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This article from the MAIL has been bought to my attention and thought that it should be posted up.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/money/art...pay-bills.html
TONY HETHERINGTON: Refund firm slow to pay its own bills
By Tony Hetherington
Last updated at 10:14 PM on 20th November 2010
R. T. writes: I received a phone call from a company called Cancel Your Loan, and was persuaded to pay £790 by credit card to see whether I had been overcharged on my mortgage. After the call I told my partner and she went ballistic. I rang the company and cancelled within two hours of the initial conversation.
I also emailed. Next day, Cancel Your Loan told me that I would receive a refund cheque, but nothing arrived. After weeks of being fobbed off, I was told that there would be no refund because I had not put my request in writing. Then I was told that a refund would come from a different company called UK Search Limited, but I have still not been repaid.
Cancel Your Loan is just a trading name used by a Birmingham company called Total Refund Limited.
Questions: Mohammed Ali Mashedi's Total Refund relies on another firm to take its credit card payments
It is licensed as a claims management business by the Ministry of Justice, allowing it to advertise that it is ‘Fighting for Consumer Rights’ in clawing back overcharged insurance premiums, bank charges, credit card fees, and so on.
It also has a foot on the other side of the fence – with a licence from the Office of Fair Trading allowing it to act as a credit broker and charge fees to arrange loans.
You are not the first person to complain that for a firm that makes its name by saying it will win repayments for its customers, Total Refund is amazingly sluggish in making its own repayments.
Some of its customers even say that they never agreed to pay the company, but gave their bank details so charges could be checked, only to find that Total Refund had taken its fees.
But what stands out this time is the role of a company you have never even heard of – UK Search Limited.This is a debt collector, also licensed by the OFT, and based in Chesterfield, Derbyshire. Its involvement is that it is authorised to accept credit cards, whereas Total Refund is not.
Cliff Poole, managing director of UK Search, told me he just accepts card payments on behalf of Total Refund, but has no role in the business.
‘I have made it very clear to Total Refund that delays in issuing refunds of this nature cannot be tolerated,’ he said. He has refunded the £790 direct to your credit card.
Total Refund is run by Mohammed Ali Mashedi and Abdul Kauser. They previously ran a mobile phone business, Ocean Communication Limited, that collapsed leaving creditors to settle for 21p in the £1.
Mashedi told me: ‘Our company aim is to help consumers who may have been financially mis-sold and never to exacerbate their financial circumstances.’ He added that he would now pursue your claims free of charge.
Meanwhile, there is the lingering question of how you could give your Barclaycard number to one company but be charged by another.
On the face of it, this would deprive you of the right to reclaim your £790 from Barclaycard if anything went wrong, since Barclaycard has never authorised Total Refund to accept plastic.
UK Search was accepted into the credit card network by another bank, not by Barclaycard, but Barclaycard was dismayed to find that it was lending out its payment processing facilities to a different business.
One Barclaycard official told me: ‘The view here is that if we found one of our merchants doing this, it would warrant immediate investigation and would lead to the likely termination of the agreement.’
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/money/art...#ixzz15uZ7MV20
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/money/art...pay-bills.html
TONY HETHERINGTON: Refund firm slow to pay its own bills
By Tony Hetherington
Last updated at 10:14 PM on 20th November 2010
R. T. writes: I received a phone call from a company called Cancel Your Loan, and was persuaded to pay £790 by credit card to see whether I had been overcharged on my mortgage. After the call I told my partner and she went ballistic. I rang the company and cancelled within two hours of the initial conversation.
I also emailed. Next day, Cancel Your Loan told me that I would receive a refund cheque, but nothing arrived. After weeks of being fobbed off, I was told that there would be no refund because I had not put my request in writing. Then I was told that a refund would come from a different company called UK Search Limited, but I have still not been repaid.
Cancel Your Loan is just a trading name used by a Birmingham company called Total Refund Limited.
Questions: Mohammed Ali Mashedi's Total Refund relies on another firm to take its credit card paymentsIt is licensed as a claims management business by the Ministry of Justice, allowing it to advertise that it is ‘Fighting for Consumer Rights’ in clawing back overcharged insurance premiums, bank charges, credit card fees, and so on.
It also has a foot on the other side of the fence – with a licence from the Office of Fair Trading allowing it to act as a credit broker and charge fees to arrange loans.
You are not the first person to complain that for a firm that makes its name by saying it will win repayments for its customers, Total Refund is amazingly sluggish in making its own repayments.
Some of its customers even say that they never agreed to pay the company, but gave their bank details so charges could be checked, only to find that Total Refund had taken its fees.
But what stands out this time is the role of a company you have never even heard of – UK Search Limited.This is a debt collector, also licensed by the OFT, and based in Chesterfield, Derbyshire. Its involvement is that it is authorised to accept credit cards, whereas Total Refund is not.
Cliff Poole, managing director of UK Search, told me he just accepts card payments on behalf of Total Refund, but has no role in the business.
‘I have made it very clear to Total Refund that delays in issuing refunds of this nature cannot be tolerated,’ he said. He has refunded the £790 direct to your credit card.
Total Refund is run by Mohammed Ali Mashedi and Abdul Kauser. They previously ran a mobile phone business, Ocean Communication Limited, that collapsed leaving creditors to settle for 21p in the £1.
Mashedi told me: ‘Our company aim is to help consumers who may have been financially mis-sold and never to exacerbate their financial circumstances.’ He added that he would now pursue your claims free of charge.
Meanwhile, there is the lingering question of how you could give your Barclaycard number to one company but be charged by another.
On the face of it, this would deprive you of the right to reclaim your £790 from Barclaycard if anything went wrong, since Barclaycard has never authorised Total Refund to accept plastic.
UK Search was accepted into the credit card network by another bank, not by Barclaycard, but Barclaycard was dismayed to find that it was lending out its payment processing facilities to a different business.
One Barclaycard official told me: ‘The view here is that if we found one of our merchants doing this, it would warrant immediate investigation and would lead to the likely termination of the agreement.’
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/money/art...#ixzz15uZ7MV20
