There’s normally something quite nice about opening the post in the morning (particularly if it is not one of the regular communications from the utility companies or junk mail).

Things were slightly different this morning however, as I opened up an anonymous looking envelope to find that it was from a debt collection agency who are claiming that I owe them over £400 ( a debt allegedly attributable to Netscalibur now part of Claranet). I really thought that this was a hoax at first as I have no debts and have had no dealings with Netscalibur for a very long time indeed, but after reading the notice several times over it seemed genuine enough; the threats of court appearances, CCJs and bailiffs knocking on the door were, it seemed, a real possibility.

Still somewhat unbelieving, I turned to the web and searched for Wescot Credit Services; there was no URL on the debt collection notice so for all I knew, they might not exist. The search returned around 115,000 results and as I started scanning through these pages (mostly lengthy forum threads), I started reading horror stories from people who turn to the online community for assistance with their dealings with Wescot.

The forums & blogs alleged that they had been subjected to threatening phone calls, harassment and general unpleasantness by Westcot whilst “complete and utter scum” was a phrase that cropped up on a number of occasions.

Tired of wading through the search results, yet worried by the picture of Westcot that the pages I had found were creating in my mind, I resorted to guessing at domain names.

Eventually I found a welcoming website for a debt management company called Wescot (hyperlink lovingly witheld): could this really be the same company that I had just been reading about on the forums? Could Ethical Gary and Helpful Sarah really be capable of threatening and abusive behaviour on the phone?.

Unfortunately for Wescot, first impressions count, online as well as offline. By not ensuring that they are first in the list of Google results, they are allowing other parties’ impressions (unfavourable ones in this case) to take precedence.

This seriously clouds people’s opinions and means that all the money spent on custom printed t-shirts is likely to be wasted: maybe they should have spent it on SEO instead. As we’ve said in the past, everything is connected to PR online.

As for me, I’m afraid that it’s communication via recorded delivery letters with this company – I have no intention of talking with Ethical Gary of Helpful Sarah.

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