Jon Stephenson - fraudster, thief, swindler, scam artist, belongs in jail

Absolutely concur with all the reviews here. Jon Stephenson is a thief and fraudster who belongs in jail and I have lots of evidence of fraud and deceit if anyone wants to send him to jail. I was taken in the same was as many others here - reasonable quotation, appeared to be professional, good website and quick initial response. ONce the 60% deposit was paid the nightmare started. 1- Pain in Feb 2018 was promised installation end April 2018 or first week May and a site visit beforehand to help prepare 2- Never saw Jon again, when I would call he would say everything on track just dealing with City requirement to get drilling permission 3 - Spent thousands preparing the site - putting concrete down for the tanks and getting an electrical point put in 4 - Up until first week of May he was adamant on phone he would install on time 5 - Come first week of May he sends an email with excuses, sent to lots of clients simultaneously (based on the wording) offering a 5% discount for those who stuck with him or a full refund if you wanted one 6 - Assuming that he had incurred no costs yet so the money must be sitting in the account, and not being convinced by this behaviour to date, I cancelled 7 - Took a week to get hold of him to acknowledge my cancellation, but we would only ever do so verbally not in writing. At this point I started calling from my recorded work phone 8 - After two more weeks of queries he sent me a refund form to fill out for "VAT reasons". I filled it out and sent it in immediately. Was told verbally payment would be made within 2 days 9 - No payment forthcoming, continued to follow up, repeated promises to pay, always some excuse such as a) accounting issues b) payroll issues c) SARS audit issues d) change in bank account details causing havoc for clients. All of these were clearly lies aimed at buying time 10 - Gave him final notice to pay me by mid June or I would go to court and he said "oh you'll definitely have your money by then". 11 - No money came, went to lawyers, served summons (he told the sheriff he didn't know what the summons was for) 12 - Eventually was put on the court notice for early September and he had no defence so he settled with me and agreed to pay me in full in four equal installments and I agreed to waive interest and penalties but he had to pay my legal costs. He also had to sign personal surety. 13 - he made the first payment, thereafter didn't pay. I called him after the first skipped payment and he said "oh sorry, i got the date wrong, thought it was this friday. I'm finishing two jobs will pay it over immediately". Two months later not a cent more received. 14 - I got judgement against him in court on 29 November. Sheriff will be attaching his assets imminently. If there aren't any I'll take his personal asset until he's bankrup.

For those affected by him or those thinking of doing business with him, you should know te following: 1 - This pattern in the reviews by people here is common, these are not aberrations 2 - We Drill Africa doesn't seem to drill itself, it looks like everything is outsourced. A friend of mine didn't cancel his borehole and they came four months after the cancellation offer while I was busy settling with Jon and the outsourced driller f*ed up his house with all the drilling to the extent that the house and the neighbours house both had cracks. His driveway totally destroyed 3 - He will extort you once he starts work, he will claim he put in extra piping or went deeper than originally quoted. This is all lies designed to get extra cash out of you. The borehole contractor at my friend's place told my friend they went down a LOT less than what was paid for. My friend eventually gave up on him, and forfeited R50k for a filtration system he paid for but never got. 4 - He/his firm is NOT a member of the Borehole Water Association of South Africa. Their membership was TERMINATED in September 2018. He still advertises this membership despite them asking him to stop. This alone is tantamount to fraud. 5 - He does not have public liability insurance. If he has come onto your property and made a representation that he has public liability insurance when he does not he has committed fraud. Report him criminally at the police station.

I could write another ten pages of experience with this guy, but hte fact that Sea Point Primary, a public school, has had to take him to court (I don't know the outcome) should tell you enough.