Questions of Cash: London Emergency Plumbing's name may change but it's still raining huge charges

Q. I had to call out London Emergency Plumbing in September. One of its workers came an hour and 40 minutes later and did little more than turn off a valve to the storage tank in the loft and turn back on the mains supply. The following day I had £678 charged to my credit card, without having been emailed an invoice or job report, as promised. Since then, three phone calls, one email and one letter to the company have made no difference.

My credit card company, Barclaycard, says it can't do anything about it. I have contacted Bedford Trading Standards, which is well aware of this business's practices. MS, St Albans

A. We are well aware too. This column has reported before on the business, variously known as London Emergency Plumbing, London Emergency Plumbers and Express Plumbing; see Questions of Cash, 13 March 2015, 12 July 2014 and 17 May 2013. On two occasions, readers were charged more than a thousand pounds for short night-time callouts, where little work was done. In the third instance, a reader was charged £132 for booking a callout and cancelling it soon after. We believe that your charge of £678 is excessive and we explained that to Barclaycard. It has agreed to make a partial refund, so that you only pay the agreed callout charge of £210, including VAT.

A spokeswoman for Barclaycard said: "We have investigated this case under both 'chargeback rules' and Section 75 of the Consumer Credit Act 1974, and have made the decision to make a refund of £468, which [the reader] is happy with. Under the Act, we feel... that [the reader] was misrepresented regarding the charges taken by London Emergency Plumbing. We have made representations through Visa regulations to reclaim the overcharge from the merchant."

We contacted London Emergency Plumbing, which defended its charges. Its call operative, -who declined to give his name, said: "A customer is always quoted a callout charge as part of our booking procedure, plus our half-hour rate, which is £149 at three in the morning. We provide a 24-hour emergency service, using qualified engineers. Obviously this service comes at a cost.

"All our calls are recorded. The customer signs the job sheet, which confirms the rate, at the end of the job and on arrival. So it is not possible to charge one price and quote another."

In December 2013 Bedford Borough Council took to court Mohammed Shamrez, who traded at the time as Express Plumbing and London Emergency Plumbers. In a statement after the case, the council said: "A rogue trader, whose behaviour was described as 'insidious' and 'amongst the worst of its kind', has been issued with a court order and been told to pay over £16,000 in legal costs. The court heard how Trading Standards officers had received a multitude of complaints about Mr Shamrez.

"The court issued an enforcement order prohibiting Mr Shamrez from overcharging for work, prolonging the time spent at customers' homes to increase charges, processing payments without customers' knowledge, adding additional charges and misleading customers on the extent of work required."

We strongly suggest readers avoid this business.

Am I liable for gains tax if I sell my shares?

Q. I retired in 2000. While employed, and over a period of many years starting in the 1980s, I obtained shares in my employer BAE Systems at an advantageous price.

I presently own more than 7,000 shares and I am thinking about selling them. Although the way in which I obtained the shares makes it impossible for me to determine the exact gain on each one, I am confident that the current price for a substantial number of shares will be between £2 and £3 above their purchase price. If I were to sell my entire holding, I would exceed the capital gains tax annual exemption [£11,100 for the 2015-16 tax year]. But since this gain is spread over about 30 years, would I be subject to capital gains tax? EU, by email

A. Gill Smith at the accountancy firm Moore Stephens said: "The capital gains tax [CGT] system no longer makes any allowance for the length of time over which a gain has accrued.

"Prior to 6 April 2008, individuals could benefit from indexation allowance, which adjusted the cost of assets for inflation. But now the capital gain is simply the difference between sale proceeds and cost.

"If the disposal of the shares were spread over two or more tax years then two or more CGT annual exemptions could be utilised. Taxpayers who are married or in civil partnerships can also transfer assets to each other, increasing the number of annual CGT exemptions available.

"Care should be taken if the cost of shares obtained in an employer is not readily available. Depending on the exact nature of the scheme under which the shares were acquired, there may be a deemed cost for CGT purposes.

"In some cases, a former employer may be able to provide details of historic share schemes, but in others the only solution may be to assume that the shares have zero cost and sell up to the value of the annual exemption over a period of years."

Questions of Cash cannot give individual advice. But we’ll do our best to help if you have a financial dilemma. Email us at: questionsofcash@independent.co.uk