HOME EMPLOYMENT SWINDLES

Auckland Star, Volume XLI, Issue 4, 5 January 1910, Page 9

HOME EMPLOYMENT SWINDLES

THE KNITTING MACHINE DODGE. The following article, published in "The Grand" magazine, exposes one of .the innumerable devices by which the unwary are fleeced: — "There is yet one other home enployment fraud against which I should specifically desire to warn the -public. This is a fraud which has been carried on most extensively of. recent years in this country in connection with the sale of knitting machines. The practitioners ■- of this swindle advertised broadcast for -women to work their knitting machines. They professed their ability to take any amount of work, offered good prices for the finished product, and stated that no experience was required. By the extravagant representations made, hundreds, or more probably thousands, of knitting machines were disposed of at the price of £4 —£l 10/- down, and the balance 'by instalments. The machine was really useless as a rapid knitter, and troublesome to manage; and though the offer to take instalments appeared to afford the purchasers the opportunity of rescinding the contract, yet in a large number of cases which came under my observation, such attempts met with failure. Eventually the persons who conducted this business made an attempt to enforce the contract to purchase against a number of their dupes in the county-court. The case came before Judge Edge, who has repeatedly shown that he is very keenly alive to the desirability of protecting the public against frauds of various sorts. The defence pleaded was that the contracts had been obtained by fraudulent misrepresentation, and after a patient trial, which lasted for three days, his Honor found in favour of the purchasers of the machine, using these words: 'I am forced to say that, upon a review of the whole facts of the case, I am of opinion that the charge of fraud has been fully made out. ... In considering the admissions made by the defendants as to their antecedents, and their conduct in respect of these knitting machines, I do not feel any doubt as to their having been engaged for some years in defrauding the public, whom they were professing to benefit.' It is as well, therefore, that those who are tempted by the offer of home employment to purchase cheap knitting machines should be careful with whom they deal. There is all the difference in the world between the genuine business —such las that carried- on by /The -Automatic Knitting Maehiaa Company,' of Southwark, and 'The Harrison Knitting Machine Company,' of Manchester," to name two of the leading firms engaged in the manufacture aud sale of kpittrajk inaihines«-gsd! that carried on in the manner to which I have rsfer.----«A»