Gift card marketplace Zeek warns it's looking for a buyer - MSE N

In your coverage of the loss of money by UK users of Zeek (the online marketplace for selling second hand gift-vouchers), you should be aware that it could be that the FCA are complicit in consumers’ loss.

Hidden away in Zeek’s Terms and Conditions is the assertion that Zeek.Me acts purely as an agent of the seller of the gift-voucher, and not of the buyer (this is not immediately obvious from their website homepage).
Indeed, it explicitly states in the T&Cs that, from the buyer’s point of view, payment to Zeek is the same as payment to the seller.
The T&Cs also state that Zeek has the seller’s authority to complete the sale of the gift-voucher.

The T&C’s are written this way as, in the UK currently according to the FCA, these terms enable the CAE (Commercial Agents Exemption) loophole to apply from PSD2 protection.
PSD2 (in the UK, the Payments Services Regulations 2017) came into law on 13th January 2018, and states that online-marketplaces that handle client payment from this date must be FCA registered, and if over certain volumes then the client funds must be safeguarded in special segregated secure bank accounts, unless the CAE applies (in which case, the marketplace firms are completely outside this law).

Now the German and French FCA equivalent regulators have long ruled that an on-line marketplace cannot invoke the CAE simply by stating in its terms and conditions that it has the authorisation to complete a sale.

See for example the German regulator’s ruling from 2014:
https www . bafin.de / SharedDocs/Veroeffentlichungen/EN/Fachartikel/2014/fa_bj_1404_bezahlverfahren_im_internet_en.html?nn= 7858612#doc7874232bodytext7

But the FCA is fighting these other regulators tooth-and-nail, and currently interprets the law to allow Zeek and other online marketplace to exclude themselves from the new law by some deft text in the T&Cs stating that they have authority to finalise a sale from one party.

The result is that client money is treated as the marketplace’s own, with no special care nor handling nor special protection, and in the case of Zeek the possible loss of sellers’ money as a result.

This should not be allowed to continue – the FCA must follow its co-regulators example, and interpret the new law correctly, and force marketplaces to protect client money as the law mandates.


I believe MSE should update its story to include these facts.







P.S.
Although Zeek is an Israeli company, it is seemingly clearly operating in the UK.
For example, its T&Cs at https wp.zeek.me / terms-of-use/ (saved just now to the internet wayback machine) state multiple examples including:
· * The Service is solely for the promotion of products within the United Kingdom.
· * (ii) the brand of the physical Gift Voucher to be listed must have at least 5 stores/branches in the UK;
· * etc.

For those of us who have used credit cards to deposit money into our Zeek wallets the advice I have received is as follows :

Do NOT raise a charge back claim, since this will be lost because the credit card company has successfully paid the money into the wallet. ie the service has been provided by the credit card company (and because the company is not in administration the full service of progressing to buy vouchers may still be possible)

What is needed is for us to prove that the company is in administration (different from receivership). Once in administration we can claim since it is evident that Zeek will be unable to fulfill the entire service ie we cant buy vouchers

Tesco Bank said that once in administration we would have a claim (under section 75). My payment was excess of £100 - may be different if less than £100

Has anyone else had a similar discussion with their credit card provider ?