The boss of a new EPC business has strongly denied allegations that it is connected with another firm which has been accused by DEAs of slow payments.
There are widespread suggestions on internet forums that NextDayEPC, which is still trading, has morphed into PayOnTheDay, whilst the trade body the Institute of Domestic Energy Assessors has issued a warning its members.
Last week, one DEA had an email from NextDayEPC after chasing them up about his missing payment. It said that PayPal had “advised that it will be another 30 days before the funds are released”.
Paul Walker, of IDEA, says he has raised several queries with PayOnTheDay, a Leicester-based firm which he says is neither VAT registered nor registered at Companies House. He also claims that it is not entitled to show some of the logos it displays on its site. He claims that all the accreditation bodies concerned have asked for their logos to be removed.
Walker says he also asked why an email of ‘confirmation of order’ sent by PayOnTheDay was signed by NextDayEPC, and why the email from PayOnTheDay had the same ISP as NextDayEPC.
EAT has also seen emails from other concerned people in the DEA industry.
But its owner Ryan Ward told EAT that the allegations were totally wrong, and that his firm has no connection whatever with NextDayEPC.
NextDayEPC offers EPCs from £24.95, and operates a system whereby DEAs bid for leads.
PayOnTheDay offers DEAs a service whereby they are paid directly, on the day, by the customer.
But one DEA who rang the company posing as a customer claims that she was sold an advance payment option, and was told that the ability to pay on the day would cost extra. This DEA has also issued an email warning about the company.
Ward said he was at loss to know why guaranteeing payment to DEAs should go down badly with them. He added: “All it takes is for one person to spread rumours on the internet, and if it’s on the internet, everyone else thinks it must be true.
“However, I will not hesitate to bring action against anything detrimental to my business, and that could mean suing Paul Walker both in person and his organisation.”
He said PayOnTheDayEPC has only been in business a few days, and its business model reflected changes in the market. Before, he ran a company called Total EPC.
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Comments
Just been caught out by this one as well and paid the £39.95 I will try and get this back through paypal and a report will be going to Trading Standards. Needless to say I haven't had an assessor call me back and this shyster's telephone number is always engaged
UPDATE!!
After reposting through paypal saying I was going to trading standards I have suddenly been given a full refund!!
I actually paid for an EPC on Monday 26th September just after lunch, I paid through paypal and it cost £39.95 and the payment was made to a Neil Pottinger!
The website clearly states that an assessor will contact you within 24 hours of payment being made and as of 21.26 on Wednesday 28th September I still have had no call from any assessor!
I did ring the 0845 no and emailed but I got no response, I then raised a dispute with paypal and a ryan rang me within minutes of the dispute being raised!
He offered to give me the number to the assessor and then told me that the assessor would ring me! Still no contact!
Here is a copy of the response to my dispute through paypal:-
Hi Mr Richards, We have spoken with the assessor who will call you this afternoon to arrange an appointment. It is disappointing to learn that you have been unable to get through to us however, we have been experiencing a few issues with the routing of our 0845 contact number today. Regards.
I will be going to the business address tomorrow as I work only 5 minutes away from Enderby and if there is no one there I will be ringing the police as this is obviously obtaining money by deception!
I've just had the misfortune of applying for a quote for an EPC from this company online. This has resulted in me contacting trading standards and reporting them for false advertising. You do not pay on the day. You have to pay straight away or they won't book anyone and then when you choose not to pay online they ring you up straight away and abuse you over the phone and you are told not to put your number in if you don't want to be called. Fair enough except you can't get a quote without putting your number in. Complete cowboys and also completely shocking. Considering calling the police with regards to the abuse.
Ive just seen a Spitfire circling overhead. I think the game is up for EPC Hunter!
In reply to 1234five. DEA's should just not bid, as even one bidder securing the work for the highest bid, whatever that is has got the problem of not being paid. As for bidding with no intention of completing the work. This isnt illegal and accreditation bodies would just laugh at you for reporting a DEA. Im sure there are loopholes DEAs can put forward if need be to cover why they couldnt complete the work. Being blacklisted, I cant find anywhere where you can be blacklisted and being reported for incorrect EPCs would need to be investigated by the accreditation body. JUST DONT WORK FOR PANELS is the bottom line.
Makes no odds to me I speak as I find!
I'm sure Paul and his predessor Jim had/have good intentions, but with some 13,000 qualified and a membership of only several hundred it doesn't make for a powerful lobbying group.
The 1980's turned collective power into singular minded selfishness, where 'me, myself and I' became the norm for most of us thanks in the main to Thatcherism.
There's no such thing as a free lunch these days, there's always a cost somewhere.
He can parachute in, barrel roll, flat spin, spiral spin or loop the loop...he's still only flying a glider!
But then this wasn't about the IDEA it was about deception on the part of EPC middle grounders. At rates of 24.95 less expenses, lodgements and the like, cleaning windows would be a better option at least you could park the car and do several in one street at a time.
I also see good old conflict of interest has evaporated as more and more commissions are offered and sanctioned by the Accreditation bodies, so maybe door to door selling would be better paid (until it gets banned by the EU).
Powerful words SGHI, I admire your ethos. Keep a watchful eye over the sky's in your neck of the woods today though. IDEA boss and ex RAF man Paul Walker will undoubtedly be parachuting into your area after the "lollipop" comments!
NOTE OF CAUTION: Anybody found to be placing ficticious bids on our system with no intention of completing the work will be reported to the relevant accreditation body in the first instance in addition to being placed on the DEA Blacklist Register.
Crying with laughter, the pot calling the kettle black, sounds official, wooh scarey!!!!!!
No i'm not a member of the IDEA, only RICS, CIBSE, CIOB, CIAT, or RIBA figure on my radar as true professional bodies, and being a member of two of them I can't say that joining a 'lolly pop' brigade ever appealed to me.
Joining a professional body should enhnace the professional standing of the individual by having attained a considerable academic and experiential level to be accepted.
I'm affraid IDEA and it's contempories would have been better placed creating a union, that's more in line with 200 - 300 moaners who collectively feel the world owes them a living.
I make my own luck, don't run any kind of panel, help colleagues in difficulty, don't employ anyone else, work 7 days per week and after expenses just about earn a living after attaining every level of qualification in this sector.
Some people are programmed to move forward others wait to be led, this world needs both in abundance...but to those in the latter group I would say employment may be the better option as self employment needs all manner of skills and attributes they don't appear to have.
Or maybe this is why so many Panels exist to provide some kind of nearly employed situation...they lead and the Panels members follow!?...in which case don't moan you signed up for the small fee and the risk of not getting paid.
EPC Hunter, I don't shout about it, I keep it to myself until I read something that boils my blood.
There is clearly a connection with all the reported companies and others not mentioned in the story. I get the same two emails from 'payonthedayEPC' as I did from 'nextdayEPC' and 'expressEPC' and 'SAVVI' and...one of the email addresses has never been given to any other organisation as it is a private email only used between the family members.
Instead of threatening to take legal action, if he could he would have without any form of notice.
£55.00 says poster ED - thats not bad but you can earn more if you know where to look. Assessors earning half decent fees seem all to happy to shout about it, as do the ones being fleeced for £35.00 by the sham panels. What goes unreported is the hundreds of assessors happily working for £30.00 who are supplied by the panels who actually pay up. EPC Hunter picthed for a contract in the Midlands and needed to beat the existing supplier - 400 EPCs a month and the fee to beat £37.50 - meaning we would need to pay an assessor £30.00. Clearly assessors are currently servicing the existing contract at or around £30.00. High fees belong to the lucky few, the rest just get on with making money.
When are DEA,s ever going to learn. Its them accepting the work which they dont get paid for, that are keeping these scam companys alive. Im owed money from Express EPC from 2 years ago. No hope of seeing it either. I dont work for panels or reverse auction companys. Im set up with about 7 Letting/estate agents who pay me £55 an EPC. The agents know of these scam companies and wont touch them. They are happy to pay me my fee knowing they get an accurate EPC delivered 99% of the time within the same day. Unfortuatley, its the general public getting conned when they pay up front and dont get what they pay for. All accreditation bodies should advise their DEAs not to do work for these people. Thats the bottom line. DEAs MUST NOT ACCEPT WORK FROM THESE COMPANIES, YOU WONT GET PAID.
At last a fellow Energy Assessor that has some business acumen.
Please tell me your not a member of IDEA?
For Pete's sake!...and everybody else's when will DEA's kick panels into the long grass??????
You don't need them at all, if you all shunned them they would be out of business overnight.
Get on yer damn bikes and sell yourselves locally like many others have...or is it the only DEA's relying on Panels have something to hide like appearance, communication skills, intellilect??
Cancel the EPC's not paid for and report the dwellings to the local TSO for non compliance, I had to do this 18 months ago when one letting Agent tried to stiff me on payment (he also ended up with a CCJ and had to pay the Baliff's twice the amount)...and guess what he closed the business and started up again with a similar name, but the same sign written car...how thick are some people!?
Now I only deal with a select number of Agents give them a damn good service, get paid in 14 days and three times the rate these goons are offering.
This lot reminds me of the snickers/Mr T advert with the weekend footballer crying on the ground clutching his knee..."stop yo jibba jabba, you ain't hurt"..get smart go out and win the business for yourselves!!!!!!!!!!!
I interviewed a DEA yesterday, and he happened to bring up PayOnTheDay. He told me that he had received a list of all the same referrals from PayOnTheDay, that he had previously received NextDayEPC.
Same IP address?
Email from PayOnTheDay was signed by NextDayEPC?
Both firms sending the same referrals?
This is an open and shut case if you ask me.
I reported fraudulent activity to Pay Pal as this company advised me the client would pay me £39.50 on completion and I was to pay Nextday EPC £4.50 commission.
I did the survey and the client advised me they had paid Nextday EPC by paypal.
So..... I am owed £35 now overdue by two months
So go ahead and sue for libel I'll support anyone who is sued.
An ECMK accredited assessor (with burnt fingers)
I love the freudian slip in the last sentence :-)
How about this for a scam - Institute of Domestic Energy Assessors IDEA claims to represent the industry. They are lucky to have 200 members on a good day! If there members spent less time moaning on their forum they might actually make some money.
The PayOnTheDay website reads very well until you start to really think about what they are saying. It is a very pretty way of getting people to send them money upfront(to cover the charges they make for releasing the vendors detrails) and there are too many similarities with NextDayEPc for this not to be the same people ultimately. Maybe they should rebrand to PayTomorrow because as we all know tomorrow never comes!
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