MSE News: Fake EHIC websites shut down

sm2012

i became victim of this internet scam in the process of getting national insurance number. they say they are going to refund money in 7days. after going through this thread i dont think i will get my money back.:(

Pollycat

The title of your posts reads

lost 77£ on this yesterday

Did you use this website:
http://nhsehic.org.uk/

it says the standard fee is £19.50 per application - £77 does not divide by £19.50.
How many EHIC did you apply for?

Did you not see the bit on the homepage that tells you what the £19.50 covers and what you get if you apply for free from NHS?

Alfredbarber

it's all very well to say read before you click, but not everyone is as Internet savvy as you and you need to be aware of this before you make such condescending comments.

Hundreds of elderly people are conned by cold callers every year and this really is no different except its not just older people conned, although I expect many do fall into the bracket of silver surfers.

The history of the guys who set these sites up speaks for itself. My elderly mother in law lost £30 trying to renew a passport. She searched google for "renew passport" clicked the top link to passport.uk.com and filled in the form paying £29. She thought it would come off the £70 the passport costs.

They have found a means of preying on people who are not sophisticated and the fact that they have repeated the scam many time over is a strong argument that it is not the poor souls conned by them that is at fault but rather our Trading Standards and other bodies like Google who host their ads and Webfusion who host the websites like who4.com that are failing us.

itsmedaz

OMG
what an idiot i am
Applied for my passport with this crew on line at their address of passportuk.com.
was in a rush to do it on my break at home wasn't till i got back to work did alarm bells start to ring , site looks professional Google address in street view a house i saw mmm ohh dear not looking good.
looked at the company name in small writing at the bottom of the page wh04 ltd did some re search seriously not looking good.
god i just wished i had found this thread sooner all my details including mothers maiden name grandparents names DOB everything credit card details the lot included a £40 charge .
i am in desperate measures here in what i should do in identity theft and personal details god i feel an idiot. anyone any ideas in what i should do these people should be caught as soon as.

Pollycat

itsmedaz wrote: »

OMG
what an idiot i am
Applied for my passport with this crew on line at their address of passportuk.com.
was in a rush to do it on my break at home wasn't till i got back to work did alarm bells start to ring , site looks professional Google address in street view a house i saw mmm ohh dear not looking good.
looked at the company name in small writing at the bottom of the page wh04 ltd did some re search seriously not looking good.
god i just wished i had found this thread sooner all my details including mothers maiden name grandparents names DOB everything credit card details the lot included a £40 charge .
i am in desperate measures here in what i should do in identity theft and personal details god i feel an idiot. anyone any ideas in what i should do these people should be caught as soon as.

Daz
this thread is about applying for/renewing EHIC cards, not passports.

This thread discusses a similar website to the one you used for your passport application:
https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/4380089

I don't know about 'your' website but UK-passport.net does give refunds IF you use the appropriate method of contacting them (and that isn't trying to cancel your payment with your card provider or ringing all sorts of other agencies) and you get to them in time before they've gone too far through the process.

Hang on!
I've looked at passportuk.com and it doesn't look professional at all (at least to me).
It just seems to give links to other websites.

I think you need to check the website that you ended up at from whatever link you followed on passportuk.com and take the advice I've given above or the advice given several times in the linked thread.

As others have said on various threads about the passport and EHIC websites, these companies are just charging an admin fee to those people who are not wary enough to ensure they have got the right website.
I don't think (but may be wrong) that they are identity theft websites.

MIMandG

I have only just realised I have been duped by the .europeanhealthcard.org.uk/applications website
a month after I got the health card and paid for the fast track service. There must be many like me who don't even know they were duped . I thought i was on the official site applying on line. I have only just found out because having been duped today into applying on line for a SORN and a car tax refund which I though was via the DVLA , I discovered I had paid money to a company called Caveat Viator Ltd . Translates as Traveller Beware! Searches about this company led me to this thread . So this outfit took £25 from me in a scam for the healthcard and I didn't even know it . I did of course get the health card. However I did realise I had been scammed for the DVLA on line applications. £75 . I assumed that the DVLA had begun charging. I am amazed at the ingenuity of these guys at WHO4 and Caveat Viator Ltd. They seem to be the same guys popping up with different websites all on the same theme. It is clearly scamming and in contravention of Distance Selling Regulations, Unfair contract terms and probably fraud. Shame on google and others for passing these websites and allowing them to pop up ahead of the official websites in the searches. Well now I know. Caveat Emptor as Caveat Viator Ltd would say laughing all the way to the bank! Hope they end up in prison for defrauding people

Pollycat

MIMandG wrote: »

It is clearly scamming and in contravention of Distance Selling Regulations, Unfair contract terms and probably fraud. Shame on google and others for passing these websites and allowing them to pop up ahead of the official websites in the searches. Well now I know. Caveat Emptor as Caveat Viator Ltd would say laughing all the way to the bank! Hope they end up in prison for defrauding people

If it is clearly scamming and you hope they end up in jail, have you reported them to Trading Standards?

And maybe to the Police if fraud has been committed?

And beware when applying for a passport or a driving test - they've got fingers in those pies too!

Pollycat

Maybe take a look at this website:

http://www.actionfraud.police.uk/home

Thoroughlyfedup

I have just been duped by a similar website, which looks like the government gateway for submitting tax returns. It comes up at the top on Google!

I cannot believe I was SOOO stupid!! I paid £650 - yes £650 - yesterday to what I thought was the HMRC website, to submit my tax return. I naively thought they were asking for a down payment of tax!

The minute I realised what I had done (seconds after I paid) I emailed the company (no response), called them (the number is unobtainable, replied to a text (message could not be delivered).

I neither needed, nor wanted the checking and forwarding service, I had done all the calculations myself, but I was in a rush and that's what they rely on. Nasty, dirty, immoral, but by all accounts, legal!

I believe that the directors of the company running this site are the same people responsible for the others, but this time they have excelled themselves. Don't go near them!

ekeitout

So cross with myself as I went to renew EHIC cards and by accident logged onto ehic-org.uk (which looks very much like to Official site. In a moment of brain freeze I found myself entering my debit card details authorising payment but it did not say how much I was paying. Only after logging off did I realise how completely stupid i'd been.
How can I cancel payment?? any ideas, anyone?