest people out of cash. I feel like I dodged a bullet but many old grannies or honest but naive good people will get ripped of by these immoral scumbags. Is there anything I can do to pursue them or report them?

Kilty_2

halfl1fe wrote: »

I'd really like to know how scammer got my details. This seems a huge lapse of security by carphone warehouse or o2.
?

My undestanding of it is that they call blocks of numbers they know to be O2 numbers registered by CPW - ie they pick say 07525 06x xxx and call each number in that block (or something like that - it's probably more scientific)

They don't get any details from CPW or O2.

SallyRose_2

A year ago I bought an iPhone from Carphone Warehouse. a few days later I was called with insurance offers that, with hindsight, were too good to be true. A company called Sealaway ltd based in Swansea. Stupidly I gave them my details and received through the post an insurance certificate which seemed fine.

Last month I smashed the screen on my phone. So, of course, I called the insurance company. The number did not exist. I emailed them. The email bounced. I googled them and found loads of forums for the company screaming at me to not give bank details. silly me. A year ago they took £105 from my bank account for what they said was 18 months insurance.

When I realised all this I was extremely ticked off but really glad my phone didnt break last year.

Anyway this morning I got a call from a different company saying 'We just wondered if you would like to renew the insurance you took out with us a year ago'. The guy I spoke to had a strong Welsh Accent. I asked where the company were based and he said Doncaster. I said that I had taken out insurance with a company which had turned out to be fraudulent. Then he started asking how much I had paid and the name of the company which I refused to give.

he said

"well Miss, if you will go around looking on the internet and claiming fraudulent behaviour and wont give me any information then we cant do much for you" then he hung up.

Im so annoyed that I didnt get the name of the company but it all happened so fast that I didnt have chnace to write it down.

However I am so glad that I didnt get stung twice.