DUBAI The old relocation scam has surfaced again. This time it’s snared a former Dubai resident from Pakistan.
Three months after paying a Sharjah company to move his belongings to his new address abroad, the man is still waiting for his stuff to arrive. After several failed attempts to salvage his possessions, Malik Ali, 34, says he is now convinced he has been conned. “We have given up hopes of ever seeing our favourite things again. There were so many of them in the cargo, including my kid’s toys, his special-themed furniture and personal memorabilia I collected over the years while working in several locations around the world. Then there were my academic certificates and degrees. You can’t put a price tag to all that,” says the father of one who paid Sharjah’s Tareeq Al Khan Marine Cargo Dh6,400 to ship his goods in two lots – one to Bahrain and another to his hometown.
Broken promises
“I was promised that I would get all my household items in Bahrain in three days. It’s three months now and we are yet to receive anything. They said the Pakistan-bound cargo would reach Lahore in 30 days,” adds Ali who lived with his family in a two-bedroom apartment in Al Warsan 4 for a year before moving to Manama in March. “We went to Bahrain with just one suitcase as we thought our cargoes were on the way. The furniture and appliances alone were worth almost Dh30,000,” says Ali who has worked as a finance director for hotels in Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the UK before joining a Dubai group of companies as head of finance last year.
No response
When days of waiting turned into weeks, Ali, a certified chartered accountant from London, called the cargo company. “The first time around they answered my phone to tell me that my consignment was stuck at the Saudi border and that we would receive it in three days. When I called them next, the phone was switched off. It’s been like that since,” says Ali. When he contacted the Sharjah Economic Development he was told the company had shut down. “It’s a clear case of fraud as these people placed online advertisements quoting lower than usual market prices. Once contacted, they come and pick all the household stuff and leave with their payment in cash,” he adds. Calls made by XPRESS to the firm’s landlines and cellphones remained unanswered.
In 2014 and 2015, XPRESS reported how British company ReloGulf conned scores of families by offering them competitive quotes before fleeing with the payment and leaving behind shipments to rot in warehouses.
YOUSPEAK: Have you had a similar experience?
