March 2012

Following the National Debt statistics mentioned last month, March has seen the publication of fraud loss figures. These have fallen to a ten year low on our debit and credit cards but telephone and cheque crime has increased. The figures show that online banking fraud has also fallen but that telephone banking and cheque fraud have risen 32% and 17% respectively.

Whilst people generally seem to be more aware of using anti virus software on their computers, malware and phising attacks have seen an 80% increase since 2010. Most telephone banking fraud losses are down to customers being duped with fake e-mails or cold calling scams encouraging them to divulge their personal information.

London House News

As mentioned last month, we attended The Franchise Show at London's Excel Arena during February. This was our fourth year there, and we felt the best yet. We received a good number of enquiries and in our opinion the quality of the interested parties was very high indeed. We have already held a number of follow up interviews and more are booked in the diary.

Outside of the show, we continue to receive enquiries daily from prospective Franchise Owners and from here we have one applicant booked to join us for training in April. More details on this next month.

You asked us

"We recently instructed you to undertake a trace enquiry overseas, but the fees were noticeably different to your normal ones. Why?" 

For international work we use trusted agents worldwide. Wherever possible these agents are also members of either The Credit Services Association or a recognised overseas association. When it comes to fees we are very much in their hands but we do try and get quotes from a variety of agents if possible for comparison purposes. Fee structures overseas are very different to here and it may be because of a lack of central records/databases (much more investigative work involved) or even the distance involved in travelling to assignments. In some cases there are fees payable to overseas departments such as "Land Registry" records that are considerably higher than our own. Each country is different, indeed there are even some countries where we will not recommend work be undertaken because of the unusual cash payments that are sometimes requested. 

Focus On.........Surveillance

Surveillance has always been a strength of the London House network and we continue to see demand for this service. A large number of our surveillance instructions come from either Family Law Solicitors or revolve around Employment Law matters and whether the subject is working outside the terms of their contract or breaking any agreements whilst on gardening leave.

As you would expect, London House has access to a full array of equipment to help us and all of our evidence is fully detailed and catalogued, including DVD and photographic evidence, to allow our clients to proceed down the legal route if required.

Planning is key to these operations, and full site surveys are undertaken beforehand to help the operation go as smoothly as possible. Do please contact us if you would like more information about this specialist service.

I need to know

We do not normally become involved in personal matters, generally working for commercial clients, but we were approached by a friend of London House for help.

He felt that things were not right at home, with his wife making excuses to leave the house and meet with friends etc far more often than usual. Telephone calls were taken in secret and she was being vague when talking to him. Concerned, he approached us and asked for help. We spent some time explaining what we could, and couldn't, do on a surveillance operation and that he may not like what we found, but he was insistent we went ahead.

We were soon told that his wife was again going out supposedly to meet friends. With our plan established, we discreetly followed the wife to a pub where she was soon in the company of another man enjoying a bottle of wine. As we were not known to her, we sat at the adjacent table and recorded the wife's meeting, whilst being close enough to hear the conversation between them.

The next day, we met with our client who wanted to know what had happened. We confirmed with him a number of times if he was sure. He told us "I need to know". Sitting him down, and after explaining the actions we had taken, we had to advise him that in fact his wife was frantically arranging his surprise 40th birthday party.