Important - Please help if you can!

[fat controller]

Last Saturday evening, I had a visit from the local police who were calling door-to-door down our street to try and gather any information they could about an incident that had occurred earlier in the week.

The officer explained that elderly neighbours (in their 80's) had been victims of a scam, where they had been conned out of £5000. To anyone, that sort of money is a lot, but to pensioners it is immense.

In short, they had been visited by men who turned up in a white van, and told them that their roof needed repairs, and that they would do the work there and then; those men visited twice during the course of the day, which suggests to me that they pressured the elderly neighbours into withdrawing money from the bank.

Whilst the police are doing everything they can, with the information they currently have it looks slim that the perpetrators will be caught.

As I am sure you will understand, the more I thought about what had happened, the angrier I got - we are all going to be that bit older and that bit more vulnerable at some point, after all.

If I knew anything about roofing, I wouldn't hesitate to be up on their roof doing whatever work was needed for free - - sadly, I know about as much about roofing as I do about ballet (nothing!). Indeed, I am not convinced that there is anything wrong with the roof at all. Equally, I don't have £5000 to give, or I would, but I also cannot just sit and do nothing.

So, I decided to open a Just Giving page to try and raise as much of the £5000 as I can to give back to these lovely people, and to show them that there is still more good people in the world than there are bad.

Here is a link to the Just Giving page - https://crowdfunding.justgiving.com/russell-nicol

PLEASE, please consider making a donation (you do not have to give your name, and you can remain anonymous if you so wish), and please share this link with as many people as you can by whatever means (Facebook, Twitter, forums, carrier pigeon.....) - - NO DONATION IS TOO SMALL, and EVERY SINGLE PENNY will go to the lovely couple that have been so terribly ripped off.

As it stands, £135 has been raised so far - hopefully we will see that continue to rise in the coming days.

If you have any questions/queries/concerns/suggestions, please feel free to post here or PM me.

Thank you in advance for your support.

Also, I would like to say a huge thank you to the moderator/admin team here for giving permission for me to post this here.

 

[ColinEssex]

I wish I had a pound for every begging advert on telly / beggars in the street / so called charity muggers in town and begging letters I get to save everything from donkeys to lions to trees.

There's always someone worse off, one can't cure it. Especially if someone is dumb enough to to get scammed by doorstep salesmen, there are dozens of programmes on telly about it.

Col

 

[fat controller]

Fair point, and for what it is worth I agree that there is quite a lot of reliance on charity nowadays, however I hope you will understand my reasons for trying and for having a bit of sympathy in this case.

EDIT - £155 and rising

 

[fat controller]

Up to £175 now

 

[sneuberg]

How can we tell if this fund raising isn't the con?

 

[fat controller]

Another fair point, and sadly one that I do not have any way of offering you proof - not least as the elderly couple concerned do not know about the money being raised yet; the intention is to raise the money and then hand it over.

I'm afraid that your decision whether to support or not will have to be based on whether you believe that I am being genuine - if you do not believe that I am, then I fully understand that you would not wish to offer any support.

 

[Uncle Gizmo]

For Clarity:-

Although the moderators said it was ok to post this, it does not mean that any moderator has checked out the validity of the request for help. Moderators cannot vouch for "Fat Controller" and we urge people to do their own due diligence before parting with money.

 

[scott-atkinson]

Interestingly, the link on the first post now goes nowhere, dos this mean that the required amount was reached or that it was nefarious and has been removed...

Perhaps we will never know...

 

[Rabbie]

Interestingly, the link on the first post now goes nowhere, dos this mean that the required amount was reached or that it was nefarious and has been removed...

Perhaps we will never know...

I have just tested the link and it is now working OK. Possibly a temporary hiccup

 

[fat controller]

Apologies I have not been back to this, I have been snowed under at work.

Also, apologies if there was any inference that this post was somehow verified or approved by the moderation/admin team, as that was not my intention - I wished to merely pass my thanks to the site admin for allowing me to make this post - I am admin on another forum myself and therefore know how we would feel if someone posted something like this without having the common courtesy to ask first.

The fund raising is still open, and I will be out and about around our area this weekend to try and garner some more support; if you feel you can contribute, that would be wonderful.

If you do not wish to, or if you are unsure of my motives or integrity, I fully understand why you would choose not to contribute.

I have learned an immense amount from these forums, and had a tremendous amount of support whilst working on Access projects, and I certainly do not want to put my relationship/reputation with this forum at risk.

I can appreciate now that I was probably somewhat naive in my approach, and asking people who do not know me from Adam to contribute some of their hard earned cash to a cause that they cannot verify; sadly, the world we live in now is such that nobody can be trusted purely on the strength of their word or intentions.

If I have caused any offence, please accept my apologies.

 

[mjdemaris]

Perhaps we could get the Clintons to speak on behalf of this couple and raise a few million?