A surprise in disguise, indeed

A surprise in disguise, indeed

Door to door delivery scam

Mr. Singh, a retired Army general residing in Delhi spends most of his time tending to his lavish garden, reading books, meeting old friends over a drink and travelling along with his wife Ramneet. After getting their only daughter married a few years back, the Singh couple spends relaxed moments with friends and family. Their daughter’s annual visit from Canada brings in all the cheer and happiness in the Singh household.

With just a few days to Mr. Singh’s 75^th birthday, phone calls, cards and gifts were pouring in from every corner of the world. A certain gentleman called up Mr. Singh to inform, that a package had arrived which was awaiting to be delivered at the Singh residence. On the other hand, very discreetly Mrs. Singh had planned for a surprise Birthday party and had invited a few close family and friends at a nearby Club. On Monday morning, while Mr. Singh was busy tending their garden along with the gardener, the doorbell rang. Mrs. Singh opened the door to a person wearing a uniform of a reputed courier company with a package in his hand. On enquiring, the courier boy had asked for Mr. Singh, as his signature was mandatory to hand over the package which contains a bottle of wine. Mr. Singh, who had overheard the conversation, appeared at the door and was curious to know the sender of the package. The delivery boy said that he was a mere delivery man and didn’t know the name and address of the sender. The delivery boy then explained that, there was a Rs 257.50 "delivery/ verification charge", providing proof that he had actually delivered the package to an adult (of legal drinking age), and not just left it on the doorstep where it could be stolen or taken by anyone, especially a minor. As this sounded logical to Mr. Singh, he offered to pay the said amount by cash. The delivery boy further explained that he had to adhere to certain policies set by the company thus the payment had to be made in either a credit or a debit card only and not cash, so that everything is properly accounted for audit purpose.

Ramneet Ji, by then was already there at the door with the credit card and a smile. The delivery boy swiped the card on a small mobile card machine and asked Mr. Singh to key in the verification code. Mr. Singh did the needful in a jiffy as he was extremely anxious to open the package and unveil the name of the sender. The delivery boy handed over the receipt instantly and rushed off for his next delivery.

To the Singh couple’s utter disappointment, the sender’s name was not written anywhere on the package. Life carried on, Ramneet ji though confused, but was happy thinking that, in life surprises come in small packages and treated it to be a surprise trailer to the grand 75^th Birthday. The real surprise shook the Singh couple when on the following Thursday, Mr. Singh received a few alert messages from his bank stating certain withdrawals and debits amounting to Rs. 1.50 lacs. The Singh couple was taken aback, to their utter shock they couldn’t react nor communicate as they were left traumatized with the incident.

Apparently the "mobile credit card machine," which the delivery boy carried, had all the information recorded, necessary to create a "dummy” card with all the card details and not to forget the verification code too.

On informing their daughter, Preeti in Canada, she instructed them to notify the bank and immediately request to stop payment, but it was already too late. Mr. Singh’s brother accompanied him to the closest Police station to lodge a complaint, on which they were informed that similar cases had happened in their area in the recent past.

Thus, surprises which often come in small packages, should be avoided. May the general mass be alert and avoid such unpleasant surprises which hamper your life. Always be alert and cautious while receiving packages. Swipe cards only if you have initiated a payment yourself.

Now you can be doubly sure of a delivery boy on Pehechano  or use the Android App. Companies can safeguard their reputation and also indemnify themselves from such impersonating fraudsters.

- Sanchita

A CLOSER LOOK

Neha was alone at her new home. Deepak and Neha, the newly married couple moved into their new home in Noida about 2 weeks ago. The house was perfect for Neha, she was still figuring out with the interiors and how to make her house into a beautiful home. She was shifting few items from the still unpacked boxes when her doorbell rang.

She looked through the peephole and then opened one of two doors, there were 2 men in their mid-20s who looked polite and were dressed neatly, and they wore some kind of a uniform. “Good afternoon mam” said a man who looked in charge, Neha simply nodded.

“Mam we are the service team, employed by the society, we are here to fix your A/C” said the in charge, showing his and his colleague’s id. Neha carefully looked and then called the security guard to reconfirm, and only after getting thoroughly satisfied, she opened the door. The men came in and right away went on with their job. They had all sort of tools through which they dismantled the new window A/C. Neha called Deepak and told him about the service guys. Deepak asked Neha to be careful. Neha knew, so she kept the front door open and stayed at the drawing room while the men were working in the bed room.

After every 10-15 minutes Neha went on to check the men who were deeply involved in their work. Neha thought the job was taking little more than usual time. thus she enquired about the same to the in charge, who assured Neha that the job will be over by next 5-10 mins. 

Neha waited in the drawing room when one of the guys called her out to check the functioning of her A/C. Neha checked and once she found everything was ok she signed few papers.

 The guys politely said thank you and before they went out of the house the in charge told Neha that they will be coming back after one week to make sure the functioning is still good, Neha agreed. Neha felt a sigh of relief as things were falling into places in her new home. She went to check the A/C again, it was working perfectly fine. She called Deepak and updated him, meanwhile she noticed a small hole on the front panel of A/C, initially she thought this might the design feature but her instinct told her something was not right, so as she went near the panel and looked closer, her eyes widened, a sweat broke on her forehead, she could not believe what she just saw. There was camera of miniscule size hidden deep inside the panel, which would be unnoticed under normal circumstances.

She checked her door was locked and no one was standing at the door. She sat down and thought for a while and came up with an idea. She remembered how her friend once told her about Pehechano. An app which stores the data of all the employees such as drivers, security guards etc. from their previous employers. She immediately downloaded Pehechano and called the security guard to enquire the names of service technicians, she noted it down and searched their name on Pehechano. To her horror one of the names popped up and had a bad history of eve teasing and harassment case.

She immediately informed her husband and police personnel. And after investigation it was found that both the technicians hid the cameras in A/C and after week took it out and sold the contents in the  market. They were doing it for the last 6-7 months. Not only Neha saved many people’s lives but she also became an active member on Pehechano, now continuously updating the track record of the people on the Pehechano App.

Safety first, convenience later

Sneha, a 29 year old lady from Kolkata, is a proud homemaker and a mother to 2year old Ishaan. Rittwick, Sneha’s husband has a very hectic professional life and his job demands touring for 10 days in a month. Rittwick’s frequent touring, thus absence from home has increased Sneha’s proficiency in both indoor as well as outdoor work. Life is hectic for Sneha too, as she single handedly manages the toddler without any nanny or help, runs errands for the home and also takes care of her in laws and parents who live in the same city. Every trip to the closest mall for buying stuff takes at least half a day and she returns back home to an unattended child and incomplete work. With the paucity of time, Sneha has taken resort to Online shopping for grocery, garments, diapers and other daily needs for the toddler to save time, energy and money. 

One fine quiet afternoon when the kid was deep asleep, Sneha decided to catch upon her best friend from school Tania, who was in town for a couple of days. In the meanwhile the doorbell rang, Sneha checked through the eye hole of the door to find a familiar face. Tamal who is employed with a leading logistics company had come to deliver some stuff that Sneha had ordered a few days back over an online shopping portal. Tamal, who has been catering to K.K.Chatterjee street area, for a long time now, was a friendly boy in his late twenties.  Sneha was relieved to find the diapers and baby food for her child arrive on time. Sneha entered her bedroom to fetch her purse to pay off the Cash on Delivery charges for the goods that she had ordered.

To her utter surprise she returned back to the living room to see Tamal seated in the sofa checking on the murals with the door closed behind him. Even before Sneha could scream and gather the neighbours to her house, Tamal was trying to make an advance towards Sneha. In the meanwhile the doorbell rang, hearing which Tamal pounced on the money in Sneha’s hand and unlatched the door to run pushing Tania aside, who was at the door. Tania had come to meet Sneha for a while, her best pal from school. Sneha was traumatised for a while and hugged Tania and sobbed inconsolably. It was her dear friend Tania, who had saved Sneha from a major mishap in life. Sneha described the entire episode to Tania. Tania was awestruck at the incident and immediately suggested her to download the Pehechano App and upload all the available details of Tamal on the portal, so as to caution others hiring or interacting with Tamal in future and are aware of his instincts. Sneha immediately contacted the helpline of the logistics company and informed them about the incident. The company had co-operated in giving Tamal’s photo and ID card, so that Sneha could upload on the Pehechano site and help employers and customers equally before employing Tamal in future.

Download the PEHECHANO app today!!

Gas Leak Check

Gopal was sitting in one corner of his house trying to reconcile with what had happened to his mother a few days ago.

It was the day when Gopal had gone out leaving his seventy-nine-year-old mother alone at home. This was not the first time that his mother Lakshmi stayed alone. They were veterans in that area and virtually every neighbour knew them well.

Around 11:00 AM, she heard the gate to her house open and saw a person in Khaki uniform enter the compound. He walked across the portico and knocked on the door. Cautious that she was, she peeped through the grilled window adjacent to the door and asked who it was. 

"Gas leak check madam," replied the man in Khaki.

"I have not complained about any leak," replied Lakshmi boldly

"Regular periodic check madam, I will take only two minutes," replied the man.

Having seen him in the gas agency down the road, she believed him and opened the door to let him in. He was carrying a leather bag which she assumed had the necessary tools for performing the check.

She was shocked when he pulled out a big knife from the bag and threatened her even as she tried raising an alarm.

Gopal returned a few hours later only to find his mother lying in a pool of blood, the gold ornaments on her body missing and the steel Almira wide open. 

All the residents in the locality gheraoed the gas distributor who himself was shell shocked. He produced all the copies of the identity proof the culprit has submitted while joining the agency, to the police. During their course of investigating the police found the identity proofs submitted, to be dubious. That man had submitted fake identification.

That is when the distributor learnt from one of his friends who also was in the same business about Pehechano, the portal where the identity of an individual can be verified. He immediately got all his staff registered on that portal and whenever they were sent on errands, an SMS indicating the Pehechano ID of the person attending was sent to the customer. The residents were satisfied that they could, from then on, verify the identity of the person before letting him or her, in. If only the distributor had known about Pehechano earlier, Gopal's mother would not have lost her life.

Swadhinta used Pehechano to play the role of a responsible citizen

Marriage in itself is an immense change in a woman’s life especially when she has to relocate completely to a new city. Moving from Jaipur to Mumbai after marriage and getting familiar with the climate and neighbour was never that easy for Swadhinta. After spending her entire childhood, doing graduation in Library science, and working as a librarian, Swadhinta had her roots in Jaipur. Post marriage, Swadhinta had shifted to Mumbai with her husband and decided to take up a job in HR. She joined the company Techno Pte, located at Nariman Point and got accommodation at Mystic Towers at Navi Mumbai. Commuting all the way from her residence to office was never that easy and it got difficult every passing day. In fact, reaching and moving back to home took more than two hours, and during peak office hours, at times the situation often got worse. Although, initially her husband Kapil used to drop Swadhinta near her office, but on a daily basis it was not possible as he had to frequently travel across India for client interactions.

One day, Roshan turned up at Swadhinta’s doorstep and said that the nearby grocery shop owner Karmakar had told about Swadhinta’s requirement of a taxi on a daily basis. The proposition from Roshan was like a God send solution for her daily commute problem and she immediately fixed up the cab service. All seemed really well for Swadhinta for next few weeks, but one day, one of her neighbour Sushmita told her about Roshan. Sushmita told Swadhinta about that the taxi driver who initially contacted her is not actually Roshan. The driver’s real name is Neeraj and has allegedly been involved in a few mischievous activities like passing the mobile number of female passengers to other people. Many times, he was seen taking pictures of female passengers or even following them and keeping a close watch on passengers’ daily activities outside their respective homes. Although, there had been a number of occasions when he was caught red-handed, but every time instead of taking any strict action against Neeraj, the local cops left him off, after just a warning. This was really shocking for Swadhinta.

She decided to keep a close watch on the activities of Roshan, alias Neeraj. For Swadhinta, it was a rude shock when she saw her picture as the wallpaper on the Neeraj’s mobile phone. The next day, it was nothing less than nightmare when she found Neeraj’s taxi following their car, when they were going out for the weekend. Finally she had a chat with the nearby grocery shop owner, Karmakar and asked about Neeraj , the taxi driver. Once again, to her surprise, she came to know that Subhash was not aware of Roshan or Neeraj,the taxi driver. Swadhinta realized the importance of checking the background of any cab driver. Later on during a private investigation and inquiries, it was found that Neeraj, was in fact a crook who had stolen the considerable amount of money from his previous customers and had a poor reputation even at his native place. Karmakar was surprised after hearing the episode from Swadhinta and asked her to submit the feedback on Pehechano. Karmakar knew about Pehechano app from one of his customer, Alam who hired his security guard only after verifying the past record of the guard. Karmakar encouraged Swadhinta to play the role of a good citizen and submit the details of Neeraj on Pehechano, so that if any other person who ever thought of hiring a cab service from Neeraj could get to view the feedback posted by Swadhinta. The entire process of submitting the feedback by using the Pehechano app proved a lot easier for Swadhinta, as in a few minutes she uploaded the address and copy of ID proof of Neeraj on the Pehechano app with her rating.

How Pehechano helped Anita

-          Baljeet Ahluwalia

Anita was looking for a maid cum nanny who could look after her two children. One day a maid just turned up at her doorstep and said that the society guard had told her about Anita’s requirement. She looked neat and clean and well dressed. Anita simply hired her.

Things started going on smoothly in Anita’s household and her kids aged 1year and 3 years looked well fed and happy. Anita took a sigh of relief that she could now focus on her career and leave the household responsibilities to Kamla –the new maid. Even her neighborhood ladies were envious of Anita.

However, one day Anita came to know from one of her neighbors that the maid Kamla took both the kids out with her during the afternoon every day. Anita asked Kamla about this, but she flatly denied the fact. Then, Anita decided to take matters in her own hands. One day she quietly hid herself within the society compound and followed Kamla as she came out of the society with the two kids. To her horror Anita found that Kamla was using the two kids to beg at the traffic signal close to the society.

It was then that Anita realized the importance of checking the background of the household help that we hire. Later on investigation it was found that Kamla in fact was a crook who had stolen considerable amount of money from her previous employer and had hence been fired. It was then that Anita’s boss suggested that she should report this on Pehechano. Anita found that this method of reporting your domestic help and other personnel on Pehechano was a great way to ensure that you did not end up hiring any personnel who had exhibited questionable behavior while working with any other employer. She also made it a point to check the identity of her new maid cum nanny on Pehechano and hired one only when there were absolutely no red flags regarding her conduct.

What’s more, the process of Pehechano is quite user-friendly and simple as you simply need to upload the fingerprint, address and copy of ID proof on the Pehechano app. This will bring up the details of any employee who has been reported on Pehechano by another employer earlier. Anita is now assured that she has hired a nanny whose conduct in the past has been above reproach and hence she is at peace because her home and kids are in good hands.

Reducing risk of outsourced hires

Pehechano – An online platform to facilitate convergence of individual’s identity with a focus on safety for people utilizing their services.

Pehechano is NEITHER a background verification service NOR a job portal.

Then what is it?

It is a repository for biometric based individual identities with easy access to stakeholders, thus providing employment traceability.

When a delivery boy, service technician or a person who provides on-site services visits a household, especially where vulnerable people (elderly, women or children) reside, it is important that the residents are fully convinced about the identity of the individual(s) visiting them. There are numerous instances of heinous crimes committed by such contract employees on this helpless section of our community. There are also reports of misconducts carried out by escorts (school bus conductors, ayahs, domestic help, and security personnel) towards children thereby abusing the trust of their employers. Once an incident occurs, these people disappear and seek employment with a different identity at some other location, sometimes in the same city. The online platform enables sharing of identity and certain essential credentials between primary & secondary employers, and law enforcement agencies.

The following are the major stakeholders, covered under the platform:

•  Cab & School Bus Drivers
•  Security Personnel
• Housekeeping Staff
• Courier Boys & Delivery Staff
•  Onsite Healthcare Givers
• Sales personnel (Door to Door, Showroom, Retail Outlets)
• Bill Collectors & Cashiers
• Field Staff – Support & Service Technicians (AMC & Installation Technicians, Electricians, Plumbers, Delivery boys etc.)

The primary focus is on traceability of such employees in the event of disappearance following an incident. If there is a cause for suspicion, technology is embedded to trace and track movements. The platform also provides an alerting system for suspicious individuals.

The process enables primary employers or manpower supplying agencies providing security personnel and housekeeping staff to establishments, travel agencies offering charter services for cabs & buses, courier agencies employing personnel to pick up and deliver etc. to keep a tab on their employees and  by reducing attrition. (Absconding cases are flagged)

                                     

The secondary employers to benefit from this platform are corporates, apartment/housing complexes, schools & colleges requisitioning services from the above primary employers.

The platform helps genuine and scrupulous employees to establish their credibility and be above suspicion.

"The whole concept will facilitate our society in its efforts to become crime free”