A few days ago I mentioned my cryptocurrency investment with a company called SOLAR MARKETS. Please note the name.
I invested a small amount and initially got very good service which suddenly dried up. At that point I asked to withdraw my money as it had apparently made a very good profit. Just before Christmas I got a call allegedly from SOLAR MARKETS (I'm using capitals so you don't forget the name).
I made an appointment with this guy who sounded Spanish and said his name was Sven or something like that to call me in the new year which he did on Wednesday. The call went on and on and he was quite abusive because I wouldn't do what he wanted. After two hours we agreed to continue the next day. On Thursday we had another two hour call which ended when he told me that we had to wait for 24 hours for a certain app to work.
I began to dread these calls as the man seemed to generally have a fuse so short as to almost not be there. When we came to Friday's call he was abusive because I wouldn't transfer money or take out loans in order to link my crypto account with my bank account. I started to get very suspicious, so I called my wife to listen to the call and the man became even more abusive, accusing us of being idiots and ignorant. I gathered by this time he was becoming desperate because I wouldn't do what he wanted me to do. He was probably being paid according to the number of scams he could activate. He told my wife that she was a woman so wouldn't understand anything he was asking us to do.
His parting words were along the line of "I will phone you Monday morning at 9 am by which time I want you to think about being sensible. Hopefully over the weekend you will see sense." He then muttered some words about not treating him with respect because he was foreign. The whole thing began to get rather surreal. I should have been suspicious from the start as he seemed so keen to sort my money out and kept accusing me of putting things off because I wouldn't deal with him before Christmas. It all started to fall into place.
The matter is now in hands of my bank's fraud section who are trying to get my money back. They have also reported the matter to the police. Meanwhile I did a little research on SOLAR MARKETS (capitals again). They have an address in Grosvenor Street, London, but there is no record of any such company at that address. Also if you put Solar Markets into Google it doesn't come up with the company but other companies selling solar panels. I then looked them up on Trust Pilot and there are so many warnings about it being a scam. I wish I had looked that up earlier but then when I applied from a news item on the internet I had no idea I would be taken under the wing of a very dubious company.
I have had to cancel and order new debit and credit cards and now will have to try and trace all the people I pay regularly. I spoke to four different sections at Barclay's Bank and they were all very helpful and supportive. I have blocked Sven's number but I bet he will try to ring me on Monday from other numbers. I certainly won't be answering any calls from numbers I don't recognise.
I have also sent a full story of the scam to the television programme Rip Off Britain and so I await a knock on the door from Angela Ripoff (sorry Rippon).
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Football fans will often see former footballer Roy Keane as a pundit on TV. My problem is with Keane's facial features. Every time he comes on he seems to have a different set-up. Firstly there was the clean shaven Keane and then the stubbled Keane and then the manicured bearded Keane and then the ridiculously lengthy and scruffy bearded Keane and now we have Keane with a ridiculously large moustache but no beard. Talk about needing to stick with a look.