Fasttrack Reclaim HMRC scam

Murf65

I received a P800 letter from HMRC early July 2023. They said I had paid to much tax and was owed a refund which I could claim by signing up to their official Gov website, this I did and made and received my refund about 5 days later. Move forward to last week (mid Sept) I received a letter from Fasttrack Reclaim saying "congratulations on your rebate from HMRC" and quoted the exact amount of money I had received, but now, it was time for me to pay them a percentage which I owed them as I used their company to make the claim, I did not use this company, as I have already said, I made the claim myself. I have had no contact with this company regarding my tax refund. This morning they called me, I told them this was a hoax call and put the phone down. I have now received an email saying "we tried to contact you today", gave me a reference number and told me to contact them. The email was in my junk if that's any help.

merlynhs

Murf65 said:

I received a P800 letter from HMRC early July 2023. They said I had paid to much tax and was owed a refund which I could claim by signing up to their official Gov website, this I did and made and received my refund about 5 days later. Move forward to last week (mid Sept) I received a letter from Fasttrack Reclaim saying "congratulations on your rebate from HMRC" and quoted the exact amount of money I had received, but now, it was time for me to pay them a percentage which I owed them as I used their company to make the claim, I did not use this company, as I have already said, I made the claim myself. I have had no contact with this company regarding my tax refund. This morning they called me, I told them this was a hoax call and put the phone down. I have now received an email saying "we tried to contact you today", gave me a reference number and told me to contact them. The email was in my junk if that's any help.

Same thing has happened to someone I know.  They are using the unethical, underhand and non-transparent terms & conditions that were signed up to two years ago for PPI reclaim, to now go after a rebate received for overpayment of personal tax.  Fast Track Reclaim had nothing to do with the claim as it came through the normal self assessment route but these chancers are now making continuous threatening calls and sending similarly threatening letters.  When times are tough it is surely criminal that companies like this exist.  What they are doing amounts to no more than theft.  They provided no service but somehow deem themselves to have a 36% claim on the rebate.  Awful.

What has the outcome been for you?

jamesmiddle

My wife has had identical thing, want 36% of HMRC tax refund that she did herself they had NO involvement! Thought it was scam as dont remember signing anything now another letter saying been to court (N1 claim form) and owe extra fees. At no time shown any paperwork that she has signed or agreed too. Citizens advise say legit solicitors and company no idea how to deal with this or terminate said contract and get them out of my HMRC account. Wits end

dunstonh

Sending you a copy of the court form they intend to send is not the same as sending it.   If they go through with the small claims court action, they will be required to supply evidence to support their work and the contract that was signed.  You will then file your defence after seeing what their evidence is.

Alpine_Star

We just had someone on our forum beat Fast Track Reclaim (Joseph James Law) into discontinuing their court claim after they got sight of their defence.

Here's how they did it **WON** Received Claim from Quickly Finance T/A Fast Track Reclaim - LegalBeagles Forum

SeeEmSee

Hi! The person that beat them (as mentioned in previous post from LegalBeagles forum) is me. 

If anyone wants any advise on this, please let me know.

I am still following this up as although I "won" the case (not that there was a case to begin with, but you get my meaning), I find it abhorrent that there is no regulation.  The legal ombudsman have just this minute responded to me to say "the service provider is not registered in England and Wales so it's out of our jurisdiction".  This is demonstrably not the case as they are utterly registered in England and Wales!  I simply cannot believe that so many people are falling foul of this completely disgusting scam.  How many people have received court paperwork and been bullied and intimidated into paying money they absolutely do not owe, and all because the FOS, FCA and Legal Ombudsman say is all out of their jurisdiction.  I'm appalled!  Do NOT pay them a penny and fight this all the way,

dunstonh

I am still following this up as although I "won" the case (not that there was a case to begin with, but you get my meaning), I find it abhorrent that there is no regulation. 

They are outside of remit because doing tax returns is unregulated.  You could set yourself up tomorrow and do it.  

It is actually possibly closer to the remit of Trading standards.

SeeEmSee

I was thinking more along the lines of obtaining funds by deception as they knew from the start the „evidence“ that they had was false and was put forward with the sole intent of getting £1100!   I also found out a couple of days ago that they told HmRC that they had „made an error“ - yet I was telling them from the start exactly the same info I put in the Defense statement. Their particulars of claim was total made up nonsense. So the statement on that document was completely false and they knew it. 

Alpine_Star

Like dunstonh said, tax claiming is (at present) an unregulated industry. As ever regulation is years behind the curve.

Fast Track Reclaim got away with murder with their PPI claims business. They were the Financial Ombudsman's most complained about claims management company but by the time FCA took over their regulation the PPI deadline was just a few months away and they couldn't be bothered to take any action.

Zola_the_cat

They tried to claim a Tax refund using ID theft on me. I got a copy of the form from HMRC in September 2023, nothing to do with me. I tried to explain this to HMRC who were not interested. Tried to contact Fast Track and they do not pick up the phone. 

Now it is 2024 and they are sending me letters demanding money for work I have not asked them to do, as I have never been in touch with them. That is flat out fraud and has been reported to the Police. Crime number the lot.

IainJB

I have also just received an invoice from them and called to complain and ask for it to be cancelled. They said I had appointed them as my Tax representative when they did PPI work for me (Which has never been cancelled) and hence any rebate I get from HMRC entitles them to a percentage of it. I have said they are not getting paid for work they have not done. I also asked them to cancel the agreement and that I regarded it as ending when they completed the work on PPI and only relating to the work they did on that basis.

Is there anything preemptive I need to do before they start sending me further demands for money and threatening court action, which they said they would do if not paid by some date in December).

Thanks in advance for your advice.

Iain