|
Dear UFI Colleague,
In the past we have provided you with information concerning a scam perpetrated against exhibitors by FairGuide.com/Construct Data Verlag with their misleading directory services. Well there is now a new organization, Expo Guide, which is working out of Mexico and which is suspiciously similar to FairGuide.
Expo Guide/FairGuide.com/Construct Data Verlag target companies through legitimate exhibition guides aimed at exhibitors. Their current activities cover companies throughout Europe, the Americas and Asia.
Expo Guide joins FairGuide in claiming to offer online listing services. They use a form which resembles an organizer's free catalogue listing service, inviting exhibitors to complete the form for an entry in an on-line directory. Unsuspecting exhibitors who sign and return the form are then contracted into a three-year, non-retractable agreement, which could cost the exhibitor a significant amount of money, with no foreseeable benefits.
Included in their group is debt collection agency Gravis Inkasso Gmbh and Swiss debt collection agency Premiumn Recovery AG (a Construct Data subsidiary) which works in partnership with the various guides to intimidate exhibitors into paying.
These publications have no connection with exhibition organizers or any of their events. It is important that all companies who are exhibiting are made aware of this.
We strongly advise our UFI members, all exhibitors and the entire exhibition community, to be most vigilant against this and similar organizations. These organizations can cause extreme damage and harm to the reputation of our exhibition industry.
There are many so called guides that mail deceptive contracts and then harass those who sign them in error for money. However the sheer scale and systematic way in which these guides attack the credibility of our exhibition industry is outrageous. So please take the initiative and advise your exhibitors before they are deceived by these fraudulent practices.
Additional information on the Expo Guide, FairGuide and other Construct Data Verlag publications is available on the UFI website and also at www.stopecg.com.
Vincent Gerard
UFI Managing Director
35bis rue Jouffroy d'Abbans
75017 Paris, France
Tel: +33 (0)1 42 67 99 12
Fax:+33 (0)1 42 27 19 29
www.ufi.org
|
