Jatinder contacted SBS Punjabi to tell his story of how he lost money to VFS scam.
Jatinder came to Australia this year on a spouse visa along with his wife and three year old child. On Friday, 9th September 2016, he got a call from someone claiming to be an officer from VFS. The caller told Jatinder that to verify the authenticity of the call, he should open the internet and confirm that the number he was calling from was the helpline number of VFS in Australia. Surprisingly he was right. The caller then told Jatinder that he had made a mistake in filling his visa application form and that his date of birth was filled in the wrong format. The consequence of that, he claimed was that Jatinder would have to go to India the very same night to correct the mistake or be deported at 7:45 next morning.
Worried about his application, Jatinder offered to contact his family back in India who could take care of the situation on his behalf but he was told by the caller that he himself needed to be present there. However, there was another option for him, which was to send money to two people who were designated for his case at Chandigarh High Court. The caller told Jatinder, one of them was a lawyer called Pardesh Limbo and the other was case closing officer Suresh Jha. Jatinder was asked to transfer $970 each to both of them plus $20 processing fee. Jatinder was also given an address of Western Union money transfer where he could go and transfer the money. Not only this, he was asked to stay on line while he did the transfer and not to contact anyone about this situation as it was confidential.
Jatinder claims that he was told that once the money was transferred, VFS will confirm the payment and then send an officer with a new form to his house for him to fill in. the officer will require two photographs, copy of his passport and visa etc and his money will also be refunded.
Source: Supplied
Source: Supplied
However, no one showed up at his place over the weekend, so Jatinder decided to call VFS on Monday morning. When Jatinder inquired about the incident, he claims that VFS told him that he had fallen victim to a scam.
Jatinder claims that VFS acknowledged that they are aware of such scams being operational but did not take responsibility for it to have happened from within the organization. The VFS officer told Jatinder that their inquiry into these scams was ongoing.
VFS took down his details and asked him to lodge a complaint with the police. Jatinder told SBS Punjabi that his call reference number with VFS is 599476.
On contacting the police, Jatinder was told that it was a case for VFS and that the money was transferred to India which is outside their jurisdiction. Therefore, there is not much they can do about it.
On being asked by SBS Punjabi, if at any time during the call on Friday, any alarm bells went off in his mind regarding the doggy nature of the call, Jatinder replied that once he saw the phone number matched that of VFS, he was convinced the call was real and also that once the caller, (Alex Johnson) told him that he will be deported, he was ready to do anything to avoid that consequence.
Jatinder is now looking for answers from vfs as he thinks that his details were leaked from vfs and they should take responsibility for his loss. Jatinder said that money was for his wife’s tuition fee and now he will have to arrange for money from somewhere else for her university.
SBS Punjabi has tried to contact VFS in this regard, but has been unsuccessful. However VFS clearly states the following disclaimer on their website page.
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Source: vfsGlobal.com
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