Call to report postal scams after firm found to have tricked elderly
THE HEAD of National Trading Standards is calling for more people to report widespread postal scams after an East Yorkshire-based company was found guilty in court of tricking elderly consumers into thinking they had won substantial cash prizes through fake promotional material.
Kingstown Associates, based in Driffield, has been fined £150,000 and also ordered to pay more than £10,000 in court costs after it sent out two promotional mailings – ‘Healthy Living Direct’ and ‘All the Very Best’ – which created a false impression that recipients were guaranteed a share of tens of thousands of pounds. However, to claim the cash prize, consumers had to first purchase products from Kingstown Associates. Having made a purchase they discovered the cash prize had very little, if any, value.
The scam mailings, sent between
January and June 2018, failed to say how much of the cash prize would be paid to the recipient and how many consumers, on average, would claim from the fund.
The investigation by the National Trading Standards Yorkshire and the Humber Regional Investigations Team found that there were 11,016 “winners” of the ‘Healthy Living Direct’ £10,000 cash prize with each person receiving £0.91 – the total amount awarded being £10,024.56.
Earlier this month, the company was found guilty of ‘banned practices’ under the Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations 2008. This included creating the false impression that the consumer has already won, will win, or will on doing a particular act win, a prize or other equivalent benefit, when in fact there is no prize or other equivalent benefit.
Lord Toby Harris, the chairman of National Trading Standards, said: “Cases of postal scams are widespread but notoriously difficult to measure given low reporting rates. Anyone who suspects that they or someone they know is receiving scam mail should report it to the Citizens Advice Consumer Helpline.”