Youi is a newie also but a richly deserving Roger Award finalist. The
nominator wrote: “I nominate Youi for the 2016 Roger Award, for impact on
people. Also for profiteering. And for straight out criminality (namely fraud
and theft). It is a novelty for a Roger Award nomination of an insurance
transnational (Youi is South African-owned) not to include the words
‘Christchurch’ or ‘earthquakes’. This has got nothing to do with either. There
is nothing hard to understand as to why Youi is a richly deserving contender.
On the contrary, it is very easy for ordinary people to understand what Youi
did wrong. It is purely and simply the systematic defrauding of, and theft
from, the public”.
“It’s all
in the accompanying evidence. But it can be very easily explained here. Youi,
uniquely, does not do business online. Very deliberately, they insist on
everything being done over the phone. Once engaged in conversation, their call
centre staff insist on being given the caller’s credit card details on purely
spurious grounds. Once the company has those details, it starts taking money
off the card or out of the caller’s bank account. Despite the caller not being
a Youi customer or having taken out a Youi policy (this is the most egregious
aspect of this corporate crime). The caller may simply have rung up for a quote
for car insurance, decided not to join Youi and stuck with his or her existing
insurance company.. But Youi, having got his or her credit card details,
proceeds to start taking money out”.
“This
scandal has not gone unnoticed or unpunished. Youi has pleaded guilty to 15 representative charges filed by the Commerce Commission (at the time of
writing, the penalty has not been announced). Plus it has been fined $100,000
(the maximum possible) by the Insurance Council of NZ, of which it is a member
(and has been allowed to remain so). I have included evidence that is from
overseas (Australia) and outside the 2016 Roger Award time period (an NZ
Herald article from March 2015)”.
“Both
provide vital context – the Herald article (‘Insurance Company’s Sales Tactics Shocking, 15/3/15, Diana Clement) alerted the world
to what Youi was up to (they took $590 off her Visa card without her
permission). The extremely detailed Sydney Morning Herald article
(‘Does Youi Owe You? Insurer Accused Of Billing Without Consent’, 28/8/16)
cites that 2015 NZ Herald article and makes very clear that
Youi operates this scam on a trans-Tasman basis. ‘In fact, the staff defrauding
customers across the Tasman were trained in the tactics by Youi’s staff in Australia.
The whistleblowers also claim Australia’s call centre actually made many of the
illegal phone sales made in NZ’”.
“The
reason for this systematic fraud is simple – Youi’s call centre staff are
relentlessly pressured by management to make sales. The company practises every
underhand trick in the book to extract the maximum amount of money from people,
including those who actually are its customers. ‘But that quote is often more
expensive than a competitor’s. So sales staff, the whistleblowers say, use
every tactic they can to lower the premium and get the sale – including
falsifying the policy. The most common trick is car colour. Youi charges more
to insure red or black cars; because they are statistically more likely to be
in an accident. To lower the premium, sales staff just put the colour in
incorrectly’ (Sydney Morning Herald, op cit)”.
“This
systematic criminal behaviour is becoming the “new normal” for Big Business
globally (i.e. in the First World, not just in the Third World). Currently there
is a huge scandal in the US involving Wells Fargo Bank having set up two
million fake bank accounts and credit cards and then having charged the
unsuspecting holders of these more than $US2 million in fees. The cause was the
same as with Youi – relentless top down pressure on staff to make sales”.
“Wells
Fargo has incurred $US185 million in civil penalties and its CEO resigned in
October 2016. Rana Foroohar wrote in Time (12/10/16, ‘Why The Wells Fargo Scandal Really Matters [Hint: It’s Not Just the Fraud]’): ‘Let
me be clear: I didn’t think he’d resign because the behaviour under his watch
was egregious - that hasn’t stopped any number of other financial executives
from staying in their posts’”.
“’But
rather, I thought he would fall because the fraud in this case was just so easy
for average people to understand. Spliced and diced derivatives contracts sold
across borders to gullible counterparties? Huh? But straight up fraud - taking
customers’ personal information and using it without their knowledge or consent
- that’s something everybody can understand. And be justifiably outraged by’.
So, what Youi did is not a one off, or ‘one bad apple’. It’s the new way of
doing business. But it’s got a very old name – crime. And even worse for the
spin doctors and bullshit artists of capitalism, a type of crime that
‘everybody can understand. And be justifiably outraged by’”.
