01616090630

CVS have now acted on our behalf in the last two valuation lists. The sales staff are rather pushy, although the surveyors are the most qualified in this sector and managed to save us a rather hefty sum both times. Recommended.

Had a threatening call from CVS saying they are about to take out a court order against us for an unpaid invoice.

They claim that another company some time back signed a contract with them that we have to pay as we are now resident at the address to which the rates reduction was achieved.

A pain as I will have to take legal advice to check if they do have a claim - amazing if they do!

I keep receiving calls from this number wanting to speak to my Director. When I say he's unavailable and what is the call regarding they hang up. The next time they call I shall be up front and say he will not receive the call unless they can provide me with more details. I predict they will hang up at this point.

CVS called using number 0117 9309285 saying that they had identified that we are being over charged for our Business Rates.  We called CVS back to speak to them about it and they then said they had no record of our company.  A few days later they called us again demanding that they speak to the Director as they needed them to sign documents.  They were quite rude and when an employee said until the Director is available we will gather any information on how they will save us money they ended the call.

some tool just called asking me to confirm our address? i questioned who was calling us...he replied CBS, I asked who or what CBS was, he replied o we are chartered serveyors for business rates.
before he could finish i promptly told him we are not interested and hung up on him, dont be fooled into paying for these thieves to 'reduce' you business rates, you can apply yourself for FREE, these theives will charge you some £500 to come out and servey weather they get your rates reduced or not they will chanrge you.01616090630

Would you pay someone elses electric bill? perhaps someone elses mortgage? no you wouldnt .................so your not liable for previous occupants contracts.

What do expect from a company linked to Strattons and Oldfields - both are multi million pound business rate frauds.

Cardiff, CVS tried to charge???? They did it for me on a no win no fee. Sales people are quite pushy but their surveyors are very good and got me a rather large discount.

http://www.muswell-hill.com/n10biz/info/news/business-rate-scam.htm

Trading standards warn of business rate scam
In the run up to the announcement by the Valuation Office of new business rates set to come into force in April, Haringey Council's Trading Standards have warned local businesses to be careful about companies offering to help them get their rates reduced.

In the past few years, such companies have had contracts with businesses that asked for payment of a percentage of any reduction in rateable value. However, in many cases, it seems that any savings made by businesses then are swallowed up completely by the company's bill.

Haringey Trading Standards pointed out that anyone can appeal against their business rate themselves - all you need is a form from the Valuation Office on 020 8276 2700. Businesses should also consider using an established lawyer if they can afford it but if they can't, then they should read through the proposed contract very carefully before signing anything.

Principal Trading Standards Officer, John Scale, said, "This latest five year reassessment will undoubtedly increase the rateable value for many businesses and they will naturally look for any way of reducing this cost. Our advice to local businesses is to be cautious about any offer by specialist companies to help reduce their business rates. Some of these are genuine but others will trick businesses over the subtleties of rateable value and transitional relief. These conmen are hiding among more legitimate companies and are giving the industry a bad name."

A local businessman, Pete Powell of Crescent Cars refused to pay one of these companies,  Herber Churchman, and was taken to the Small Claims Court. Mr Powell successfully argued that Herbert Churchman had misrepresented the amount of savings he could make and did not have to pay the company's bill.

Rate Reduction Scams

Small businesses may also fall victim to 'rate reduction' firms who lead businesses to
believe that for a fee they will get their business rates reduced on appeal. Sales
persons often give the impression that no fee is payable until a reduction is obtained,
however the small print in the contract requires a fee when an appeal is logged.

Local authorities are required to collect business rates on behalf of central
government. Businesses are revalued and new rates are applied every five years.
Rogue firms deliberately target businesses whose rates have increased and charge
fees of around £500 to make an appeal against the revaluation.

The best advice to businesses is to say ‘no’ to such firms. Their contracts are often
carefully worded and do not match up to verbal promises the salesperson makes.
You will have no automatic right to cancel once you have signed and paid.

Get advice from the local Valuation Office before you agree to anything. Details of
the appeals procedure are included in a revaluation notification and in the notes
accompanying the rates bill from the local authority. Details are also found on the
valuation office website at www.voa.gov.uk and at www.businesslink.gov.uk. But
remember, if you appeal your rates could go up as well as down.

For further information or assistance regarding your rates bill please contact the
Business Rates Section at Leicester City Council on 0116 252 7005; email:
business.rates@leicester.gov.uk or go to the relevant section on this website.

If you need specific advice regarding the scams
tradaing.standards@leicester.gov.uk or call 0116 252 6599

Extremely persistent cold caller trying to get through to my boss.  I have told him at least 15 times that we do not want to deal with them.  I have asked twice for our number to be taken off of their caller list but still the same person calls.  He has even resorted to putting on different accents and changing tack to try to fool me that he's a personal friend of my director.   I have explained that if he is this persistent and sneaky now there is absolutely no chance that we'll do business with them EVER.  Absolutely the worst kind of selling tactics and based on my experiences with them  I'd hazard a guess that the positive comments here are from CVS themselves masquerading as happy customers.

Newdale it is against the RICS guidlines for them to tie you into two rateable value period and this contentious and breaching the guidlines of their governing body. There is also another extreme possibility that the Surveyor working on your case was subcontracted and a such this should be stipulated in the contract (third party contract act) and as such you would have a case to refuse terms. Get in touch with RICS and get advice on the third party contractor information from your solicitors.

Looking at the accounts of CVS it appears that life is proving a little tough these days, thankfully.

This is not a company full of surveyors but a company full of low paid, high commisioned sales staff flogging their services. The surveyors they use bar the odd one or two are all subcontracted. They pay these surveyors around 7% of the saving while keep the other 43% for themselves. Your best bet is to use a local surveyors and not one that is being ran by majority shareholder Jason Clarke who has a history of rating scams http://www.yorkpress.co.uk/archive/2000/10/03 ... all_businesses/ .

Even better to just give the government's Valuation Office Agency www.voa.gov a call and they'll tell you how to do it yourself for free on their website. Too many shysters around scamming as surveyors and introducers.

A man from this company called a while back demanding to speak to one of our directors (a director who would have nothing to do with business rates anyway). "Just put him on, I'm about to go into a meeting!" were his words, just saying he was from the Surveyors Office but not telling me why he was calling. Extremely rude. Tried to bully me into putting him on the phone. Abruptly hung up when I wouldn't.

They called again, different man, asked for someone who has left the company a while ago, had completely the wrong address for us and wrong details.

I have used cvs rates total rip off fees charged me over 6000 thousand pound rude people never use again dont tell you that like some companies charge 50 percent of first year saving they charge 50% 5 years tied for 5 years lied about fees dont use unless you are totally stupid like me also charge you each year up fron before savings

Called on 25/4/13.  Asking for my Director, who would not deal with Rates anyway.  saying they had sent a letter and saved many other properties near us lots of money on rates bills. Again he asked for my director and i said i dealt with rates, they changed their tune and became all chatty. But  when i asked if they were calling from our london borough, they got all panicky and started waffling.  I mentioned that someone had called me last week and i was sure that i had asked them to not call again. Now i have googled them i have lots of stuff to hit them with if they call  again, mentioning Strattons/ Oldfields and the fact that d the words scam, fraud and telepest came up a lot, i dont think i am willing to take the risk!

Very pushy, as I would not put through to Director he was very arrogant. Do not deal with these people.

Sadly I was taken in by CVS's sales techniques and really regret it.  They are so rude and bully people over the phone and don't explain why you owe them money just make demands and threaten court action.  You cannot actually end an agreement with them.  Seriously beware before letting these guys 'save you money' which they don't actually do.

Depends which Rating Period you signed up for. If it was just 2010, it will end on the 31st march 2015. If you signed for the next rating period, it's much longer.

Hello,

We are in the same boat as you.  Very pushy e-mails and a letter stating we owe them almost £5,000.00.  We signed a contract with them in Oct 2007 supposedly for 2005 and 2010.  We didn't hear another word from them until end May 2013, demanding the money.  We actually vacated our premises a year ago so haven't paid any rates anyway.  What was the outcome in your case please?

Thank you for yor help.
Regards, Eugene.