PAYFORIT, Wolf in sheeps clothing???

Intasun32

A few years ago when mobile phone users were having money removed from their account without authorization (AKA theft) by means of unsolicited (and unwanted) chargeable texts, the premium rate industry came up with an idea to make themselves look more organised. With the blessing of Phone Pay Plus, OFCOM,and all the networks PAYFORIT was born. It consisted of a consortium of premium rate service providers.

Recently there have been quite a few threads regarding unsolicited premium rate texts with a 7000xxxxxxx prefix. When these first appeared a while ago T-Mobile & Virgin media, where the text first surfaced, denied any knowledge about them as did OFCOM & Phone Pay Plus. Now on the Phone Pay Plus (the premium rate industry regulator) website it confirms that these prefixes belong to payments made through PAYFORIT. Unlike a short code, the usual method ofsending and receiving premium rate texts, PP+ do not show the details of which company has sent the text, why is this?

Having done some simple research on the PP+ & PAYFORIT web sites I have come up with some interesting facts. (Which are accessible to anyone.) Of the 14 companies that make up PAYFORIT only two have not been fined (see adjudications on the PP+ web site) by the industry regulator, Phone Pay Plus, for breaching its regulations and taking money from mobile phone accounts without the owner’s consent. In the real world this is known as ‘theft’ but as I have been informed bythe City Of London Police, the mobile phone industry operates in a grey area ofthe Law. Why is this?



PAYFORIT Companies.

(In brackets are the number of fines/breaches of regulations made by Phone Pay Plus. Remember not all scams are reported or acted upon by PP+.)

2Ergo (20)

Banjo

Dialogue Communications (19)

Ericsson IPX (13)

24GMedia

Mblox (58)

Mobile Interactive Group aka MIG (12)

Sybase365 (5)

Open Market (5)

Netsize (7)

Tanla (17)

Oxygene8 (1)

WIN (48)

Zong (1)

diamonds

Payforit is owned by the big 5 & completely unregulated by Ofcom or anyone - it was set up in such a way by big 5 & Ofcom do nothing ! The 14 companies are subcontracted by Payforit - and yes they are mostly dodgy as hell from the deregulation from Ofcom to PP+, like private company Telecom ombusman's - paid for by the network you make the complaint against.

There is very little protection given to consumers as Ofcom deregulated it all - open market, your are expected to go to court and pay all the costs - if you exhaust all the external "ombusman" companies to no avail EVEN when they ignore law & legislation.

Ofcom is a shambles, Oftel done its job - Ofcom made it a open market for anyone to make money out of it.

The mobile networks paid billions for 3G & in exchange get away with murder at the consumer expense - I've posted this repeatadly for years but none of you, government ministers or even peoples champion Martin take up the fight of it...you all expect the next person to do it.

I tried & failed as Ofcom ignored my complaint against it saying it fell in legisltion, the relevent minister was not interested....

Research it & make a formal complaint to your MP people, make a online petition.TAKE A STANCE. (oh no but you will all just carry on moaning regardless and do nothing as thats whats brittish culture stiff upper lip is about - being neither pro or re active, just accept UNFAIRNESS :rolleyes: )

Intasun32

@Diamonds,

I have a file two inches thick with letters to all and sundry, I also had a meeting with my local MP which was a waste of time. I did get my money refunded from the scammers, Moby Magic & Dialogue Communications, eventually but it took a lot of hard work.

I took my 'then' network, Vodafone, to Otelo and they found in my favour. I received £50 compensation and a letter of apology which was not worth a light as Otelo would not find that VF had acted incorrectly by not aiding or supplying information to trace the company that had scammed me, the main part of my complaint. Guilty but not guilty, as I have found it could only happen in the mobile phone industry

Would I do it again if I was scammed, bl@@dy sure I would...........

diamonds

Its VULGAR what Ofcom have done in this country to the very genre they are meant to govern & regulate - no wonder its a government dept with org.uk and not gov.uk

Vodafone under data protection & freedom of information would HAVE to supply that information, you should make complaint to FOI commissioners office http://www.ico.gov.uk/ get a ruling & sue Vodafone (in a small claims court or higher) on the grounds Vodafone had a direct connection to the company involved & had financial benefits directly through P4it with them 2 companies and breached Data Protection Act & Freedom Of Information Act due to its involvement with the 2 companies as to protect its financial revenue from & including its 20% share of ownership of P4it

PLEASE do its time someone showed what Ofcom have allowed to go on unregulated & its further failure to state on its publication & website telecoms "ombudsman's" are not the only option the consumer has in dispute & consumers can bypass these "companies" and go straight to court as they hold no legal status & the courts who are the only impartcial service to resolve telecom disputes.

Intasun32

diamonds wrote: »

Vodafone under data protection & freedom of information would HAVE to supply that information.....

@Diamonds,

Very true but at that time, 6 years ago, like many people I never knew that I could be scammed by receiving a text message. I was told by VF that I MUST have subscribed to a web site, they would not listen to the fact that I was a little to old to be subscribing to joke sites or downloading ringtones. They just were not interested.

I was angry, I had only been scammed for £4.50 but I was being treated like an idiot by VF. I was lucky to find a forum called The Scream which had a thread about the same short code as I had been scammed, the guys on there were very helpful. None of the authorities are interested in helping, at least now T-Mobile will bar incoming premium rate texts. As do Vodafone but you will not find anything about it on their web site and some of the C/S advisors deny that it is available.

:beer:

diamonds

You set me off on one LOL

>----Original Message----
>From: [EMAIL="OCCtelecoms@ofcom.org.uk"]OCCtelecoms@ofcom.org.uk[/EMAIL]
>Date: 04/05/2012 16:53
>To: "DIAMONDS"<DIAMONDS@tiscali.co.uk>
>Subj: Ofcom reference: W3-SUK
>
>Ofcom reference: W3-SUK
>
>
>04 May 2012
>
>Dear DIAMONDS
>Virgin Mobile Telecoms Limited
>
>Thank you for contacting Ofcom about the above company.
>
>Although we are unable to get involved in individual complaints (our role is to encourage the communications industry to take responsibility for sorting out such issues/disputes), I realise that you have approached us for help and will explain how you can progress your complaint.
>
>If you have already contacted Virgin Mobile Telecoms Limited and feel you have been dealt with poorly or unreasonably, you can ask them to take your complaint to a higher level. You can find out how to do this from your service provider's code of practice. This should detail their full complaints procedure and will be available through its website and customer services. Some service providers also print complaint information on the back of their phone bills.
>
>You are likely to resolve your dispute by following the complaints procedure but, if you exhaust this and remain unhappy, you should ask your service provider to send you a letter outlining their final position. This is known as a 'deadlock' letter.
>
>Once you have received a deadlock letter, you will be able to take your dispute to an Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) scheme. You can also take your dispute to an ADR scheme if it remains unresolved 8 weeks after you first complained.
>
>An ADR scheme is an important piece of consumer protection which every service provider has to belong to. They are free and independent services available to residential or small business (up to 10 employees) customers. Service providers must abide by an ADR's decision. However, you are not bound by this decision, and if dissatisfied with the outcome, may consider legal action.
>
>Virgin Mobile Telecoms Limited is a member of the Communications and Internet Services Adjudication Scheme (CISAS) for the purpose of ADR. You can contact CISAS at:
>
>CISAS
>24 Angel Gate
>City Road
>London
>EC1V 2PT
>
>Phone: 020 7520 3827
>Email: [email]info@cisas.org.uk<mailto:info@cisas.org.uk[/email]>
>Website: www.cisas.org.uk<http://www.cisas.org.uk/>.
>
>With regards to concerns about the quality of customer service given by your provider, I should explain that we do not have regulatory control over this. However, we record all the complaints we receive so we can identify issues of general consumer concern. If we notice a particular increase in similar complaints against the same provider, we may raise this with them for internal review.
>
>
>I hope you find this information helpful and can confirm that I have recorded details of your experience. If you need more advice, you can visit our website at: www.ofcom.org.uk<http://www.ofcom.org.uk/&gt; or phone the Consumer Contact Team on: 0300 123 3333 or 020 7981 3040. You should quote the reference number at the top of this letter.
>
>
>Yours sincerely
>
>Kirby Sharpe
>Consumer Contact Team
>
>
>
>________________________________
>
>******************************************************************************************************************
>For more information visit www.ofcom.org.uk
>
>This email (and any attachments) is confidential and intended for the use of the addressee only.
>
>If you have received this email in error please notify the originator of the message and delete it from your system.
>
>This email has been scanned for viruses. However, you open any attachments at your own risk.
>
>Any views expressed in this message are those of the individual sender and do not represent the views or opinions of Ofcom unless expressly stated otherwise.
>******************************************************************************************************************
>

Thankyou for your email,


Can you please state what legislative content from relevent sections of Acts Ofcom as the UK telecommunications regulator.

1)Makes Ofcom "unable" to get involved with individual complaints.

2)Place no responsability on regulator Ofcom in assisting a consumer with a telecommunications provider dispute.

3)Where ADR run by private for profit companies, paid by the telco provider dispute are a acceptable form of mediation & independent and legal review & are not a conflict of interest.

4)Which part of legislation states ADR MUST be used before legal action/s.

5 Why Ofcom presents itself as a "organisation" & not a government funded regulatory body, re: ofcom.org.uk and not ofcom.gsi.gov.uk


With regards,


DIAMONDS

leesamarie

PAYFORIT charges

Payforit have been charging money on my 13 year olds mobile phone bill. Once a week 4 separate amounts of £2 are charged to the bill one after the other (Sunday mornings interestingly). The payments are for 'content' and there is no shortcode showing against the payments nor any original text relating to this.

My daughter has no idea what it is all about -_-.

She has an Iphone on Orange. Orange say I need to contact Payforit but there are no contact details on their website.

Can someone please tell me what she might have done? Has she accidentally subscribed to something? Is it likely to be a game? Is it Payforit that is charging the money or are they akin to a Paypal service and its the merchant that I need to get hold of?

Is there some way to find out exactly what you are subscribed to via your mobile?

How do I find out what game (she has hundreds) these weekly charges are in relation to?

HELP