Sickest holiday claims con of all
At a charity event for CANCER victims this cynical boss of a cowboy claims firm briefs hostess to target punters... before telling undercover MoS reporter: I’ll get you £2,000 – and all you have to do is lie about being ill abroad
A COWBOY compensation firm cynically sponsored a cancer charity’s fundraising event then used it to drum up fake holiday sickness claims.
No-win no-fee shark Brian Cromby was secretly filmed at the boxing match telling undercover Mail on Sunday reporters he could get them £2,000 each if they lied about being ill on holiday – then bragged ‘most of my clients were not sick’.
The callous claims management boss used young girls wearing tight jeans and T-shirts to collect money for Sunflowers, a cancer care charity based in Liverpool.
But as our investigators watched, they also handed out Cromby’s business cards telling spectators they could win huge payouts ‘with or without medical evidence’.
Earlier, Cromby had told an MoS investigator posing as a model looking for work at the £25-a-head charity fundraiser that he would use the event to ‘generate lots of leads.’
Last night, Tory MP Craig Tracey, chairman of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Insurance and Financial Services – which monitors claims firms and reports to Ministers – said: ‘This is absolutely disgusting. To encourage people to make fake illness claims at a charity fundraising event for people who are genuinely seriously ill is the lowest of the low. These people
‘This is absolutely disgusting. The lowest of the low’
are sharks. We need tough new regulation of these claims management companies.’
The Mail on Sunday has previously revealed how cowboy firms systematically coach British tourists to lie about becoming ill on all-inclusive holidays in order to win compensation payouts of up to £5,000.
The practice has led to an explosion of sickness claims, many of them bogus, which travel firms say will push up the cost of holidays for honest tourists. Fake food-poisoning claims rocketed 500 per cent in 12 months, according to industry experts.
Last week it was reported that Spanish hotel owners have called for British holidaymakers to be banned from their resorts, alleging bogus claims have cost them £42million in 18 months.
Now The Mail on Sunday can reveal major travel firms – including Jet2, Thomson and First Choice – say they have started blacklisting customers whom they suspect have made bogus claims.
Cromby, 32, from Liverpool, runs RTA Solutions which specialises in holiday sickness and accident claims. He used to specialise in whiplash claims from car accidents but has moved into holiday sickness compensation after the Government clamped down on bogus claims which were forcing up car insurance premiums.
He sponsored a boxing event at Grand Central Hall in Liverpool on Friday night called ‘Scousers Don’t Get Knocked Out – Cancer Does’. It was held to raise money for a local cancer care charity Sunflowers.
But Cromby used the night to attract new clients – and hired two attractive young women to hand out business cards which urged punters to ‘call our dedicated holiday sickness team’.
The women handed out the cards at the same time as they approached punters with a yellow bucket appealing for charity donations and selling raffle tickets.
There is no suggestion the women knew Cromby encourages people to make fake claims.
Speaking to undercover MoS investigators at the boxing night, Cromby was covertly filmed telling our reporters how to make a false food-poisoning claim.
Cowboy claims firms target tourists on all-inclusive packages. They tell them to insist that they never ate outside of the hotel to avoid travel firms claiming they became ill from eating elsewhere. Bogus claimants are helped by the fact ‘victims’ only need a pharmacist’s receipt for food-poisoning remedies to make a claim, and not a doctor’s note. In many cases no evidence is required. At one point his partner, Julie, interrupted his patter to warn our reporters: ‘If you’re wired up I will find out.’
Cromby continued: ‘I’ll put it together for you. I’ll send you the criteria. There’s only six questions, right, my team will ask you. Did you always eat at the hotel, you didn’t go on any excursions, even though you did just say no on that one, yeah?
‘I’ll give you the questions and answers. All you have to say is you had the s***s for a week and that’s it and I’ll get you two grand. It’s as simple as that, yeah?’
He went on: ‘Two grand, that’s the average pay cheque. If you want to say you were sick for ten days or two weeks I’ll get you three grand.
You know the whiplash was the big one, weren’t it? You know people say, “I had whiplash” and all that. It’s undetectable – it’s the same with that. If you say you had it, you had it. No one’s going to question that.’
Cromby also offered to pay our reporters £100 for each case they referred to him. Cromby’s firm finds clients and passes them on to lawyers. But while it is illegal for lawyers to pay claims companies for referrals, many get around the law by paying a monthly retainer.
Speaking to Cromby at the boxing event, one of the MoS reporters asked him: ‘But what if you weren’t actually ill?’
Cromby replied: ‘Just don’t tell my team that. I’m going to tell you what to say. You were sick for seven days or more, nine days before it cleared up. I’ll tell you all the symptoms that you had.
‘Nausea, headaches, coming out both ends and that. You don’t need no medical evidence. Have a look on the card – “with or without medical evidence”. And if you get someone who’s got medical evidence I’ll pay you £200.’
Our reporter asked again: ‘Even if you weren’t sick you still can get a claim?’ Cromby said: ‘Most of my paid for referring yourself or someone else!’ Ahead of the boxing night, Cromby wrote on Facebook he was looking to hire people to work in RTA’s ‘events team’ and said: ‘Experience in accident management would be an advantage but basic knowledge of the industry would also help.’
An undercover MoS journalist messaged Cromby via Facebook to enquire about the job.
He replied: ‘It’s a boxing show in Liverpool city centre. I just need a couple of girls who can hand some cards out and talk to everyone about the company. Mainly speaking about holiday sickness claims and generating lots of leads but also about RTAs (road traffic accidents) and other accidents as well.’
Contacted by the MoS yesterday, Cromby declined to comment but said: ‘I look forward to your story mate.’
Last night, the head of Sunflowers, an independent charity that supports cancer patients, survivors and carers in Merseyside, said she was ‘extremely shocked and upset.’ Emma Squibb, the charity’s chief executive, broke down in tears and said: ‘We are a legitimate cancer charity which helps people who are very sick, we would never encourage anyone to lie about being ill. I don’t know why anyone would lie about being ill, there is nothing good about being ill.
‘I don’t know anything about Brian Cromby or his business dealings. He may have sponsored the event but he has not sponsored Sunflowers, that man is not connected with us in anyway.
‘We do sterling work and I’m extremely upset by this.’
A spokesman for the Association of British Travel Agents said: ‘We have seen a 500 per cent increase in holiday sickness claims over the last few years driven by the actions of unscrupulous claims management companies and their legal partners who charge sky-high legal fees in addition to awards made to customers.
‘These bogus claims are costing tour operators and hotels substantial amounts of money and if this dishonest practice continues it may well start to have an impact on holiday prices. It is already damaging the reputation of UK holidaymakers overseas. Encouraging someone to submit a false claim is a criminal offence. Customers who are tempted to submit such a claim should also be aware that they will be breaking the law both in the UK as well as the country where they took their holiday and they risk a custodial sentence.
‘We know that fraudulent holiday sickness claims are a priority for the police and we would strongly encourage them to launch an investigation following the work of the Mail on Sunday’s reporters.’
Tour operators have generally settled cases quickly to avoid expensive court battles, despite suspecting that many of the claims are fake or exaggerated.
But now some major companies are fighting back against the bogus claimants by blacklisting them. Private investigators have also been hired to probe sickness claims.
A spokesman for Jet2 Holidays, which sold 6.6million breaks last year, said it recently blacklisted two people and more are expected.
A spokeswoman for Thomson and First Choice, which sold 5.2 million holidays last year, said claims had increased ten-fold since 2013, adding: ‘We have many cases with evidence that there was no illness, or where the symptoms or duration have been exaggerated.’
She warned the company would turn bogus claimants over to the police, and said: ‘Where we have identified fraud we will consider prosecution and we will also blacklist customers from travelling on any further holidays with us.
‘UK holidaymakers should understand that if they make a fraudulent claim they could face prosecution at home or overseas and have their future holiday options severely limited.’
‘Bogus claims may well affect holiday prices’