Friday, August 08, 2008

YOU EQUIP IT LTD (SCAM)

K picked up her iPhone on Sat. She took out Carphone Warehouse insurance payable every quarter for around £150 for the year. All was well. On Monday morning (her first external call to her new phone) she was contacted by someone claiming to be from the Carphone Warehouse regarding her insurance. They had her name, address, date of birth, mobile number and knew it was an iPhone bought on Sat from CPW and that she had taken the extended cover. They explained that there had been a price decrease to the insurance and as a matter of courtesy they were contacting new customers to pass the deal on. Instead of the quarterly payments she needed just one up front payment of £99.99. No problems, she paid over the phone and was happy for the call.

It turns out this was a scam - one of many similar ones going on at the moment. How they got all her details we'll never know - CPW and O2 are of course claiming it was nothing to do with them. CPW's insurance company tells us they are known and are taking court proceedings against them. We have put a charge back in place at the bank due to the 'verbal misrepresentation' and contacted Trading Standards and the Consumer Advice Office. The company who did this have an email address that appears not to be checked and a phone line that gets you through to an answerphone that no one seems to be checking.

YOU EQUIP IT LTD trading as FONE-PROTECT
15 Brynymor Road
Swansea
SA1 4JQ

info@youequipitltd.com
0870 012 0213
Company reg: 06312029

Companies House has them as:
YOU EQUIP IT LIMITED
33 HEATHFIELD
SWANSEA
SA1 6HD

Further investigation shows them as: www.youequipit.com with a phone number of: 01792 418 492. The best bit is their terms and conditions page (http://youequipit.com/termsc/index.htm) contains a link directly to Carphone Warehouse!

There are MANY more reports of this company and similar scams all over the Internet if you search... Hopefully this will help someone.

12 comments:

Anonymous said...

It seems You Equip has actually copied the T&C of Carphone Warehouse... have a look...
CW: http://www.carphonewarehouse.com/commerce/servlet/gben-server-PageServer?ARTICLE=MAIN.UK.INTERNET.HELPINFO.ORDERONLINE.TERMS
YE:
http://youequipit.com/termsc/index.htm

Anonymous said...

This scam happened to me too.
I sent a letter by recorded delivery to the Byn-y-mor address demanding my money back in accordance with their "cool off" period and received a cheque for £99.99!
CPW know about it. Under UK law (Data Protection Act) CPW have failed in their duty to protect customer's details. But I'm sure the FSA etc have much bigger scams to work on!

that-tom said...

This really sucks the same thing happened to me, i was just looking through my bank statements and realised that i was still getting charged by carphone warehouse for the insurance and thought it was a little strange so i googled you-equip-it and found this ]= not impressed £70 ill never see again

Anonymous said...

same thing happened to me...
it must be CPW who sold us out..
I will pay an other 99.99 to see them going to jail...

Anonymous said...

below is the owner of the web site got this from whois

contact: Jaswinder Bansal
organisation:
address: newbury park
address: ilford
address: essex
address: London,
address: IG2 7DN
address: GB
phone: +44.7944020391
fax:
email: jazz@e3uk.com

Anonymous said...

My son had the same experience - the only people who knew that he had taken out CPW insurance on the iPhone were CPW and the insurance company they use. Further, the scumbags at Foneprotect / youequipit rang on the temporary number that CPW had issued as a stop gap until the existing numbers had been transported over - which takes about 2 days. So the only people who knew - and therefore must have leaked the details were either (i) CPW, (ii) iPhone/Apple or (iii) O2, who are ensuring all new iPhone contracts have to go through them as opposed to CPW. Needless to say we exercised our cool-off period rights, but the cheque from foneprotect bounced on first presentation and their answerphone rings and rings and I bet the 0870 code means that we are also paying for them not to answer, by way of adding insult to injury. The insurance also alleges "protection from fraudulent calls" - obviously excluding those from foneprotect. Am sending all this stuff to Trading Standards.

Anonymous said...

I have taken out insurance and have contacted Ricky on 07854 850181 who has then phoned the company as he is saying "not Him" I threatend court and police action and have recieved a callack within 5 minutes. I was given a password and they brought up my details and have promised a cheque in the post today. hopefully does not bounce but at least it is evidence. good luck

Anonymous said...

The details of the website owner, are simply just the web designers who are stuck in the middle, they gave me the contact number for ricky on 07854 850181 who they had contact with in relation to designing and hosting there site.

Anonymous said...

fone-protect phoned me after i had my new phone saying i should cancel my insurance with carphone wearhouse and go with them all i had to do was pay a one of payment of £80 and when my phone got broke after i had a break in i contacted them they told me to send my phone of with the poice record. I phoned aweek later and i got no reply i phoned that many times can someone help me to get my phone back broke or not. if you can help me contact me on my email joannelouise03@hotmail.com

Anonymous said...

same has happened to me only thing is i payed £150 for both mine an my partners N95 8GB phones, now my partners phone is playing up and i need it sorted obviously i cant get it fixed by you equip it ltd, im not holding my breath but does any body now how to get money back if possible,if so u could u email me www.smilerrobins@yahoo.co.uk thank you

Anonymous said...

It sucks big time, I have an Iphone and I paid to You Equip Ltd £99.99 for insurance, as they were claiming that they were from Carphone Warehouse. Now my phone is not working :S I dont know what to do??

Anonymous said...

oh.. just found this after trying to call the number on my policy with 'extreme guard' (but small print of 'you equip it') and having a message about the phone number not working. What a complete scam!!

Same thing happened to me - I got my new iphone and they called up claiming to be part of carphone warehouse (where I got the iphone) and I paid £99 one off fee.

AAAAARGH! I dropped my phone last night, I am getting the white screen of death. I've got 3 months left on my contract on this phone so don't even know if it's worth paying to get it fixed. I thought it was covered. Gutted.

I hope this helps ANYONE who gets called up with this offer!