A UK consumer electronics retailer has revealed that it is seeking legal counsel about an offshore corporation attempting to pass off as its online trading arm by registering and operating similar-sounding domain names. In a statement issued this week, Essex-based Home Cinema Store Ltd clarified that this offshore corporation is in no way affiliated nor associated with the company, and advised its customers to make sure they are on the correct website before handing over their credit card details.
Besides operating brick-and-mortar shops in Romford, Basildon and Lakeside, Home Cinema Store sells audio-visual products – ranging from HDTV displays to home theatre systems – through its official ecommerce portal MultizoneAV.com. However, in recent weeks a cluster of websites containing the same MultizoneAV trading name (such as multizoneav.net, multizoneav.info and multizoneav.eu) have emerged on popular search engines, presumably to lure unsuspecting customers who may believe that they’re buying from a trusted dealer when in actual fact they are not.
Whilst unethical and dishonest, the offshore company’s attempt to pass off as Multizone AV is hardly surprising, given the amount of positive goodwill and strong branding the latter has build up over the years. Adhering to RETRA’s (The Radio Electronics and Television Retailers’ Association) code of practice, MultizoneAV.com has scored a 5-star rating with customer reviews on Trustpilot.com, and is part of the ISIS (Internet Shopping is Safe) and IDIS (Internet Delivery is Safe) approval programmes. All payments on the website are processed through the Sagepay gateway, and secured with SSL verification from Verisign.
Unlike the rogue websites, the official MultizoneAV.com site carries distinctive branding, and clearly displays the parent company’s contact address and telephone number. If in doubt, customers are advised to contact Home Cinema Store Ltd directly on 01268 202 200 for clarification.
i am not at all happy with you as a company i myself have today found out that i have been part of a scam having checked all multizoneav reviews i thought i was buying through a good company although i know it is not your company that are part of the scam i feel you should be making it more clear that your name is being used in a scam. i am now out of pocket £911.05 and with a 11 week baby and on maternity leave that is not good. i feel like i should have been told also when i called your cust support line the man who answered the phone was not at all helpful and just said well thats it you lost your money. just feel you should be doing more for your customers and before this ruins your reputation. hayley
I nearly fell for the cheap prices when something told me to Google it. My God! So pleased I did. It’s the old saying:
“If something looks too good to be true….then it probably is”. Caveat Emptor! Buyer Beware!
I agree Tony, same instinct here. Wanted to pay by credit card to get the insurance, when option wasn’t available, I googled it and saved my money.
I also was very interested in this site. I have spent hours checking prices on the internet, Multizoneav.eu cannot be beaten. I decided to be cautious and investigate a bit further. Boy am I glad I did. I did actually contact them before I knew about the scam, and as soon as I press “submit” the screen went blank. Which I thought was a little strange. However, I did receive a very polite reply.
Needless to say I will not be buying from them
The real MultizoneAV.com has advised us that they have notified the police, Trading Standards, IMRG, and a whole host of other entities. They have also spoken the registrars of the domains, and had the rouge websites taken down twice and yet they have come up again. Consumers have also managed to get the fraudulent site taken down, but it keeps returning.
Taking the fraudulent websites down through arbitration may take up to 3 months, so we can only hope that potential buyers are aware of the scam in the meantime.
Warmest regards
Vincent
MultizoneAV.com obviously has an axe to grind here because of the similar name and cheaper prices but is it not also possible that another company has just used the same name for a legitimate business opperation?
Is MultizoneAV a registered trademark?
Has anyone actually tried to buy from multizoneav.eu and had a bad experience?
I purchased a Sony Bravia 40″ TV and home theatre system on Saturday night and used paypoint ukash voucher. They subsequently e-mailed back confirmation or order and further processing order e-mails.
Prior to purchase I did a search on Multizone and read reviews on the legitimate site which gave me confidence to buy. Clearly completely naive!
The tv is due to arrive on Monday, but given what everyone is saying don’t hold any hope of it arriving.
I am just amazed that nothing can be done to pull this site down quicker, also the ‘price comparison’ sites promoting the website don’t help and they should be removing all references to them.
I purchased an ipod touch for my mum off a company called multizoneav yesterday after trying to find her the ‘best’ price and now after reading alot of comments about this company I am guessing we have been taken for a ride aswell!
The website I went to is multizoneav.shoppingstime.com – and its still up and running at the mo
I find it via google shopping price comparison which is a popular site for finding the best price of items, so naturally I presumed it was all genuine.
By the looks of it my mum is now out of pocket and this con company is just free to carry on stealing over innocent peoples money!
I think its damn right DISGUSTING that not alot more has be done to track this con merchants down? the internet watchdog or whoever investigates this type of thing should easily have the software and hardware to track down this people as they are thieves and breaking the law, also the company that own ukash should be be helping in trying to stop it
i have been naive too ! i ordered a fridge freezer due to be delivered on friday . it looks like i wont be getting it too . like the man above i went through google shopping price comparison thinking its safe ! ! ! ! PAYED BY PAY POINT AT THE COOP they are unable to to give you your money back . now going to the police and what will they do ? ? ? ? totally fed up !
Hi Amanda
What site did you order it via? multizoneav.shoppingstime.com or multizoneav.eu
The best thing is I went back onto the google price comparison this morning and they are still listing them as a seller!
They caught me out also. I bought a monitor for £50 less than anywhere else. Meant to arrive tomorrow but I’m sure they won’t. Just hoping that paying with an egg card in the spar will be insured. The multizoneav.shoppingstime.com site has addresses but i’m not convinced that these will be real. Going to the police asap
I too ordered an iPod touch from multizoneav.eu. Like many other people on here I also googled the site after seeing the prices. Unfortunately when I did so, the only hits that came up were for the genuine .com site and so I believed this to be genuine. I naively assume the requirement to pay by PayPoint was a way for them to avoid credit card charges and thus help lower their costs.
I’m usually a very savvy shopper but fell for this one. Lesson learned.
Mark that’s exactly what I fell for thinking that they got away with such low prices because they used paypoint instead of visa.
Apparently these ‘thieves’ have been getting with this since 2008, everytime they get found out they shut the website down and re-open it on a new server using the same name. Also apparently paypoint, google and the internet watchdog know about them aswell and they haven’t done anything to stop them since 2008!!!!
I think I will be contacting all the above companies to get my money back!
Add me to the list of the gullible. I ordered a printer a couple of weeks ago using ukash. i thought everything was ok, i got an order no and a delivery date for this coming Friday but since finding and reading all these comments i feel ivè been well and truly done.
How can villains like this be allowed to operate for so long, where are our protecters.
I thought of going to the police but quite frankly ime not speeding so whats the point, nothing in it for them.
Distinctly fed up, what sort of existance are we creating for are kids.
Oh well another lesson will i ever learned !!!. Tony K.
The thing that makes me laugh is that these criminals obviously are using a bank account to get the money sent to and then they have to go and draw that money out and even if they keep closing and opening new accounts the fraud squad should still be able to trace them considering it’s been going on since 2008!!!
Well add me to the list of well and truely done.Mine was only a small amount but it still hurts. I’m so sorry for everyone that has lost out but my real worry is what is the money they conned out of us being used for. My husband who made the purchase is usually very security and bogus aware checks McAfee sights but he was done . Wishing you all good fortune in the future. Good luck Kath
Bought an Xbox from them last week, and couldn’t believe my luck……well obviously!!! Does that mean the money’s lost? What happens if you go to the police? Can we claim through PayPoint? Any advice welcome
OMG, I’v been done too, bought an Acer netbook for someones birthday present, all the coms seemed ok until today. I went through the link and the order number was not found. It was only then that I searched the net for similar problems and could’t believe it when sooo many people had fallen victim to the same scam. I paid with a credit card so my bank have cancelled it and reported it to the fraud squad. Not sure if I will get my money back, but i’m not holding my breath. Maybe I should report it to the police too. Surley there must be some kind of traceability on where the money has gone, UKash must re-direct it to somewhere.
i ordered a 32 inch tv as i split up with my partner and had no tv (as he took it with him) i payed with ukash it should be delivered on friday but dont hold out much hope have no money to buy another one
99999
I just have been robbed. Garmin nuvi 3790T for 112 GBP was unbeateble. Today I wanted check my status, but order ID has been sudenly unknown and email address as well. Than I went to find review and I found that this web-site has been robbing people since 2008. They often change name. I payed it by pay point – Now I am trying to get money back, because I know that item will never arrive. Do not use cheep web – site amazon is allways safe – in my experience.
Hello All,
It is good to see that now this fake website is reported and somehow it would be able to save atleast other people in future.
I was also amazed with the cheap prices and ordered a Canon xs 210is Camera for 98.21 GBP, here I should thank to the old lady who was selling the UKash vouchers, as she asked me the purpose of buying that cash voucher and when I explained her the reason, she advised me that people use this card often for gambling as UKash voucher is as untraceable as cash money and I(she) would not recommend you to buy this now better I(to me) should be very sure about my purchase. And therefore it got my attention to doubt on its authenticity, also the feel of this scam website and there mail Ids were not very appealing to me. therefore, I thought to use some of my computer skills, I checked that this website domain is newly registered on 8th June 2011 ( other details are here http://www.dnsstuff.com/tools/whois/?ip=multizoneav.net&server= ) . then I thought to do some more research on there existence and came to know about different websites address similar to the original multizoneAV are redirecting to the fake multizoneAv site those were http://www.multizoneav.eu/, http://www.multizoneav.net/ and also http://multizoneav.shoppingstime.com/ also as I was already known about there fake email ids as they were hosted by some other companies like few email address were and .
Although the best possible way of tracking these fraudsters may not be suggested as this type of frauds are much more known to police and other internet monitoring authorities and they are familiar to the process they can acquire to trace these criminals, but probably in a general view they can be tracked back using the UKash voucher numbers as these numbers ( from people who finally paid for the orders) can be tracked to find at which access point or bank account they got cashed back , Also the IP addresses, PCs unique MAC IDs and other related information recorded by various internet traffic monitoring websites one of them is Google itself required to mention that this Google actually led everybody to be a victim of this fake cheap price website by registering in their Google Shopping.
Wishing all the best to everybody…
does anybody think there is anything in complaining to google as it was them that advertised them in the 1st place?
Has anyone had any luck complaining elsewhere?
So Gaurav what your saying is that the police/fraud squad should be able to trace where the UKash payment went to? thats what I thought, but if thats the case then why haven’t they caught them since 2008? I personally believe its too much paperwork for them and they are turning a blind eye.
Also why is Google letting this happen?
Like all of you waiting for a camera to be delivered even paid for 3 year warranty, paid by pay safe and can say goodbye to my money. Feel really stupid
What a joke, we,ve also been scammed. expected our tv to come today, cos it hasn’t tried getting on their site to see if could find phone number to chase it up!! So come across all the comments from others also been well and truly done! How can people like this get away with what they’re doing and for so long? is it worth going to the police? probably not reading some of the comments! Dealt with Amazon a few times and will make sure stick with them from now on, lesson learnt.
On Saturday the 16th of July I purchased a 4th generation 8gb Apple Ipod Touch with my young daughters hard saved pocket money as she has been saving for over a year now to purchase an Ipod Touch.
Last night 20th of July 2011 I went on to the site to see how far the order was only to find that none of my information was reconised, We paid the order by e-Voucher. Can anyone advicse me if there is a way to claim my daughters money back or have we lost it for good. Also who do we contact to report the issue to.
Hi as a single parent of three boys it takes me a lot of time to save up money for birthday presents and such like and i purchased my son the toshiba 40 inch flat screen including p & p was £212.86 now i realise we have been scammed like a lot of other people but like a lot of other people I am amazed that google is still letting this go on, and we paid by ukash at our local Spar, I have stayed in all day waiting for it to be delivered because we got a tracking number for Fed Ex but realised that this was included in the scam, my son is devestated that he wont get his television for his birthday and I am devestated that I cant find the money to pay for another one surely there must be something that can be done to stop this and help us get our hard earned cash back
Well i spoke to the real multizoneav today and they told me to contack the police and Action fraud ( http://www.actionfraud.org.uk/ ) . I filled out a form on action fraud but not heard anything back as of yet. I looked into complaining to google but it looks like they have some sort of disclaimer saying it’s their policy not to “police” sites that come up as its search results.
Other than that I cant see any other avenue to go down. I emailed uKash to complain but they have a notice on their website anyway warning people about this scam so they wont pay up i’m sure.
I reported the site to the public domain registy and they have told me they have recieved my complaint but the site i used is still up and running i can’t believe it!
I’m going to try the internet watchdog as a last resort then im done complaining may aswell accept it.
Hi Everyone
I placed an order on 12th July for a coffee machine £150, after reading the really great reviews of Multizone.com (never realised that this company was Multizone.eu). I paid by UKash and received the genuine looking emails to confirm my order. On Friday 15th July I thought I would check my status to find the website no longer existed. I immediately felt sick & realised I had been scammed. I reported it to the local police & the fraud team contacted me & asked me to email all paperwork to them, which I did on Monday 18th July. I don’t hold out much hope of anything being done but will be really careful in the future.
I purchased a coffee machine for my husband, sent numerous messages asking for support on how to pay, how long the order will take, each email was responded to within 24 hours providing much help and support and phone numbers should I wish to call.
Obvioulsy no coffee machine, obvioulsy no more emails and my order is no longer recognised, Can’t believe that I have lost £150.00 and there is nothing that I can do about it.
Feel so stupid.
What is really annoying me is that I found out UKash have the facility to track where the money we all paid it being sent to BUT they won’t (can’t be arsed more like) and think that they are in the right because they have a warning on their website.
So in other words they have been letting this happen since 2008!!!
i ordered a dyson on the 7th july due for delivery today…paid by e;voucher to this website,also i paid FED EX for delivery so i assumed it was all legite, but as the same as all off you i have realised i have been scammed, im a single mother that is disabled with 3 children to care for, money does not grow on trees, im furious that this has been going on for years and the police have done nothing to stop it, maybe they should be the ones to be held accountable for letting the idiots continue breaking the law, i would be grateful for any advice as to what we should all do next, because they cant be allowed to just get away with it, and take our money!
I also have fallen victim to these scammers. I am usually SO careful about checking out sites etc, but the emails I received when I placed my order were so good, and the fact that I was linked back to the real Multizoneav site sucked me right in.
£155 wasted.
Damn thieves.
Makes me want to cry.
Me to paid £160 for a panasonic camera supposed to have been delivered on the 22nd and guess what, now if we were to tot up how much we have collectively lost, it explains why these bastards keep doing it, I was also taken in by google search engine and paid by paypoint thinking it to be multizone so what can we now do?
Me too. So annoyed. I have contacted Action Fraud and will contact internet watchdog too. May even be worth trying to get a bit of publicity on this and raising the stakes for Ukash. I’m sure they don’t want the bad publicity but they are the vital point in ensuring the success of this fraudulant work. I would ask everyone who has been caught out by this to complain to Action Fraud – this goes automatically to the police. Report to Ukash with your criminal reference number. We have more power in numbers. If you stand by and accept it then it will happen again and again and again.
I to have been scammed. Ordered my daughter an i pod touch for her birthday, today (25th july) went to check order statues and could not get on the sight. I have e-mailed Ukash but havent recieved anything back. I am usually so careful feel cutted especially as my daughter now has to wait till next month for a present. Surely there is something that can be done with so many people falling victum to the same sight.feel really p d off.
Hi all. I found out yesterday that we’d been conned by Multizoneav.eu. Not chuffed, £98 paid through UKash at the local co-op. The only saving grace is that I paid with my CC so may be able to get it back. When I phoned the real Multizone AV and gave my order number the guy seemed resigned to the fact that lots of folk have been conned. He did, however, give me the fraud hotline number (0300 123 2040) where you report it and get a crime number. Then you phone UKash (no. on their website) and give them the crime number so that when the police call them, they can give out the info. All very good, BUT UKash have paid the fraudulent vendor and CONTINUE TO PAY THE FRAUDULENT VENDOR! They know who this person is, know his bank details etc so why aren’t they doing anything to stop this? Feel sorry for the real Multizoneav but it really wouldn’t hurt for them to do a bit more to make customers aware that they are victims too. Thanks for reading the rant. Kath
I too have been conned. Ordered a Dyson, paid by Ukash
received email confirmation of order due for delivery 26th July. Tried to follow order but not found’
tried again and the web site had disappeared.
I can say goodby to my £100.
As above I too have been conned out of £100 for a Dyson delivery date 26th July.
No response to email request – no order recognition-website not found.
Anybody have any way of getting our money back??????
If I go to the police do they have any methods of identifying payment of UKASH??
Please help a birthday pensioner.
PLEASE EVERYONE BE WARNED, This company is a con, a total scam. I purchased myself a Ipod Touch, out of my savings. I paid through Ukash/ Paypoint, I like a lot of other geninue niave people believed them to be a reputable company, I had no idea that i had been involved in a scam. I got my email order back on payment, i got a tracking email, which i monitored for the 3 stages over a 3 day period. This was done by opening my email and clicking on the tracking link, this opened up another page first showing my payment received and being processed, the next day, it showed my order being processed to next and final stage before despatch. The 3rd day it gave me a delivery date, etc and said it would be despatched via oversea shipping one week prior to delivery date. The expected delivery date was yesterday, and no surprise to a lot of people reading this imagine it didn’t arrive, I was upset, but still did not suspect anything wrong, until I tried to log on my tracker link in my emails this morning. When i did this the pages were blank. I did go to the police, who in turn have given me the telephone number for “National Fraud Intelligence Bureau”. who i rang immediately, they are aware of this company and what is happening, and they are doing there best to track the thiefs down. The telephone number is
0300 1232040. I urge anyone who hasn’t reported it yet to contact this fraud squad, even though i know i will probably never see my money again, at least i know i have tried to help catch the people who are doing this, so they will be caught and carnt cheat anyone else out of their money. Also if when reading this, you haven’t been involved with this company but no of anyone who has, please pass this number on to them.
I too have recently been conned by these criminals. I only wanted a cheap DVD recorder and only lost £50, not a lot compared with others but still £50 could have gone to another one elsewhere. If this has been going on for so long why doesn’t the “National Fraud Intelligence Bureau” or Interpol or whoever, force UKash to give them the info on who they passed on our money to? Jack Bauer or Jason Bourne would have found them by now pity it’s only fictional characters that are able find the bad guys.
I was conned out of £73 for a video recorder. I paid by Paypoint. If you look at their site, they make a great thing about fraud and security. They use the latest techniques in uncovering fraud. If they are so good how are they allowing this repetitive scam company to become a client. ? Equally customers like ourselves should be protected in the same way as credit card payments. I suggest that al Paypoint customers submit claims for compension.
Finally got an email back from ukash, this is what they had to say :-
Dear Customer,
Thank you for contacting the Ukash Service Team.
Unfortunately we have to inform you that it is not possible to stop a Ukash transaction.
We regret to inform you that after investigating the case and based on the information supplied we are unable to provide any lost voucher information to you. This is in the interest of our consumers as well as voucher resellers alike and we trust you will understand the reason for this procedure.
We strongly advise you to keep accurate records of your Ukash vouchers as these cannot be provided if lost due to the anonymous nature of Ukash vouchers.
You have used your voucher with an unauthorised merchant. Therefore, we cannot assist you any further. Please only use Ukash vouchers at authorised merchants. In order to find out which websites/merchants accept Ukash as a payment method, please visit our website http://www.ukash.com, select your country and click on WHERE TO SPEND. There you can find a list of all merchants currently accepting Ukash.
Should you require pursuing the lost voucher further you will need to contact the website you provided the voucher to or report this incidence to the police or Action Fraud in the UK.
Should you have further questions about the information given above, please reply directly to this email, including our original text and ticket number. This will help us to deal with your inquiry much faster.
Thank you for using Ukash.
Kind regards
M. Schmidt
Ukash Service Team
I came so close, I bought my Ukash/Paypoint voucher ready to buy a camera from Multizone.eu. On the Ukash voucher it warns you to check with them that the company you intend to spend with are affiliated to them, so I did.
Surprise, surprise – Multizone .eu are not a genuine Ukash trader!
I did not order the camera, but now I have an unused Ukash voucher. I will be able to retrieve most of my money, I may lose about a tenner.
Warning to all, DO NOT attempt to purchase from Multizone.eu or anything that looks like it with a Ukash voucher or similar. If any website will not accept a credit card for payment, look somewhere else.
Please be warned. Last year I was scammed by a Company called expomag.eu when I purchased a computer costing £499.00. I also, found this website on a google comparison site and stupidly went to my local spar where I purchased UKash vouchers to complete the sale. I received a very amateur e.mail confirming that my computer would be delivered via Fed-x, which obviously never arrived. I reported the scam to the fraud squad and hoped that these scammers would be stopped. Looks like they are still at it under a new name of Multizone.eu. Please don’t buy from these scammers.
Hello Everyone,
I placed an order with MultizoneAV.com a few weeks ago. Turns out they are frauds as well. All their numbers are now disconnected, and their website has mysteriously disappeared? Be very careful about doing any business with them! They are supposed to be a verified member of RETRA, but I contacted the agency to investigate them today, and as of this week their membership has been suspended. Hopefully, enough people get this information before they are conned like I was.
Sincerely
Daleep J. Sawhney
thanks for all the previous comments, although I too have been “had” there was a little comfort in reading others’ experiences. I took Susies advice and contacted the fraud squad on 0300 1232040 open monday-friday till 8 at night and they were most sympathetic and helpful and they confirmed the more information they can gather the better. Hope they are able to put a case against these fraudsters.
I ordered a washing machine plus delivery costing £479 on 30th August 2012. I also spoke to a male on number given to confirm my order. When my order still not received on 10th September, I tried the number and no reply from this telephone number, and the website had disappeared.
I am normally very cautious when ordering on line, I checked the previous reviews, and ordered via Quidco to get my cashback. Unfortunately I have been duped as well.
I will contact fraud line to, to add to their investigation.
Me too, spent £1200 on home cinema system. Didn’t arrive so chased this morning, turns out creditors are now involved and will have to wait and see if I get my money back.
HI Everyone,
Sorry to hear that you’ve all been ‘had’ by this rogue trader. It seems that I was lucky back in 2011when I bought my Blu-Ray player, apparently from the real http://www.multizoneav.com.
However today, in trying to find out if a multi-zone Blu-Ray playback upgrade is available yet for the player I tried to both get on the website and ring the phone number listed on the original invoice, and unsurprisingly found that both are unavailable.
But more worrying for current customers (assuming there are any?) is the fact that the phone number listed on this website for Home Cinema Store Ltd (01268 202 200), isn’t available either!!
@Marcus: Home Cinema Store (trading as MultizoneAV.com) went into administration during the final quarter of last year.
Warmest regards
Vincent