Do you sign up to be an HP extra on pm-global-services.com?

[Snow_Crystal]

Hi All

This is really important for you to read if you ever signed up to the http://www.pm-global-services.com/ website to be an extra on HP.

Well I did. I tried to unsubscribe from the service because I didn't want to pay the monthly fee anymore - on the website it said I could do this at any time without any notice being required. I originally subscribed to the service because it told me that if I paid £5.50 per month my details would be available for TV/Movie directors for auditions for Extras on films and TV programmes including Harry Potter.

After 2 months of never having received an e-mail of any sort, I started to suspect that they are actually not above board and are simply withdrawing money from my bank account through WorldPay and not actually delivering the service. Of course I can't be absolutely certain of this but when you see what efforts I went to cancel the service you will see what I mean.

It says on their website that I can cancel at any time without penalty or a notice period and so I decided to attempt to cancel the service. Here are the steps I took.

1. I tried to unsubscribe from the service on http://www.pm-global-services.com/ website
2. The website would not let me - the Page apparently "could not be displayed"
3. I tried to contact them at http://www.pm-global-services.com/ using the Contact Us link but again the page "could not be displayed" so I therefore could not e-mail them or telephone them. There is no contact information anywhere on their website. This of course started to ring alarm bells.

4. I then contacted my credit card company to see if I could cancel the transaction. They informed me I would have to do this directly with the company.

I then decided I might be able to get a telephone number for them from the website hosts.

5. I went onto the www.allwhois.com website which tells you who has registered a domain name, for PM Global Services it returned the telephone number 01232 456789 and the e-mail address of jamesbond2004uk@yahoo.co.uk both of which do not work. The area code incidentally is very similar to another company called Springboard which offer a completely different service.
6. I tried to call the telephone number and it does not work and so I tried to ring directory enquiries for a number - none was listed
7. I went onto the website to remind myself how I joined the service - I clicked on Join Now and it goes through to the World Pay website. I tried to call World Pay and the recorded message advises that I need to cancel with the company directly.

8. In a last ditch attempt I went onto Companies House website to look the company up - http://wck2.companieshouse.gov.uk/3dae1 ... ompdetails It said the company are based at the following address but Directory Enquiries were unable to provide me with a telephone number for them as none were listed.

SPRINGBOARD ONLINE LIMITED
2ND FLOOR
145-157 ST.JOHN STREET
LONDON
EC1V 4PY
Company No. 05710891


10. In an attempt to get an e-mail address for them, I asked the site to e-mail me my password to login to the service. It gave me webadmin@pm-global-services.net. I e-mailed this address and got a delivery failed message
11. I went onto the website and logged in to see if I could access my user area (that it told me I should be able to do) to see if I could update my personal profile and it pointed me to http://www.sbprofiles.co.uk/.
12. I attempted to log in here but it said it did not know my username which had been given to me by PM Global Services. website.
13. I looked up http://www.sbprofiles.co.uk/ on www.allwhois.com and it came back with TG Telecom Ltd as the owners of the domain
14. I looked this up on Companies House http://wck2.companieshouse.gov.uk/6e73e ... ompdetails

Name & Registered Office:
TG TELECOM LIMITED
2ND FLOOR
145-157 ST.JOHN STREET
LONDON
EC1V 4PY
Company No. 05253480

Recognise the address!!! Very dodgy!!!

15. I tried to contact Directory Enquiries for the telephone number of this company and they were not listed. However the operator did inform me that about 20-30 companies were registered at this address...

16. Eventually I found a link to e-mail WorldPay's help team. I explained the situation and after much back and forth conversations by e-mail I was eventually able to cancel the service. I just hope that, that is it!

I believe the company which also seems to go by the reference of Britstars Limited is potentially not above board. Don't be sucked it into like I was.

[Rory Pridinham]

I'm glad you got it all sorted out, but I would have keeled over in frustration halfway through that list. I'm glad that you've let us know because I was looking for a company that would do just that - now I'll be sure that I can contact them, etc before I sign up.

Sorry you had to go through all that trouble, but it's good you fought the good fight for your money!

[Scellanis]

You perhaps may want to think about giving all that information to the police or something, if it is a fake company its fraud or something illegal anyway, i'm sure, taking money off people and not giving a service, surely someone somewhere should be notified about it to stop them taking more money, particularly if they are citing things like Harry Potter movies, someone needs to warn all other fans (not just our members) not to join it....

[Snow_Crystal]

Yeah it's really naughty isn't it. I mean they tell you, you can cancel at any time but they don't tell you how and all the while they take money from you.

Companies House recommended that I talk to the police about it too. I will need to compile all my info properly and then might pop down to the police station to report a potentially fraudulent company. It's so difficult to prove though that they are not providing the service. All I know is that no-one ever contacted me (although I'd only been on it 3 months) but at least you would expect some sort of confirmation that you'd even signed up for the service etc and also that it was nearly impossible to cancel the payments.

All that investigation took quite some thinking but I'm pretty tenacious so kept going.

[Snow_Crystal]

Sorry one more thing. You're right about letting other people know. I don't know where else they advertise their site but I have certainly seen links on wizardnews.com and mugglenet. I plan to contact them and let them know my situation as they may want to reconsider advertising for them.

[Scarlet Lioness]

Aww poor Snow....I would've given up if that was me...

I'm glad its all sorted out!!! It must've been quite frustrating...

[Rory Pridinham]

I never though of that . . . tell the coppers! Brilliant! Fraud bust alert! Mwahahahaha! (Sorry - I just like the idea of people getting busted when they're being very bad)

[Snow_Crystal]

Thanks everyone! Yeah I feel so stupid! I've never been sucked into anything like that before as it all looked pretty legitimate and I thought yeah why not - just for a laugh! Just for a laugh though cost me - I'm just glad I realised quite soon about my mistake.

[sombre]

Hey Snow Tiger, Quick question, I stupidly signed up for it aswell and was able to cancel my subsciption through world pay, but was looking through me credit card bill and it appears that they were taking money twice from my account. When it came up on your bill did it come up as Britstars Ltd, Purchase Finance Ch and WP-Spingboard? I am really frustrated as I can't work out what the Purchase Finance was?

[Snow_Crystal]

Hi Sombre - it's a nightmare isn't it! so easy to get sucked into it - I've never been caught by a scam before and I was just kicking myself.

It came up as Britstars Ltd on my bill. If you go to the WorldPay website and login, can you see a list of all the bills that currently go out? is Purchase Finance one of them? I didn't know my password to login but I went to the forgot my password section and they e-mailed it to me. I also went through their customer complaints section and raised it that way. They sent back some good communications and I was able to cancel.

If you can't see Purchase Finance on your World Pay account then it's possible this might be something else entirely or managed through another company like FuturePay. Might be a good idea to find out from the bank/credit card company which financial organisation is currently responsible for actioning the transaction. For example PayPal help e-Bay customers transact does another company assist the the Purchase Finance transaction.

It's a horrible situation - so if there's anything I can do to help, feel free to use the PM to get in contact with me directly without publishing in this thread.