Following on from our recent article concerning Contract Debt Relief Centre and European Debt Recovery, as we stated, we have established that these two outfits are merely lead generators for Hunter Rock Associates and Venture Compliance, both of whom we will delve into later but first we thought we would expose a seriously disgusting scam perpetrated by Hunter Rock.
The scam
As usual, it all began with a cold call. This concerns a couple in their 80s, the husband is seriously ill and with this stress the wife had a stroke two years ago. They were cold called with the previously reported EU court scam. In the past they owned timeshare in both Spain and the UK with Diamond but due to age and ill health they terminated their ownership and had the requisite confirmation from Diamond Resorts. The series of calls received persuaded the wife that there was EU court action against them, furthermore the original letter confirming exit from Diamond was worth nothing, all lies of course; unfortunately believing what they were told the couple paid £5,000 to the fraudsters.
Having slept on their decision, they decided to cancel. This type of “off premise” sale is covered by the distance selling and doorstep selling regulations which demand a 14 day cooling off period. On contact with Hunter Rock they were told that they had forfeited their right to a cooling off period on account of their agreement that work commence immediately.
Whilst there is an element of fact regarding this, the regulations state that it must be clearly explained that taking the immediate start action would invalidate the 14 day cooling off period, no such explanation was given.
We have subsequently established that the wife contacted Diamond Resorts at their UK head office and Diamond once again emailed her a letter confirming the timeshare was exited in 2015 with no monies owing.
Trying to back pedal, Hunter Rock said they would mount a claim to get the couples money back, only two slight problems here; firstly, one timeshare was purchased in the UK so no claim there. The second was purchased in Spain but before the 5th January 1999 the magic date that introduced law allowing certain timeshare contracts to be challenged, yet again, more lies.
Section 75 claim
In this case the wife paid by credit card so a possible Section 75 Consumer Credit Act claim could be presented. Unfortunately the scammers were one step ahead. Within the 1974 S75 legislation there is what is known as the DCS link, let us explain:
- Debtor – The card holder.
- Creditor – The card company.
- Supplier – The company or person you paid to do the job or supply goods.
So as the supplier was Hunter Rock then the card payment should have been to them, but it wasn’t. According to their website, Hunter Rock are based in Beverley nr Hull but the card payment was to a company called HW Advisory Group who appear to be in Brighton, on investigation TCA found no record of a company with that name. Breaking the DCS link is one of the greatest reasons why S75 claims are refused by card companies. In this case we feel the lady has enough evidence to substantiate fraud which may overturn the DCS problem.
TCA investigation
So we have two companies seemingly non connected entities being Hunter Rock and Venture Compliance but when checking Companies House records we find they share the same Director being Philip Hunt. The similarity doesn’t end there, both corporate websites; though of different designs are clones of each other. Let’s do a quick fact check:
Huntland Rock trades as Hunter Rock and was registered at Companies House on 15th July 2022. The company domain name was registered on 12th January 2023. The quoted telephone contact number reveals Ofcom records show that numbers starting 01482 693 are protected from allocation. Where numbering capacity has been withdrawn from service, the block or code is sterilised for a period, typically 2 years. Alternatively the Ofcom Numbering Unit might protect capacity for a limited period, to avoid dialling errors into similar codes. Turning to the office address, according to Endole Suite there are 75 companies trading from the address which is indicative of virtual offices.
Venture Compliance was registered at Companies House on 30th November 2022. The nature of business is quoted as 70229 – Management consultancy activities other than financial management and 82110 – Combined office administrative service activities. The domain name was registered on 5th November 2022, turning to the phone number. Ofcom records once again show that numbers starting 0203 918 are protected from allocation. Where numbering capacity has been withdrawn from service, the block or code is sterilised for a period, typically 2 years. Alternatively the Ofcom Numbering Unit might protect capacity for a limited period, to avoid dialling errors into similar codes. Of interest was the following comment:
“If you have received a call from this number, it is likely that the caller is spoofing their identity.”
There are two addresses quoted, 124 City Road, London, EC1V 2NX, once again according to Endole Suite there are 49,697 companies registered at this address. There is also a postal address quoted, 86-90 Paul Street, London. EC2A 4NE, again, Endole reveals 20,525 companies registered.
As a general comment on the websites, neither has any reference to timeshare matters, EU court cases or anything else the scam hinges around. There is a trend amongst scammers to invent websites that appear to offer contract resolution services, whether this is to try to avoid discovery we can’t say, but what we can say is this is one more layer of subterfuge.
TCA comment
Again we see companies registered but with both instances showing the age of about 6 months or so. The same can be said of the websites which bear no resemblance to the “services” on offer. Office addresses that are patently virtual in nature. The telephone numbers quoted are prohibited from being allocated, one even confirming spoof identity. It’s more than likely that these numbers are Voice Over Internet Protocol numbers (VOIP). It is almost certain that the VOIP providers are not in the UK because of the Ofcom ban on issuing such numbers
Once upon a time timeshare scams were run by a couple of wide boys from an apartment in Tenerife or the likes, if they could scam €500 it was a good days work. Nowadays the scam industry is bordering on organised crime. As we have seen from this article, the €500 scam has turned into £5,000 and more, if they can get away with it, and they obviously do. The really distressing fact is that because of the general age demographic of UK timeshare owners, the victims are virtually all senior citizens, the most vulnerable sector of our society.
For more information regarding this article or assistance in any other timeshare related issues please contact the TCA on 01908 881058 or email: info@TimeshareConsumerAssociation.org.uk