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Financial advisers warn people against Whatsapp stokvel

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Financial advisers have warned people about involving themselves with pyramid schemes. This after people cried foul about an on-going WhatsApp Stokvel. They claim that they’ve been robbed by people who lured them into the scheme. In the stokvel, one is required to join a Whatsapp group and transfer an amount of at least R200 and recruit more people to make more money.

This resulted in thousands of people losing money.

Two people, who asked to remain anonymous, say they had to learn the hard way.

“I joined hoping to recover the money that I lost in the other group. When it was my turn to get paid and that’s how I lost my second money. So, I lost R400. What I learnt is that never deposit your money in stokvels that you don’t know,” says one stokvel victim.

“I felt the need to make quick money because a friend of mine referred to me and said that here is a quick way of making money and during that time, I had my Intel pay out and I wanted to grow it quickly. Little did I know that it was a pyramid scheme and that it would collapse after a few days. Basically, everything that we were promised was just empty promises and it was a way of people trying to manipulate us,” says some stokvel members.

Financial Law Specialist, Thabo Mantyi says there are alternatives available to the public when they want to raise funds.

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