Geraint Davies, 39, said he was left feeling “empty inside” after he was scammed out of £17,000 by a rogue builder he had found on an online trader’s marketplace
A dad has opened up about the heartbreak of losing his life savings towards a dream home transformation, after being conned out of £17,000 by a fraudulent builder.
Geraint Davies, 39, father to three kids, spoke out about how he’d been swindled out of the fortune, which was an inheritance from his late father. He believed in turning their house in Flint, North Wales, into a dream abode – but instead found himself significantly short-changed.
Geraint crossed paths with an unidentified craftsman through an online marketplace for traders. Initially, everything seemed to be falling into place. The man arrived to do some measurement work at their residence, promising to have it all done within two months.
But, all Geraint ended up with were empty promises and no tangible progression on any actual building work. The total cost quoted for the job was set at £24,000, out of which Geraint paid £17,000 upfront. This initial deposit was meant to cover both the labour and materials.Geraint said: “We wanted to do something we’d look back on and think, ‘he’s [his dad’s inheritance] really helped us out, even though he’s not here’. It was a nice gesture that we could use for something worthwhile and it was going to change our lives.”
Looking back at his ordeal, he confessed: “Thinking about it now, I probably didn’t do as much homework as I should have done. But he turned up and had the company name on the side of the van, so you take people at face value.”
“It was scary (transferring the money) but I was confident he was going to transform my house into this amazing property that we’ve always wanted.”
That dream was shattered when a string of excuses from the workman, who failed to show up on the first day for scaffolding setup, led to growing concerns, reports the Liverpool Echo. Mr Davies recounted how the tradesman cited poor weather and other jobs as reasons for his absence.
Geraint revealed: “He even sent a message saying his father had passed away. We started getting an uncomfortable feeling that something wasn’t right. We’d message him and say, ‘You’ve got a lot going on, give us the money back and we’ll come back around to it another time when we’re both free to get the work done’.”
“He said there was a problem with his bank, that his account had been frozen. Then it went another few days, a few weeks, then there was silence – no messages back.”
“[It felt] crippling. I felt empty inside. I’d thrown my inheritance, and what money we had to do anything memorable with, and just gave it to somebody to line his own pockets.”
CEL Solicitors came to Mr Davies’s aid, uncovering that his bank had failed to implement proper safeguards, which resulted in him being reimbursed for his losses. Jessica Hampson, CEO of CEL Solicitors, commented: “We actually found that Mr Davies acted completely reasonably.”
“He had a look at reviews, he spoke to them in person, it would make sense for him to give the deposit that he gave. The bank should have picked up on large amounts of money rapidly going into his account and out of his account to this new payee. It had no intervention whatsoever despite the obvious red flags of fraud. You trust the bank to protect your money and they do have a duty of care to the consumers.”
Following his legal win, Mr Davies expressed his relief, stating: “I felt light again, like I had a spring in my step. We were going to be able to do nice things again and not have to worry month to month.”