Virgo Healthcare Nottingham - on Watchdog

trisontana

Lets hope they get locked up for a long time.

Paul_Varjak

The courts don't like conman who prey on the elderly. In our area, one man got a sentence in excess of 7 years!

trumpton

Good news. The authorities are taking these companies more seriously now and using criminal charges, instead of consumer regs offences.

The fact is that some of these mobility companies have been criminal enterprises from the outset, intent on fraud by intimidation.

It is time that any mobility company had to have a license and that contracts signed alone in the customer's home are not valid.

No doubt the guilty plea is to get time off the sentence. Let's hope they get 5 years and steps are taken to recover the profits which these scum have made from the misery of others.

geemele

I just want to post a message/thread on the unscrupulous Amerjit Gill..
I am 99percent sure that this fellow sold Kirby Vacuum cleaners from Sept 1986 onwards,as I did..He was based in the Derby office and I was based in the Nottingham office..I only lasted a couple of months,a very difficult sell..Back then the cleaners were selling for £1000.00..
If I remember rightly he went by the name of "Amo" which is short for Amerjhit.This is too much of a coincidence for me to be talking about the wrong person.His mugshot,although a little different now is still recognisable,bearing in mind he is now fifty..
He was in his mid twenties when he sold kirbys..
Let me tell and to be fair to Amo he was an exceptional sales person..Very Very good..You had to be very good to sell kirbys,he was one of those who excelled in this role and made about £600 per week..That was a sustantial amount of money in those days..To earn in a week..
You had to be hard,rogue..ish,to sell kirbys..Make no mistake about it and its those qualities that put him in good stead to sell mobility products,scooters etc...

canary111

Please find below a press release from Derbyshire Trading Standards.

The boss of two former mobility companies which were featured on the BBC's Watchdog programme has been jailed after admitting defrauding elderly victims out of over £40,000.
Our trading standards team carried out one of its biggest ever investigations after receiving a wave of complaints about companies called Virgo Healthcare Limited and Lifestyle.
Both were run from premises on Gainsborough Business Park, Long Eaton, by husband and wife Amarjit Gill, 51, and Ranjit Gill, 45, of Brackenfield Drive, Giltbrook, Nottingham.
Yesterday (Dec 17), appearing at Leicester Crown Court, Amarjit Gill was sentenced to 18 months in prison for what Judge Mooncey described as 'disgraceful activities'.
At a previous hearing the Gills had both admitted 25 charges for offences which saw them fraudulently make £42,515 from elderly victims. Ranjit Gill was given a 12 month prison sentence, suspended for two years, and ordered to do 200 hours of unpaid community work. Both Amarjit Gill and Ranjit Gill were banned from being company directors for five years.
Staff from Virgo Healthcare and Lifestyle sold mobility aids − including reclining chairs, orthopaedic beds and walk-in showers − costing up to £3,892 to elderly buyers through home visits after speculative telesales calls.
Some of the fraud offences related to the elderly victims not being given their money back when they tried to cancel the contract during the legal seven day cooling off period − this right to cancel is given to anyone who agrees a contract in their own home.
In the worst cases, the goods weren't even delivered to the victims − leaving them significantly out of pocket and without the mobility aids they had paid for.
Councillor Kevin Parkinson, our Cabinet Member for Regeneration, said:

"This was one of our biggest ever investigations and we're pleased justice has been done.
These crimes targeted some of the most vulnerable members of our communities in their own homes.
The judge in this case acknowledged Amarjit Gill's total disregard for a six month suspended prison sentence made against him in February 2011 after we took action against his previous company ABM Mobility under the Enterprise Act.
Our trading standards team will always take the strongest possible action in such cases and unscrupulous traders should be aware that we will not tolerate crimes of this nature."

David Messom, 27, of Maws Lane, Kimberley, Nottingham and Samuel Routh, 26, of Wilkinson Close, Chilwell, Nottingham, were employed by the Gills as managers. Messom was sentenced to 12 months in prison, suspended for two years, and ordered to do 200 hours unpaid community work, after pleading guilty to nine fraud charges.
Routh was sentenced to nine months in prison, suspended for two years, and ordered to do 180 hours unpaid community work, after pleading guilty to eight fraud charges.
The BBC's flagship consumer protection programme Watchdog featured the trading practices of Virgo Healthcare Limited and Lifestyle. Both companies are no longer trading.