driving-licence-assistance-online.co 

i got charged £89 after renewing my licence and not sure why

Omg what a vile website nothing more than robbing scum bags . I thought I was renewing my drivers license with DVLA cause they come up first . They basically stole £98 from me and I won’t get a penny back. I’ve emailed them back for a cancellation but no reply. DVLA needs to do something about this company cause they are robbing from the vulnerable and they seem like to accept this company as their sister website. In future i ain’t renewing my license and I will use this company bas an excuse why because ive basically paid for the next 114 years I’m 46 now so I ain’t going to get my use of it. Literally livid

Crikey, I can't believe I got screwed by these shysters. I really don't even know how I ended up on their site, I thought I was on DVLA! They must surely have some sneaky link somewhere that takes you to their page. It's not so much the £89 but more the fact I despise being ripped off!
Something REALLY needs to be done to get them off the web.

UPDATE! Today I received £89 back into my bank account via a chargeback from Barclays bank. I spoke to one of their very helpful staff only yesterday, giving him a comprehensive report on what had happened regarding my initial attempt to recover my money. He said I'd have a response within 5 working days so this came as quite a surprise. This also proves that Licence Assist are trading illegally/immorally. I have however blocked the payment card in case the sly robbers try to take some more.
if you've been duped by Licence Assist then get on to your bank ASAP.

Felix Hamsell is a thieving fellow upsetting customers knowingly.UK based clients need to take action under Fair Trading provisions that exist in the UK law to intervene in the way he conducts his business. I am sure there are provisions under which he can be fined and have orders applied to the company. Why is his photo all blurred when you google him up. I wonder how proud he's made his parents.

Con artists. Please pay attention to what you are clicking on and make sure it's the DVLA website, ending with .gov. This is a complete and utter scam, robbing people of their hard earned money. It's a shame they have to have one star.

DO NOT USE. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!!!

I’ve also been scammed £89!!! I went on what I thought was the DVLA website but apparently it wasn’t??! Rang my bank (Barclays) who said they can’t really do anything as they appear to be a legitimate company??!! Phoned the number for the license Assist and although they said they would cancel the subscription they refused point blank to refund me!! I told the lady that it was a scam and she said I should have noticed the £89 on the website! I “kindly” explained that I didn’t go on their website etc etc to which she argued the toss! We went back and forth until I said that I had seen the trust pilots reviews and that hundreds of people are all saying the same, that it’s a scam and we all can’t be wrong!!! at which point she put the phone down on me!! Lesson learnt!!! DVLA need to do something about this!!

My daughter applied for a provisional license, and I used my credit card to pay the £34 fee, thinking it was DVLA. Licence Assistance took £89, 3 days later, for a “subscription” hidden in small print, which they refused to refund.

However, I got my money refunded 15 days later. If hoping I'll now go away, they've underestimated my anger and determination to help others.

Short version

They stopped responding to my emails, then issued a refund, when I did three things:

1. Asked them to explain:

(a) Why two agents claimed their registered address is 61a West Ham Lane Office 4 London E15 and 57 Berkeley Square London W1J 6ER, neither of which is the Estonian address in the T&Cs, Harju maakond, Tallinn, Kesklinna linnaosa, Tornimäe tn 5, 10145, but which are the former and current registered addresses of Licence Assistance Online Ltd, owned by the same person as Application Service Digital OÜ.

(b) Why Application Service Digital OÜ has no UK registered address despite stating they are "a company registered in England and Wales” twice in their T&Cs.

(c) Why payments taken from my credit card were to Licence Assistance, not Application Service Digital OÜ.

2. Made clear previous and future attempts to avoid answering these questions would be brought the attention of the court in subsequent legal action.

3. Copied my emails to the (same) owner of both companies. Trustpilot prohibits stating names/email address but both are a matter of public record in Estonia - search for Application-Service-Digital-O.

The threat of legal action has to be serious - I intended to send a Letter Before Claim to Licence Assistance Online Ltd since they took my money and are registered in England and Wales. This would have been followed by a court claim, after trying a credit card chargeback.

Long version

The way they sign you up to a subscription violates the Consumer Contracts Regulations 2013. They say this is untrue and the regulations do not apply because they provide a service rather than goods. Nonsense! The following is my personal opinion and not legal advice.

1. The subscription charge is hidden in small print, well below the payment "submit" button. This violates Regulation 14 Paragraph (2): "If the contract places the consumer under an obligation to pay, the trader must make the consumer aware in a clear and prominent manner, and directly before the consumer places the order, of the information listed in paragraphs (a), (f), (g), (h), (s) and (t) of Schedule 2." Schedule 2 includes: "(f) the total price of the goods, services or digital content …” and "(h) in the case of a contract of indeterminate duration or a contract containing a subscription, the total costs per billing period or (where such contracts are charged at a fixed rate) the total monthly costs”.

2. Regulation 14 states "(3) The trader must ensure that the consumer, when placing the order, explicitly acknowledges that the order implies an obligation to pay. (4) If placing an order entails activating a button or a similar function, the trader must ensure that the button or similar function is labelled in an easily legible manner only with the words ‘order with obligation to pay’ or a corresponding unambiguous formulation indicating that placing the order entails an obligation to pay the trader. (5) If the trader has not complied with paragraphs (3) and (4), the consumer is not bound by the contract or order." Hence you are not bound by the contract.

3. Regulation 12 states: "(1) In the case of an off-premises contract, the trader must give the consumer—(a) a copy of the signed contract, or (b) confirmation of the contract. (2) The confirmation must include all the information referred to in Schedule 2 unless the trader has already provided that information to the consumer on a durable medium prior to the conclusion of the off-premises contract. (3) The copy or confirmation must be provided on paper or, if the consumer agrees, on another durable medium. (4) The copy or confirmation must be provided within a reasonable time after the conclusion of the contract, but in any event—(a) not later than the time of the delivery of any goods supplied under the contract, and (b) before performance begins of any service supplied under the contract. ... “ Regulation 5 defines a “durable medium” as paper or email, or any other medium that—(a) allows information to be addressed personally to the recipient, (b) enables the recipient to store the information in a way accessible for future reference for a period that is long enough for the purposes of the information, and (c) allows the unchanged reproduction of the information stored.

Finally, they submit the licence application on day 1, within the 3 day "free trial". The £89 subscription is for something else, after the trial ends.

It is disappointing that a company like this one - LICENCE ASSISTANCE ONLINE LTD is allowed to operate. Like everyone else here we have been scammed out of £89 by this shady website. Clearly this person is operating at the very edge of legality. Don't expect to get your money back.

This is definately a con. There are a number of web sites that have similar names and formats to the true .gov web site, the one that coned me was driving-license-application, to make you think they are indeed legitimate sites. They take a small processing fee and then, in the small print, a much larger quarterly fee, which if you dont cancel just keeps going even though they nothing.

Scam avoid
They make you think it’s dvla and then take a reoccurring fee of £89 from your bank

I have had the same terrible experience described by the other reviewers. I was swindled of £119.00 in total.

It's like the DVLA are colluding with them, by endorsing a link from the official government DVLA site to the site of this deceptive scammers preying on unsuspecting people. Why do that?!

There must be thousands of individuals who have experienced this sting operation and yet it is being allowed to continue.

Shame!

I have now had to cancel my credit card

Thieves! If you are reading this, you are probably already victim of their scam!

I too have just been scammed!!
I have been debited almost £180 for something that should have just cost me £20 (my understanding).
It turns out when I go to check my on-line banking app that this has been taken (almost 5 day's after the initial £20). By then it's too late to cancel! They do not respond to emails, phonecalls or messages via the live chat so you can't anyway (convenient that!). I did not sign or consent to any of this........

It's a scam company. Was on DVLA government website to renew my driving licence for £14. However have been charged £89 for joining their services, which I never joined or arthritis. Withdrawing fund without our authorisation and under the false pretences. Reported the incident within 24-hours to the company ask for cancellation and full refund. But they are reluctant to pay so far.
This incident has been reported to DVLA and formal complaint has been made to them. I am surprised by DVLA that they allow such a company be on their website. They are a government website not ordinary company and many people use them daily.
In addition the experience has been reported to my bank.
THIS IS A SCAM COMPANY, AVOID AT ALL COST.

I'm an 18 year old who's recently finished college and I was looking to get myself a provisional licence, when searching up GOV.UK provisional license it's the first site to pop up. Like everyone else here alot of money has been charged out my account which I am most definitely annoyed about. REMEMBER: LOOK AT THE BOTTOM OF THE SCREEN OF THE WEBSITE. this I didn't do and after reading the small print saying they aren't and have nothing to do with gov.uk I only recently found out it was a scam.

My only question is why this site hasn't been taken down yet and it should be taken down ASAP before more people fall into this damn scam of a website.

What a absolute scam of a shambles of a company - very underhanded and as soon as they get your membershio through very shady means - they will bascially be laughing to the bank!!! 90 quid i hope people read this before people loose money to their shady business - fuming

Driving licence renewal is £14 every ten years…

Why would a website offer an £89/quarter service (that’s £3,560 over ten years) for something that costs £14???

Answer: ITS A SCAM

Yes I feel such an idiot! I can't get my money back but the least I can do it to warn anyone else about this company, MAKE SURE YOU ARE ON THE legit GOV WEBSITE WHEN APPLYING FOR YOUR LICENCE, I didn't and ended up paying over £100 for my licence! Unfortunately I had to much going on in my life, and wasn't thinking straight, if this is you get someone to help you, double check and MAKE SURE. I feel very stupid right now :( stay well away from this company!

Absolute scum bags. Thanks fully my bank looks like it may have stopped the payment (as it looks dodgy to them), absolutely no idea how I got scammed into this but check check and double check you don’t end up on this awful site and company.

My 16 year old has just mistakenly used this site. I’ve paid £44 and then realised something felt off and googled!
HSBC have stopped my card and hopefully blocked the payment. If it goes through I’ll have to ring the bank back to make a fraud claim.
I am also concerned they now have a lot of personal details!!!!
I’m going to collect a paper application and not risking online again!
It’s ridiculous this is allowed to happen!
Google should also be held responsible for these fraudulent companies!
Fuming!!!
As an add on I actually received the driving licence really quickly. As I cancelled my debit card I managed to just pay the £44 still more than dvla but at least we received it!