algy Posted July 10, 2012 Report Share Posted July 10, 2012 BOGUS CHARITY BAG COLLECTING VANS. There is a spate of unmarked charity bag collection vans operating in the Warrington area at the moment (probably all over the UK also), about two weeks ago around 0700hrs a large white unmarked van came into our close and picked up charity bags that had been left outside by residents. As the van driver started to reverse and turn to exit the close a marked ‘Age Concern’ van arrived and parked in the middle of the road preventing the unmarked van from leaving, the age concern driver who wore an Age Concern jacket and who from now I shall call the good guy leapt out of his van, opened the bad guys door and requested him to get out of his cab, which he did, the good guy was English, the bad guy who was built like the proverbial brick ‘outhouse’ could only speak broken English and appeared to be of East European origin, a second marked van arrived and this driver backed the good guy up, there was a lot of mobile phoning going on by all concerned and eventually plod arrived in two ‘plodmobiles’, it turns out that the bad guy was going round the area illegally collecting the charity bags approximately 30 mins prior to the official vans coming round. When plod opened the back doors of the bad guy’s van it was stacked high with charity bags, he was arrested, carted off to the ‘plod shop’ and one of the plods drove the van after them. I learned the detail from the Age Concern driver who informed me that they had been on this guys case for about a fortnight and had fortunately started early for personal reasons. I believe the bad guy has received a fine and had his hands smacked. The problem as I see it, is that people are starting to get wise to this and as we do, instead of putting anything in the bags posted through our doors are now taking clothing etc to the legitimate bins at supermarket car parks and the like, with the result that a number of deserving charities are being deprived of revenue, and yes I’m sure someone will point out that they don’t receive all the money from the collected items, however some revenue is better than non at all. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bazj Posted July 10, 2012 Report Share Posted July 10, 2012 The bad guy will get £5.50 a bag for the clothes from the likes of clothes4cash.... a van load is a nice sum of tax free cash if you ask me.... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dizzy Posted July 11, 2012 Report Share Posted July 11, 2012 They probably make even more selling the items at car boots or selling them abroad. I hate people like that and they should be locked up and have their van crushed. A fine and a slap on the wrist probably wont stop them I must admit I never put things in charity bags now though after a similar scam around here years ago. I was also put off after getting a bag from a well known charity but there was no charity registration number on it. I have no idea why I looked but I did. I phoned the actual charity head office and they confirmed that they DID NOT do collections that way and it was a scam. I take my bags of donations to the local charity shops in person now instead. This is interesting by the way.... http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2031998/The-doorstep-charity-bag-Millions-duped-donating-clothes.html Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.