The founder of Refund Home Loans, Wayne Ormond, has been slammed by Australian Competition and Consumer Commission chairman Graeme Samuels after Ormond admitted that statements made to franchisees about a supposed agreement with the ACCC were false and misleading.
The Federal Court found Ormond had breached the Trade Practices Act after telling franchisees that the ACCC had approved the way Refund was dealing with franchisees.
“Mate, I’ve had meetings with Graeme Samuel himself. I have nothing to worry about,” Ormond told franchisees, according to the ACCC.
But Ormond has now admitted the statements were false and misleading and Samuels is clearly unimpressed of the use of the watchdog’s name.
“Using the name of the ACCC or individual ACCC officers as a means of discouraging franchisees from exploring their own legal rights is reprehensible,” he said in a statement.
“Franchisors and franchisees have a special business relationship. Franchisees trust their franchisor to provide honest and reliable information as to their own business and about franchising generally and to mislead them in this manner is an abuse of trust.”
Samuels has emphasised that the “does not, in any circumstances, approve individual conduct”.
Refund Home Loans, which was ranked 43 on SmartCompany’s Smart50 list in 2009, has grown quickly in the last few years, with average annual revenue growth of 42.5% over the past three years and revenue of $15.5 million in 2008-09.