Ripped-off - but consumer gets cash back

He bought the items under the impression he had been awarded a government tender to supply the goods. But he discovered he had been duped. Armed with an affidavit, he went to the goods' suppliers to return the unused products in a bid to recoup his money. Service providers duly gave him a refund, barring the iStore in Eastgate.

The store's refusal to refund Luzipho was in contravention of the provisions laid down in the Consumer Protection Act and their own refund policies.

However, iStore says its reluctance to refund Luzipho was influenced by an instruction given by a Vodacom manager who, it says, told the iStore not to refund the money as Vodacom did not intend to do so either.
But, on Consumer Line's intervention, the iStore agreed to refund Luzipho.
Vodacom store manger Michael Sacks denies influencing the iStore.

He says: "All I asked them is what are they going to do - and the manager told me that it was up to their head office to make the call."
Sacks adds: "I have spoken to the owner of the store and we will give a refund for the six phones as long as they are not broken, used or the seals have not been broken. I will require a bank account number and the money will be transferred."

An iStore official says: "We will refund the money."
Luzipho says: "It feels like I'm waking up from [a] nightmare. Now I will sleep easy."
The businessman was almost conned by fraudsters who use government departments as a front to rip off up-and-coming entrepreneurs.

Luzipho says he received a call from an "official" calling himself Jeffrey Mashele who invited him to quote on iPads and iPhones with a collective value of R461 000.

After "winning the tender", Luzipho took out a loan with a friend - because he could not secure one from the bank in such a short time - and proceeded with the purchase of the iPhones and iPads as he had to beat a five-day deadline, he says.

He says he undertook to buy 19 iPads and 15 iPhones for the Department of Water Affairs and the Forestry Department but it turned out that the tender was a scam.

He became suspicious when he was told to deliver the goods to a warehouse in Ekurhuleni and was directed to a block of flats a stone's throw from Ekurhuleni department to make the delivery.

He says, he refused to enter the premises as there was no indication it was a government building.

"I became suspicious since I had not delivered wares anywhere but in Pretoria in my previous dealings with the same department," he says.

Luzipho says he called Mashele to complain about being escorted to the flats instead of a government building and Mashele tried to convince him he was at the right place. But Luzipho decided to go to the department where he was told it was a scam.

So he went to the nearest police station where he discovered he was not the only one who had been duped by the fraudsters.