Scams – Nigel Ball

February 15, 2014

An Open Letter to Veda

At the beginning of November 2013 Veda advised that they had a record of my change of address. Since I have been at the same address for more than 10 years I informed them of their error. BTW, the bank who gave the incorrect information to Veda (Bank of Melbourne, a division of Westpac) point blank refused to advise Veda of their error.

After 2 months Veda have corrected the address on their file for me. When writing to thank them I was reminded of how much they and their clients SUCK and decided to share my vitriol.

Hello Customer Relations Team:

Thank you for your reply. It’s a pity that you don’t apply the same degree of urgency to requests from poor punters as you do to requests from your credit thug clients. I’m sure that Telstra et al would not be too happy if you took over two months to reply to their requests for updates.

Well, no point in pissing into the wind – you will not make any change to your thuggery just because a mug like me complains.

Anyway, I tried to copy some text from my file to be told that I needed a password to do this. I entered the password that you supplied to be told that it was not correct.

Then I tried to print the file. Same outcome.

So, you have set a password on MY file that I do not know. Just another example of your High & Mighty attitude.

Please advise the passwords that I need to use MY information how I choose to. Preferably sometime this side of May.

BTW I, like about 20% of the people that you hold to ransom, use a Mac computer and do not have access to, and would not use even if I did, a Windoze boat anchor.

Just for the record, as both Telstra and Baycorp know, but refuse to do anything about, the Overdue account of $916 is included in the $2,362 Overdue account as Telstra sold the same disputed account twice.

Furthermore, Telstra has informed me that they have no details about the origin of either of these amounts and can provide no evidence of the supposed liability. Any attempts to garner such information is met by a simple statement, “contact Sensis” who, when contacted, say “contact Telstra”

So, I will be making no applications for credit until these false, unsubstantiated and malicious entries are removed by the passage of time.

Equally, I have blocked the phone number of Baycorp (your client) who, for 2 years, have made threatening calls to me on a regular basis and decline my offer to have the matter heard by a court of competent jurisdiction.

I can only assume that they are indeed aware that they have no supporting evidence for the claim and are hoping that I will need a loan before the 5 years is up.

Well, I had no intention of wasting my valuable time on you or the thugs you serve. But now I have spent the time I will send copies to the puppet claiming to ensure you behave ethically, and Baycorp.

All the best,

Nigel Ball

If you have ever borrowed money, or been late with paying a telco or utilities bill you should consider getting a copy of your personal credit file.

According to the Veda website you have to pay them an exorbitant fee (blackmail) of $70 to get a copy of the information that they hand out to any Tom, Dick or Harry financial thug.

But, they also have another website which is not referred to on their official site. There they set the scene of how they deal with us. They will send you a copy of your file 10 days after receiving your request. BUT, if you pay them $60 they will send it to you tomorrow! Blackmail and thuggery is an integral part of their corporate culture!

October 16, 2013

New Speed Camera Cash Grab by Victoria

Covert Speed Cameras

The Victorian Government has announced that from last night speed camera operators can hide themselves, their cars and their equipment to catch speeding motorists. This is in addition to the fact that most of the camera equipped cars are unmarked. It also recognises the fact that the operators already do this anyway.

Remember too that many, if not most of the operators are in fact employed by corporations who are required to make a profit for their shareholders. Such profits arise from commission paid by the Government for each motorist entrapped by their equiplent.

To avoid outcry, the announcement made reference to the Commissioner for Speed Camera (Revenue) to attempt to appear “independent”. This is the same independent Commissioner who examined 116 complaints from the public about placement of cameras breaching the previous guidelines. He found in favour of the camera operator in every case. To be absolutely fair, he did find that the camera positions were in breach of the rules in 3 cases, but then decided that there were valid reasons for the breaches. He might be independent – but it’s a bit hard to see it!

Now for the funny part. The announcement then went on to claim that the move is required to protect mobile speed camera operators from “intimidation or threat in their workplace”. Official statistics reveal that none of the operators of the 100+ mobile cameras have actually been harmed in the course of their duties and that there have been a staggering 110 incidents where motorists have swerved towards the vehicle containing the operator and his gear. That’s about once in every 700 shifts.

In fact, given that nearly 85% of speeding tickets in Victoria are issued to drivers travelling less than 5 kph over the limit, coupled with the removal of restrictions on placing cameras at the bottom of hills, it would not be unreasonable to estimate that the additional annual revenue to the Government could be in exccess of $15 million.

Do you think it is reasonable to trust the decisions of a Government with such a vested interest in the outcome? I don’t.

And if you think I’m paranoid just remember that:

in NSW every speed camera is in full view and required to be signposted twice before you pass it; and
in South Australia the open road speed limit is 110 kph a full 10 kph higher than in Victoria

By the apparent standards of the Victorian Government politicians in those states must be little short of mass murderers. You and I both know that this is not so. The truth is that the Victorian Government is addicted to the revenue raised by its so called safety cameras. And it will use any means possible to protect that revenue.

September 21, 2013

Safety Camera Truths

May 2, 2010

Is it unreasonable to expect telco gouging to be stopped?

A colleague, knowing that I had recently fallen foul of yet another telco for thousands of dollars of “excess usage charges”, sent me “this link(Another Telco rort)”:http://j.mp/cXGqiP, presumably thinking it might make me feel better.

Instead, it prompted me to recall that this is the fourth time a telco (a different one each time) has gouged, or attempted to, gouge me.

I am unable to use the services of one large Australian Telco because, even though they do not attempt to collect it, they retain a record of a debt in their system. So, if I attempt to sign up for a new service, they accept my application subject to the payment of an eight year old $14,000 debt.

Another luckily collapsed under the weight of its rich and powerful promoters while suing me for thousands in excess usage.

Yet another continued to charge me $500 per month for services which were available from other vendors, and to their new customers, for about $90 per month. In this case I was an early adopter of a new service and ended up paying several thousand dollars more than the provider charged later signups for the same service. They hid behind their “contract” to insist on payment.
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April 23, 2010April 23, 2010

Storm in a Teacup?

I know it is just a game, and I know I have more important things to do than post this blog entry. But, I can’t help wondering what it is that I am missing about the ginormous kerfuffle encompassing Victoria and the NRL.

According to the official Storm website there are 36 players on the NRL squad. In the absence of any better information I will assume that this number is not unusual. So, what is the magnitude and significance of the overpayments?

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December 16, 2009December 16, 2009

Beware of bidpax.com

A few weeks ago Facebook carried an advertising campaign for a business called BidPax, a so-called penny auction site. Briefly, you pay BidPax for bids to be placed on their auctions. Each bid costs about $.70. When an auction starts, bidders use their pre-purchased bids. Each bid placed increases the price of the item being sold by one cent and adds 10 seconds to the duration of the auction.

Obviously, anyone who wins such an auction appears to get the item at a huge discount — provided they are prepared to forget that each one cent bid cost $.72. However, even allowing for this, the history of auctions on BidPax suggests that the winning bidder is indeed saving huge sums when compared with the recommended retail price of the items won.

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