This company offered my daughter and I jobs as psychic readers with their company.
(1) We were not asked to give a test reading to test our integrity, which is worrying given that vulnerable members of the public call psychic lines for help and guidance in a crisis.
(2) They charged us 10 to train us (when we were already trained to read on premium rate psychic lines), during which they told us to "keep callers on as long as possible", which is against regulations for premium rate telephone lines in the UK see:
http://www.phonepayplus.org.uk/For-The-Public/Make-a-complaint.aspx
Where it states quite clearly:
"Why complain about a premium rate serviceYou may want to complain about a premium rate service for one of the following reasons: the cost of the text or call isnt stated misleading claims are made about the service the content is offensive the service is unnecessarily long which makes it expensive a prize is promised but isnt delivered a request to stop the service is ignored"
(3) We were told during training to quote: "Tell people what they wanted to hear, even if it isn't the truth, so that people don't commit suicide and they go off the call happy and smiling and more inclined to come back for more, bumping up the earnings".
People phone these lines for expert guidance and support in all manner of life crises, often in place of consulting a psychologist or trained therapist. Many of them in a financial crisis, where they can ill afford to be kept on the phone for long periods of time paying anything between 46p to 1.53 per minute.
This company has gone viral in all UK national magazines, often with full pages plastered with their ads, ads that say:
"Cheapest Trusted Psychics" from only 46p per minute call 0906 360 7303"
"Affordable Psychics Cheap call only 46p per minute Cheapest Call 0904 007 0990"
"Psychics 46p per minute You deserve true HAPPINESS All Questions Answered call Now 0904 007 0988"
"Uk's Cheapest Psychics, Mediums & Clairvoyants Incredibly Breathaking Cheap Psychic Readings 46p per minute Call Now: 0904 007 0482"
"Cheapest Trusted Psychics Mediums, Psychic Tarot Cheap Call 0906 360 7315"
"UK's leading Expert Team of Love Specialists - Love Psychics & Mediums" Cheap Call 0904 007 0551"
"UK's Cheapest Ultimate Psychics & Clairvoyants only 46p per minute Call Now: 0904 007 0562"
"Welcome to the UK's Cheapest Spiritual Healing for the mind body and soul 46p per minute 0904 007 0020"
"Text World Class Psychics"Text HOPE to 67111 today! "
"Clairvoyants Psychics Mediums Affordable Amazing Readings 46p per minute as seen on TV Cheap Call 0904 007 0563"
They advertise most of their ads and claims on their web site:
http://www.trusted-psychics.co.uk/
On their recruitment web site they claim to pay readers 10 per hour see:
http://www.livelinesukjobs.co.uk/
(4) The truth is that they pay readers 16p per minute which equates to 9.60 per hour. So not only to they make false claims to readers but they are misleading the general public.
(5) My daughter and I were NOT asked if we were spiritual healers, or pet psychics or love psychics and yet once we had signed up with them they put our profiles as readers on all pages of their web site, which was misleading the public into believing that we did all of these things, since each page listed psychics apparently able to offer all of these services.
See:
http://www.trusted-psychics.co.uk/
http://www.trusted-psychics.co.uk/naturally-gifted-mediums.php
http://www.trusted-psychics.co.uk/horoscopes.php
http://www.trusted-psychics.co.uk/pet-psychics.php
http://www.trusted-psychics.co.uk/angel-readings.php
http://www.trusted-psychics.co.uk/love-and-romance.php
http://www.trusted-psychics.co.uk/love-advisors.php
Every reader who works for them is on every page of their web site, leading people to believe that all of these people can do all of the things they claim to offer on each page.
Many psychics do not have any expert knowledge of astrology, yet all of their listed readers are on the their Horoscope page:
http://www.trusted-psychics.co.uk/horoscopes.php
Not all readers are spiritual healers but this company claims to offer this service, no doubt by all of their readers. Claiming:
"Welcome to the UK's Cheapest Spiritual Healing for the mind body and soul 46p per minute 0904 007 0020"
It is against the law in the UK to claim to heal when you have no ability in this field to do so!
(6) We were told when we applied for jobs with this company that it was NOT compulsory to have to work a set shift with them, like a night shift running from midnight through until 6am, but once they had us signed up, we were given a night shift to work and abused when we told them that we could not work this shift pattern, and then ultimatums were launched, and we found ourselves being bullied into working this shift, so we quit and then had to haggle for our wages which was a pittance and they still insisted on charging us 10 each for the training which we didn't need since we have worked premium rate lines before and the training lasted all of 10 minutes and we were trained in the same phone call with our phones on speaker phone, saving the cost of them training us separately.
(7) I worked 194 minutes @ 16p per minute which should have earned me 31.04
My daughter had problems logging on to their lines but she worked 21 minutes @ 46p per minute and this should have earned her 3.36 in the end I was paid 12.37 and my daughter was paid NOTHING.
We are in a financial crisis at present and every penny counts, so they seem to be ripping off readers as well as the general public.
(8) There is a ruling in the UK that all psychic companies should state that their services are "For entertainment purposes only" in all of their advertising, but everyone knows that vulnerable people will still call these lines in desperation for guidance and many of them hanging on every word spoken by psychics.
(9) There needs to be a complete overhaul of the psychic industry in the UK, which is still too lax and doing little to protect vulnerable people from abuse.
(10) The time which my daughter and I spent working for this company could have been better spent working for a more ethical and considerate company, and the clients we read for claimed that when they tried to input a readers pin number they never got the psychic that they wanted, and yet the company tells readers to quote their pin number at the end of the call. So this is misleading to the public also.
(11) This company advertises in the following UK psychic magazines:
"Spirit & Destiny Magazine"
"Soul & Spirit Magazine"
"Horoscope"
"Chat its Fate"
"Fate & Fortune"
To name but a few.
They also advertise in major UK glossy magazines like "Marie Claire".
Something needs to be done to put a stop to this abuse before anyone else is harmed or abused. It is far too easy to set up a psychic company in the UK and make false claims, not to mention abusing readers.
I hope that our courage in filing this report will prevent others from harm.
Thanks for reading.
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