Illness left salesman unable to say no

Mar 14 2010 by Ian Robson, Sunday Sun

John said: “I hope 3 can acknowledge they took advantage of someone who was vulnerable and unable to resist sales tactics.”

David used to run a Government training scheme before the stroke three years ago.

He was alone when he had the stroke resulting in left-sided weakness and sensory inattention.

It is thought he was lying for two days until John phoned up and realised something was wrong.

He is under the care of a consultant neuropsychologist.

The consultant said: “Although Mr Stopher has made reasonable recovery physically the brain injury has also resulted in significant personality change which is another well-known consequence of brain injury.

“This has resulted in Mr Stopher being vulnerable to financial abuse resulting in the loss of substantial assets.”

He said there was unlikely to be any further recovery and David’s situation should be regarded as permanent.

Single David, 59, of Wallsend, North Tyneside, said: “Following the stroke I was flooded with sales calls from agents for mobile phones.

“It got to the point when they would not take no for an answer.

“I think they were passing my information from agent to agent because they already had my banking information.

“It got to the stage where I was dreading the phone ringing.”

A spokesman for 3 promised an investigation into the six contracts David had taken out with them.

He said: “We are looking into why the contracts were sold to Mr Stopher as we consider this a serious matter and want to get to the bottom of why he managed to sign up to six contracts.”

He said the sales calls and chase-up activity on bills had already been stopped.

And he said that most of the money that David had paid would now be refunded.

He said: “We have established that some of the phones were never used except to turn on, look at, and put it back in the box.”

The spokesman added: "3 is sorry to hear of the illness Mr Stopher suffered.

"We understand his condition led to him making some irrational decisions including taking on multiple contracts, for which he cannot be held accountable for.

"Since the time the products were sold to him almost three-years-ago, 3 has enhanced its systems to more effectively track incidences of multiple sales to someone by third-party retailers.

"Given the exceptional circumstances surrounding this case, and even though there was some usage on all the accounts taken out by Mr Stopher, as a gesture of good will we are prepared on this occasion to refund the money."