value-group-ireland.com

Screaming Monkey

Slightly OT, got this piece of junk post from a company called "www.value-group-ireland.com (217.114.171.174)"

If you ring a 2.40euro/min number you are guaranteed to recieve awards worth up to 75,000euro. Our lines are open 24hours a day, call now !

...nothing unusual about that you say, but the website is hosted by an irish company http://www.dataelec.com/index.html

Anybody know about this "value-group-ireland" company...and should dataelec be hosting this rubbish..

A.

iano

They are no doubt related to the crowd "Value Group" mentioned in:
http://money.guardian.co.uk/scamsandfraud/story/0,13802,1435740,00.html

In Ireland, the Regtel Code of Conduct (http://www.regtel.ie/code_8.htm ) states:
8.2.9 Competition Services and Promotional Material must not:
(i) use words such as 'win' or 'prize' to describe items offered to all or a
substantial majority of participants,
(ii) exaggerate the chance of winning a prize;
(iii) suggest that winning a prize is a certainty

If you have a complaint, 1850 741 741 is the number.

iano

Or, if you prefer:
The Mirror http://www.mirror.co.uk/investigate/ warns:"BEWARE.. Mar 31 2005
WE'VE warned about Value Group before but so many of you are asking about it, we'll repeat the alert. This firm, which claims offices in London, Dublin, Madrid, Berlin and Sydney, operates via a Post Office box in Huddersfield, Yorks, and a call centre in Ireland.

The "cheques" attached to its mail shot "guarantee" that you have won big money - you haven't. This is a con designed to get you to call a premium rate phone line and as reader Thomas Duggan puts it, the letter is no more valuable than "bog paper".

Pigman II

Damn I was sure I was quids in there when I opened the letter they sent me!

Anyone know where they're getting my address etc and how I can stop any future 'opportunists' of this kind from contacting me again in future?

Capt'n Midnight

Question of Skill (or Judgement)
AFAIK this is included so it evades being a lottery.

We reserve the right to add, remove, change or edit any of the rules, terms or conditions at any time and without notice, and or terminate all or part of this competition at any time, and without notice. The managers decision is final and no correspondence will be entered into. Printers/technical errors invalid.

PO Box 8409

The tightening of laws against this sort of thing in the UK just means that these carpetbaggers will start coming here unless our regulators get tough on them. By tough I don't mean handing back some of the money as a fine or being able to get around a promise not to do it again by using a new name next week.

Is there any way we can sue the regulator for not enforcing the regulations once they have been informed ???

Hecate

Notify the admin/tech contacts for that ip - or an abuse address if they have one - that they are hosting scammers on their network. People take a dim view of this kind of thing, I know I would.