Tony Hetherington is the Financial Mail on Sunday’s star investigator, battling readers’ corners, revealing the truth behind closed doors and winning victories for those left penniless. Find out how to contact him below.
Ricos: Noyan Nihat was behind two nuisance calling companies
A boss of two financial firms, which have been given the Financial Conduct Authority seal of approval, has been found to be behind two separate companies facing massive fines for making more than a million nuisance calls to victims older and vulnerable.
Outsource Strategies Limited and Dr Telemarketing Limited were investigated by the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), which found that the pair had called almost 1.43 million people who had included their numbers on the Service’s “do not call” register. Telephone Preference. The companies have been fined £240,000 and £100,000 respectively.
The calls were made over a 13-month period. The ICO revealed: ‘Complainers said the callers were aggressive and used high-pressure sales tactics to persuade them to sign up for products. The ICO investigation also found evidence that both companies specifically targeted elderly and vulnerable people.’
At the time of these offences, the sole director of Outsource Strategies was wealthy north London businessman Noyan Nihat. He was also one of the two directors of Dr Telemarketing. The other was his long-time business colleague Wayne Phillips, who has since been banned from acting as a director of any UK company.
Meanwhile, Nihat is registered with the FCA watchdog as a director of Monark Global, which also uses the name Tru-Diamonds to market as an online jewelery business. Registration with the FCA allows the company to act as a credit broker.
He is also a director and chief operating officer of Privat 3 Money, an FCA authorized electronic payment services company. And he is a member of the Advisory Board of the Payments Association, a leading trade organization.
According to the FCA Register, Nihat has been approved by the regulator since 2018 and has never faced any disciplinary or regulatory action. This is true, but what the Register does not show is that Nihat was a director and part-owner of a Cardiff company, Mefinance Limited, which was authorized by the FCA, allowing it to sell insurance through telemarketing.
In 2013, I reported how the same company used telemarketing to boost business for a consumer magazine called Sapphire.
One Mail on Sunday reader called was promised the magazine and a selection of discount vouchers, all during a 14-day free trial.
If you didn’t cancel within that time, an annual subscription of £79 would be debited from your bank account. The reader, a pensioner, did not receive any magazine or vouchers, but Mefinance collected the £79 from his bank.
When he protested, they told him it was his fault for not canceling the payment before the free trial period ended. After The Mail on Sunday intervened, the reader received a full refund and the company itself went into liquidation in 2015.
Even further back, in 2011, Nihat ran a marketing company representing Vitamail, a famous mail order company that issued emails that gave people the impression that they had won thousands of pounds. The winners had to place an order for health products from Vitamail, after which the products arrived, but the prizes were somewhat more elusive.
I asked the FCA how, in the wake of Vitamail and Mefinance, it had felt confident that Nihat would treat customers fairly when it approved him in 2018 for a senior role at Monark Global. And I also asked the watchdog if it was now reconsidering its approval, following the huge fines imposed by the Information Commissioner.
The FCA declined to respond. A spokesperson told me: ‘We cannot comment on individual companies. We take seriously all information we receive about the companies we regulate, including fines from other regulators.’
I also invited Nihat to comment on the £340,000 fines faced by the two nuisance calling companies he ran. And I asked him if he believed the FCA would also take action. Nihat did not respond.
Crossed wires on O2 departure bill
Mrs. KM writes: I have been an O2 customer for almost 30 years. Last summer I stopped being able to make or receive international calls or texts, which are crucial as I have a property abroad and my Portuguese bank needs to text me a code for every transaction.
O2 said I needed an add-on and sold me a two-year contract, but it didn’t work out.
He then told me he needed a new contract with a new number, which worked, but now he wants to charge me almost £300 to leave him, even though he doesn’t.
Making a splash: O2 told Ms KM she needed a new contract with a new number – which worked
Tony Hetherington replies: Firstly, it was O2’s idea to sell him a new contract, with a new number, because he had already failed at work by cutting off international calls. But penalizing him a sum of almost £300, telling him that he had broken his first contract to start the new contract, which O2 itself had sold to him, is more than ridiculous: it is marketing madness!
He tried to solve this problem with repeated visits to his local O2 store, but told me: “The staff almost got stuck in the back door in a frantic effort to escape when they saw me.”
I was luckier. I asked O2 headquarters to intervene and you apologized. O2 now lets you switch providers without penalty, so you can forget about the £300 lawsuit. And O2 told me: “We have offered an extra £60 as a gesture of goodwill, which Mrs M has accepted.”
If you believe you are a victim of financial irregularity, please write to Tony Hetherington at Financial Mail, 9 Derry Street, London W8 5HY or email tony.hetherington@mailonsunday.co.uk. Due to the large volume of inquiries, it is not possible to provide personal responses. Please only send copies of the original documents, which we regret cannot be returned.
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