Under the banner of a brand-made air conditioner authorized maintenance, a fake maintenance website line attracts customers, and a “li gyu” repairer is placed in the house to defraud clients of large maintenance costs in the form of unsick repairs, minor repairs and even artificial failures. Recently, the shanghai police, in an effort to protect consumer rights and interests by maintaining a people-centred approach, began with a report from a citizen, bringing together the same type of police officers to study and study the situation and dig into the scenes, succeeded in eliminating an air conditioner repair fraud syndicate and arresting nine suspects, including website maintenance, telephone service and maintenance personnel, for over $3 million。
High air conditioner maintenance costs are ineffective
In february 2021, ms. Liu, a citizen, reported to the shanghai city public security bureau, bong hyen, that the central air-conditioning installed in her home in 2014 had suddenly been unable to start, that, since the warranty period had passed and the documents purchased had long been missing, a “400” call had been searched through the internet. Ms. Liu, believing that this was an official telephone call, sent a telegram to fix it, and after asking in detail about ms. Liu's air conditioner failure, the “passenger” at the end of the telephone indicated that workers would be placed in the house for repairs。
The next day, the maintenance staff in the air conditioner branded work suit came to the door and, following a check, indicated that the computer master plate of the core air conditioner component needed to be replaced, at a price of $10,000. Considering that the new air conditioner was used for more than 70,000 items and that the other party claimed to be a branding authority and official maintenance, ms. Liu did not question, nor did she test the machine on the spot and pay for it, but did not realize that the air conditioner could still be activated and the maintenance party could no longer contact and reported it to the local police station。
Upon receipt of the report, the bong-hyun police immediately contacted the branded air conditioner company and found that there were no maintenance records and that the telephones sought by the network were not authentic official calls. At the same time, according to ms. Liu's description, the police conducted a clean-up analysis of the record of complaints from the branded air-conditioning company and the related police situation throughout the city, and it was found that dozens of complaints and disputes related to similar services had been reported on the online search of telephones as a result of air-conditioning failure and the expiration of warranty periods, and that disputes had arisen over excessive maintenance costs and ineffective maintenance. As a result, the police determined that there was a risk that a fraud-repairing group was behind this, and established a task force to do its utmost to solve the case。
Visiting to check for evidence
In order to establish the facts and establish the evidence, the task force visited the complainants and the police on a case-by-case basis, and coordinated the air conditioners company to arrange for the presence of specialized engineers to conduct simultaneous inspections of air conditioners. According to the interviewee, maintenance workers generally come to the door and propose the need to replace the main parts of air conditioners, such as main panels, electric appliances, and to report high maintenance costs. However, the inspection by the specialized engineers revealed that the actual maintenance of air conditioners did not correspond to the description of the so-called maintenance workers, either with no trace of maintenance or with no replacement of spare parts. Many of the interviewees did not realize that they had made false calls, nor did they notice that they had been deceived, but only complained to air conditioners because they felt that maintenance was expensive and did not work well。
On the basis of extensive visits and evidence-gathering, the team gradually identified the identities and activities of several maintenance workers. In september 2021, the bong-hyun police arrested wang, wu, huang and zhu's four suspects in the city of pudo-yang, min-yu and qing po myong-ju. In november, two suspects were arrested, one by one, and one by one, by two others, in persaipura and pudong zhoupur. Within the above-mentioned repairer's residence and means of transport, the police seized work clothes with well-known branded air conditioners logos, false post-sale service work papers and a large amount of air conditioner repair spare parts, tools, documents and consumables。
After the above-mentioned suspects arrived, the maintenance order process and fraudulent methods of going to and from the house were described. As a result, the task force follows the chain-wide, network-wide strike requirements, following lines and digging deep behind the scenes, to single groups. In mid-january this year, three suspects, zhao, deng and hu, were arrested by the police in the city of rechan, jiangxi province. As a result, a chain-wide air-conditioning repair fraud syndicate, including a maintenance team, website maintenance and telephone service, was wiped out。
Building a fake service site, making a profit from false maintenance
Since 2020, the task force has found that zhao, deng and hu three suspects have set up several websites for false after-sale maintenance services, and then conducted maintenance operations on internet search platforms to ensure that clients first see these sites when searching for the relevant keywords, using pre-registered “400” telephones close to official customer service calls and forged corporate authorization pictures on websites that mislead clients to believe that the search is for official services. At the same time, according to the distribution of customers attracted by false websites, three people recruited maintenance workers and formed off-line maintenance teams throughout the country through the micro-credit group of air conditioners maintenance practitioners。
When the client calls, the three suspects obtain further client confidence based on a pre-designed set of jargons, with detailed background information on the type of equipment that the client is required to perform, the breakdown and the address of residence, in order to make a preliminary assessment of the financial situation of the caller and the possible maintenance price threshold. The maintenance team is then sent maintenance orders by point-to-point contact and informed of previously known clients, deceiving high maintenance costs in the form of un sick leave repairs, minor medical repairs and even artificial faults。
At present, four suspects in one category have been arrested by the police in accordance with the law on suspicion of fraud, and five suspects in another category have been subjected to criminal coercive measures in accordance with the law。
Accordingly, the police have reminded the public to properly preserve documents such as domestic appliances, electronic equipment purchase vouchers, instructions or security cards so that, at the time of reporting, they can call the official security number on the documents; if the documents are missing, they can also request a telephone call or a direct call to the customers of the relevant official shops on the main electric power company's platform; and if they are searched through the internet, they must be made aware of and use the official telephone or website certified by the search platform. Care should be taken to protect critical personal information during telephone calls, and identification should be carefully verified when the maintenance staff comes to the door。
