The street where 82 scam businesses are registered to 20 homes

Ian Ross sighs as he slaps down a half-inch thick pile of paperwork relating to the six businesses registered at his home in Essex. With names like Ghiselli, Kellyjard and Beridze, they don’t sound like the sort of company that might have been set up by a retired electronics engineer.

There is a good reason for that: Mr Ross has nothing to do with any of the shell firms supposedly trading from his 1920s villa in Leigh-on-Sea, even though all of them have the apparent stamp of legitimacy that comes from being registered with Companies House.

Nor is Mr Ross alone. In the past four months, shell companies have been sprouting like weeds in the neatly kept homes of Henry Drive, with 82 of them now registered to the 20 houses that make up a single postcode in the seaside town.

What they all have in common is that they were set up by sole traders resident abroad, and that the first any of the residents knew that their addresses were being used illegally by third parties was when they got letters out of the blue from Companies House.

“No one knows why they have picked on this street in particular,” said Mr Ross, 69. “It seems as though they have singled out this postcode, because it’s only one end of the street and as soon as you get to the next postcode there is nothing.”

Financial crime experts believe that scammers based abroad, most likely in Russia or China, are setting up shell companies in the UK using the addresses of unwitting homeowners, in order to create paperwork that will help them obtain loans from banks in countries with weak checks and balances, possibly using the homes as collateral. The loans will never be paid back and the banks will never be able to track down the borrowers because the entire paper trail is fake.

The scammers are able to exploit people like the residents of Henry Drive because Companies House does not need any proof that someone exists, or is the true resident of an address, before registering a company name to that address, as long as they pay a registration fee of £12.

Many of the victims, particularly the elderly, now worry that their credit rating will be affected, or even that bailiffs will turn up at their front doors demanding repayment of loans they know nothing about.

Rosemary Perella, a retired nurse who lives next door to Mr Ross, said: “I’ve had at least four letters and I’ve been told that when this has happened elsewhere the criminals have used the homes as collateral for loans.

“It could be worrying if people came to your house demanding something for a company you’ve never heard of.”

Within a week of householders receiving a letter from Companies House confirming registration of the company, an automatically generated letter from HM Revenue & Customs lands on the doormat giving that company a tax reference. Letters from accountants and other services often follow, touting for business after seeing that a new company has been registered to the address.

Mr Ross received the first letter, for a company called Kellyjard, in early June. “I assumed it was a one-off,” he said, “until another one turned up a month later. Since then it’s been one every two weeks.”

Firms called Gratien, Lauret, Surveillant, Beridze and Ghiselli are also now registered at his home, each of which requires him to fill in a form to notify Companies House that it is a scam, and a phone call to HMRC to do the same.

Mr Ross said: “The ridiculous thing is, they don’t have to prove they live here before they can register their company to my address, but I have to prove I live here - by sending a utility bill to Companies House - before they will take it off the register.”

Kit Akister, a 64-year-old retired store manager who lives on the other side of the road from Mr Ross, said: “I have only had one letter, in June, when a firm called Bedinri was registered at this address. But then I checked Companies House records and discovered that another two companies had been registered here, called Mikeladze and Shotadze. I haven’t even had letters about those ones.

“When I contacted Companies House they said this was happening all over the country and they had a two-month backlog of cases to process.”

A spokesman for Companies House said: “We are sorry to hear about the difficulties these individuals are experiencing and will take action where the law allows.

“The Government is bringing forth measures to reform Companies House in the Economic Crime and Corporate Transparency Bill.

“Once in force, the Bill will significantly enhance the role and powers of the Registrar of Companies, so she can become a more active gatekeeper over company registrations - including by cracking down on the use of false addresses.”