A rescue service in need of rescuing
Service not rendered, client given runaround
When Charlotte Tshabalala, 51, could not find employment after losing her previous job she decided to go under voluntary sequestration to keep her property.
Though that was a step in the right direction she feels she was misled into parting with the R45 000 she paid to Tharwah Solomon of Consumer Verification Services (CVS), also known as Bond Secure, who profess to be experts of distressed properties.
Tshabalala, of Jabulani, Soweto, said Solomon called her on her cellphone in 2013 and told her the company helps people struggling to repay their debts.
Solomon knew about her bond non-payment and called as the bank was threatening to repossess her house.
She advised her to go under voluntary sequestration.
“She said sequestration was by far a better option than having all my assets auctioned off. That won me over,” Tshabalala said.
She said Solomon told her that once under sequestration the bank would not attach her house and she would be insolvent for four years and still get a chance to apply for a further 18 months to be rehabilitated.
Tshabalala said being sequestrated was not an easy pill to swallow, but the only consolation was that she could move on with her life free of debts.
Solomon advised her that to keep creditors from hounding her she should pay for the sequestration process, which she did. The cost was R45 000, which she got from helpful relatives, she said.
Though she paid the required amount Solomon abandoned her matter soon after receiving her payment.
“When inquiring about my matter she referred me to people who had no knowledge about it,” Tshabalala said.
A year ago she had a rude awakening when the sheriff of the court arrived with an eviction letter to vacate her house, she said.
Tshabalala said the only thing Solomon did was to publish a notice in the government gazette in May 2015 to notify Tshabalala’s creditors that she was insolvent.
This was two years after she paid for the service.
The bank and the receiver of revenue were never notified as expected after the placement of the notice in the government gazette.
“I want my money back because I never benefitted from the service they offered me,” said Tshabalala.
Solomon said CVS was currently under business rescue.
She said her attempt to lodge Tshabalala’s claim with the practitioner appointed to place them under business rescue had failed.
Ken Stewart, a business rescue practitioner at Smoken Consulting, said Tshabalala has forfeited her money because her claim had not been submitted when the rescue proceedings commenced in June last year.
Stewart said notices were sent out to all known creditors prior to the publication of the plan and an advertisement was placed on June 29, 2016 in the Cape Times.
“Any creditor who did not prove his or her claim to the reasonable satisfaction of the practitioner within 48 hours of the time of the second creditors meeting, which was held on 5 July 2016, will not receive any dividend and will forfeit their claims against CVS entirely,” Stewart said.
Tshabalala said it would not have been possible to know about CVS’s financial woes or be aware of the advert because it was published in a Cape Town newspaper.
“I feel cheated, I have been calling Solomon constantly and she failed to disclose this,” said a distraught Tshabalala.
However, John Muller, the managing director at CVS, said a misrepresentation on the value of the properties had prompted attorneys to reject their matter.
Hence they could not place her under sequestration.