DDS Europe Ltd review: Non-payment 22

They are shameless, scoundrels. They lie when paying, they have been scamming people for many years, they don't even publish their accounts in the official bulletin. I am going to go after them until I tear their eyes out, I will use all the means at my disposal to make it known that these people are persona non grata.

I've been working with Antelsys for approx. 1 year now. They paid but now, since summer 2023 they are making excuses and false promises. They till owe me some 5000+ Euro! I'll initiate legal action.

My name: Tess Roseng Carbonell Klempt

tck.roseng@gmail.com

A decade after these scammers were first reported in several forums, they are still at it. If you have made the mistake of accepting work from them, do expect a rough ride getting paid.

They pay only after several massive reminders and, according to David Brown, they are even astonished to be asked for payment "when the oldest invoice is only 20 days overdue". His promise “the final invoice will be paid when it becomes due” is all hot air. When Gail Brown states that "you were paid last week and of course we intend to pay you what we owe" it is obviously an intention only, since no EU bank transfer takes more than a week. They "intend to pay" but what they do is another story...
Infos on the financial situation of this agency can be found on http://companycheck.co.uk/company/SC287990

Hi, We are Agency based in India and Gail owes us
====== Payment Due with Details================
English to Farsi 1/6/2011 T-7221 GBP 540
English to Arabic 9/6/2011 T-7255 GBP 85
English to Arabic 29/7/2011 T-7388 GBP 20

Total Pending GBP 645
=================
We have sent several emails and they are NOT paying us. We would like to complain this to thier EMBASSY about the same.

Our email id is technocom@gmail.com

Congratulations Sol! Your determination has paid off! I don't know whether I have been paid yet; probably not, but they do at least know that every extra day is going to cost them more in interest, and that I will not only take legal action if they don't pay up extremely soon, but also look into the possibility of reporting them to the Trading Standards Authority for trading whilst insolvent (which is most definitely illegal).
And they have been doing exactly that for several years now - whilst telling endless lies to their translators about how and why they cannot pay them just yet - but still apparently having enough cash to take jolly trips to parties in Ireland, etc...!

Dear Translators,

I have finally been paid by DDSEU, on time!
All of you who still are owed money, please, feel free to contact me in private: sol.marzellier@telefonica.net

Have a nice day.

I have the same problem with this company. I have received a judgment from the court. The company owes me a lot of money and they do not answer my e-mails.

Dear Shirley,
Sorry for my late reply but I did undergo a dental surgery this afternoon and my face is still hurting all over... indeed, we all have health problems from time to time, maybe I should have told Gail this morning that this big invoice is going to pay the whole process (surgery, dental splint, and so on).
Frankly, these people are nothing but insane, as soon as I get paid (or so I hope and wish the same to all of you), they will become, as a colleague says, "an ignore function".
FYI again, this is what she replied and I replied, and so on, before rushing to the dentist (bottom>up), with the same illnesses and family death excuses, AND A PARTY IN IRELAND (what a performance!) :

De: sol.marzellier@telefonica.net
Fecha: 17/01/2013 15:19:28
Para: gail@ddseu.com
Asunto: RE: Invoicing and payment terms

I hope so, thank you...
Regards.

Sol Marzellier de Pablo

-------Mensaje original-------

De: Gail Brown
Fecha: 17/01/2013 15:00:50
Para: sol.marzellier@telefonica.net
Asunto: RE: Invoicing and payment terms

Ok I’ll make sure that David processes payment

Gail Brown

From: sol.marzellier@telefonica.net [mailto:sol.marzellier@telefonica.net]
Sent: 17 January 2013 13:44
To: gail@ddseu.com
Subject: RE: Invoicing and payment terms

Sorry to hear that, Gail, but I REALLY expect to be paid on MONDAY as agreed.

Regards.

Sol Marzellier de Pablo

-------Mensaje original-------

De: Gail Brown

Fecha: 17/01/2013 14:39:01

Para: sol.marzellier@telefonica.net

Asunto: RE: Invoicing and payment terms

He came back on 7th but David and I who own the company did not come back till 9th and then I was further delayed by flu and as I mentioned a death in our family. It was a longer than expected break as we were invited to a friend’s birthday in Ireland so that was a bit of a journey there and back

Gail Brown

Hi Sol,

Thank you for the update. Oddly enough, Gail was unfortunate enough to suffer from a death in the family back in 2011 as well when I was trying endlessly to get my 2010 invoices paid, ; indeed, on one occasion when I telephoned one of them - David, I think - he snarled at me that he was outside the funeral parlour and slammed the phone down on me.

At that time, too, Gail told me that she had been ill and also informed me that her husband had ended up in hospital. In her very hostile email to me then she implied that David's illness was due in part to my unreasonable demands to be paid for work I had done and delivered on time and without any complaints in 2010.

After that they ignored all subsequent messages from me until the one I sent them yesterday.

Some parts of their endless string of excuses may possibly be true; other parts cannot possibly be so. And quite apart from the fact that we all suffer illnesses and bereavements at times, not to mention leaky roofs and all the other tales of woe which DDSE have spun to different people according to the reports on this and other forums, none of it in the least excuses their behaviour towards many different translators over a period of at least four years. In my own case, as I wrote earlier on this forum I think, the result of their unkept promises to pay was that my credit rating was wrecked and I lost my house. Not a minor consequence by anyone's standards!

Yet DDSE have never so much as offered me the slightest hint of an apology for any of their abusive behaviour, never mind its catastrophic impact on my life, and even now, Gail's latest reply to me is rude and dismissive. She claims that she now wants to pay me, but she cannot even be bothered to dig out my past messages to her or her own records of past work done and payments made in order to find out what they owe me and where they should make payment to. All of which I have told them many, many times.

As for Gail's 'purely circumstantial' silence; well, my most recent reminder to them was last October, and that too was greeted with the usual silence. And I am not in the slightest bit surprised that she has 600 emails to work her way through; in fact I am surprised it is not more.

As you may gather, I could hardly have a lower opinion of these people and would not recommend that anyone works for them ever again. However, it does sound as though they are at least starting to pay some of their more determined creditors, so with luck you will get paid - and so, after nearly three years, will I!

Dear Shirley,

FYI, these are the last emails:

Gail... James told me that the office opening day was January 7th, not 9th:

De: James Drew
Fecha: 07/01/2013 14:43:45
Para: sol.marzellier@telefonica.net
Asunto: RE: Invoicing and payment terms
Hi Sol,

This is the first day the office has been open, I will get this sorted out as soon as Gail gets in.

Indeed, the two small invoices have been paid (without interests) and I thank you, but the first, one month and a half late and the second, one month and a week late (your office was not closed when these invoices were due)... your payment terms, as indicated the first time we worked together, are 30-day period, not later.

The large invoice, as stated in the attachment, is due next Saturday, or let us us say, on MONDAY: as you expect to receive the projects you order to your Translators on due time, we Translators, expect to be paid on due time, this is what James agreed with my legal representative in the UK who will lodge a claim whenever I deplore a lack of payment, as many Translators have already done ... their comments on several fora are really spine-chilling.

Regards.


Sol Marzellier de Pablo

Traductora/Traductrice/Translator

+34.91.441.21.23
+34.609.189.879
sol.marzellier@telefonica.net
http://www.translatorscafe.com/cafe/member118506.htm

-------Mensaje original-------

De: Gail Brown
Fecha: 17/01/2013 12:00:52
Para: sol.marzellier@telefonica.net
Asunto: RE: Invoicing and payment terms

Sol we were on holiday from 21st until 9th January, then I was struck down with this horrible flu plus a death in the family, hence the late replies from me. The 2 small invoices which were overdue have been paid and the larger one will be paid next week when we do a next payment run.

Sincere apologies for the silence it was purely circumstantial. I’m now back and working my way through about 600 emails.

Kind regards

Gail

A short while ago I sent the following email message to DDSE:

"Dear James, Gail and David,

As you very well know, not long ago I sent you all yet another message reminding you about your still unpaid debt to me for work done in February and April 2010 and promising that if you failed to pay me immediately, I would take whatever legal action was necessary to recover the money owed plus interest and costs. As usual, you failed to acknowledge my message or respond in any way.

I have just heard the following from yet another of your company's many victims, Sol:

'James told me the following in a former email, a week ago:
"Hi Sol,
There is no need to worry, we have been closed since 21st December and this is our first day open, I will get this sorted out. For the record the comments on Proz are not always accurate. We have had translations back that the quality was so poor we could not use them, in any case there has not been one translator that has done work for DDS Europe that has not been paid, all be it late on occasion."

Blatant lies and libellous smears of that kind will not benefit you in any way whatsoever. They merely make me and many of your other victims far more determined than we already were both to spread the word to every corner of the translating profession about your unquestionably illegal business malpractices, and to take every action necessary to get our claims paid in full, immediately, and with full interest and costs.

I shall also be looking into the avenues open to me to report your malpractices to the Trading Standards Authority or other appropriate body, as very evidently your company has no business to be trading while insolvent.

Yours,

Shirley Fawcett B.Sc. M.B.A."

My message clearly had some impact this time, as instead of the usual silence from DDSE's end, Gail replied within a few minutes as follows:

"Shirley
Sol has been paid according to the 30 day terms so I have no idea what she is saying this for. As for lies and smears – this is simply untrue.

How much do we still owe you?"

As you can see, quite apart from effectively calling both Sol and me liars, Gail didn't even have the competence or courtesy to look back through DDSE's records - if it possesses any! - to find the numerous requests I had made for payment of my invoices and full and repeated details of the amount owed.

So my reply to Gail just now was:

"What is simply untrue? Are you saying that when James claims that all translators who have done work for DDSE have been paid, that is true? If so, given how you have treated me and many others, how dare you?"

Since DDSE's tactic is to divide and rule - get the translators it has paid, especially the new ones, to sing its praises on the forums and ignore or disbelieve the fact that they are accepting money which was already owed to somebody else - it will be helpful to know whether there is any truth in Gail's assertion that you have now been paid Sol, and within the 30-day period which DDSE claims to honour?

Of course, even if your situation has now at last been resolved, Sol, that does not alter the truth of my own appalling situation or the blatant untruth of James's claim that all DDSE translators have been paid. And there is no way that I am going to allow myself to be bribed by the (probably yet again false) promise of payment into dropping my intended course of action against DDSE. But I would find it helpful to know whether you are still unpaid after their 30 day time limit, Sol, and also who else still has not been paid.

Because it seems to me that by uniting our forces, we unpaid victims of DDSE's fraudulent business practices may be able both to share costs, and take much more effective action against this rogue company whose favourite tactic is to divide us and lie to us about just about everything - including our fellow translators.

We definitely must spread the word, whether they pay the last big invoice they owe me on Monday or not (if not, I will lodge a Small Claim Court), I will report them on TC!

James is an utter liar! I am one of the many translators who did several jobs for them, without the slightest hint of any complaints about the quality of my work or the least suggestion that my work could not be used, and who has still not been paid for a number of jobs almost 3 years after doing the work.
In fact some of those still unpaid jobs - from early 2010! - were for a client for whom I had previously done work through DDSE (for which I did eventually, after many months of struggling to get payment, finally get paid). So clearly that client was not unhappy with the quality of what I produced, or they would not have come back for more.
Unfortunately if you take a look at DDSE's company accounts you will see that they owe a truly huge amount of money - mostly presumably to people like me - and are callously and I am sure totally illegally continuing to trade by pulling in new translators, paying them for the first couple of jobs but then keeping all the money from their later work, perhaps to pay off a few of their debts but mainly to hook in new people to work for them in the same way. It's basically a kind of Ponzi scam.
As for what to do about it; well, I myself have been very ill so have not yet taken legal action against these crooks, but I absolutely intend to do so. And I sincerely hope that everyone else in this situation does the same. It sickens me that they are not only doing this wicked business, but also smearing the reputations of the people they have conned by claiming that they produced bad quality work. DDSE are beneath contempt.

Dear all who have posted here,

Your comments and stories are spine-chilling, but I'm glad I've found such a complaint board and you all.

I did my first job for Gail last October and got paid immediately, then a second job, a third and a fourth (this time a big one), sending the corresponding invoices in the meantime.

They owe me 1.484, 01€ which, for a Translator, is huge... moreover when you live as I do i Spain, where the situation is pretty uncomfortable.

What kind of people are they? How can they play with people lives in such a disgusting way?

James told me the following in a former email, a week ago: "Hi Sol,
There is no need to worry, we have been closed since 21st December and this is our first day open, I will get this sorted out. For the record the comments on Proz are not always accurate. We have had translations back that the quality was so poor we could not use them, in any case there has not been one translator that has done work for DDS Europe that has not been paid, all be it late on occasion."

Never heard about a Company that closes for the holidays without leaving a message on an answering machine...

Obviously, nothing was sorted out and I claimed my money for the fourth time this morning, but I guess there will be no reply to my request, nor will my invoices be paid.

I've read many comments on how you people tried to deal with the situation, but, as I live in Spain, I feel kind of desperate and lost... what would you suggest? Starting with a debt collection agency? Could anyone recommend a Scotland-based agency?

Thank you beforehand for your suggestions, good luck to everyone and best regards.

I couldn't agree more with Claudia; DDS Europe are liars, cheats and thieves. They still owe me around £900 for work that I did for them in 2010; they promised to pay on six different occasions, each time with a more dramatic story than the last to explain why they had not paid me yet but were just about to do so... and they never did.
I shall be taking them to court now that I have discovered just how many other people they have also done this to - see the Proz forum and the Translators' Directory for more shocking stories from some of their many other victims.
As far as I can see their company is basically bankrupt and has been so for a long time, but they are continuing to trade and to commission work which they have no intention of paying for. They knew they had court judgements against them when they commissioned that work from me, and I'm perfectly sure that they billed the client for it and then pocketed the fee that was meant for me. Which is quite simply theft.

Did a couple of small jobs in 2011, payment always late but arrived eventually. Then into 2012, invoices not getting paid, finally received no contact, no response to emails etc. They have been banned by ProZ as well as being blacklisted on several sites.