Police have arrested a Dane accused of operating a fraudulent reservation website for hotels in Thailand which left more than 400 foreign customers with nowhere to stay when they arrived.
Thai police received complaints from representatives of credit card companies as well as foreign tourists about hotel reservations made via www.vacasianhotel.com. Customers were unable to check in to the rooms they thought they had booked, forcing them to find accommodation elsewhere with no notice.
The fraud tarnished Thailand’s tourism image, said Pol Maj Gen Surachet Hakphan, acting deputy chief of the Tourist Police Bureau.
The investigation revealed that the website was operated by Secure System Co, which received the advanced payments from abroad through a payment gateway system to an account in Thailand.
The court issued an arrest warrant for Danish national Jocob Holm Schultz, 43, on charges of fraud and false input of information to a computer system causing damage to others. He was arrested at a parking lot of a department store in Nonthaburi’s Bang Bua Thong district.
Pol Maj Gen Surachet said the money was transferred to an account belonging to Junthee Lomsak, 36, who also helped with the registration of the company. The woman later gave the money to Mr Schultz, he added.
The investigation revealed that there were six accomplices in the fraud, five of them Thais, and the gang operated the scam for about two years, he said. The 400 victims were mainly European nationals and incurred estimated damages of more than 20 million baht.
He added that police will investigate whether Mr Schultz, who entered Thailand in September, had also violated immigration regulations.