A travel boss was jailed after she fleeced 47 holidaymakers out of £300,000 in a ‘Ponzi scheme’ scam and then used the money to pay off her children’s private school fees.
‘Compulsive liar’ Shelley Simpson, 46, told customers they could make massive savings by using her business to book luxury holidays but it was a ‘dance of deception’ and they later discovered their flights were never booked.
The married mother-of-three scammed her friends and on one occasion a customer gave Simpson almost £40,000 for their dream holiday to Barbados – only to be told by British Airways their flight tickets didn’t exist.
Simpson organised trips for her friends and their friends including tickets to an Adele concert, Glastonbury Festival and the 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar.
She also told one victim that she could get discounted nights at the Ritz Hotel because she knew the manager and left another to fork out £11,000 to pay for his honeymoon less than two weeks before he was set to leave.
For her ‘callous disregard’, Simpson was today jailed for 33 months. In total she swindled almost £300,000.
Simpson ran the travel agent Sphere Events Limited between 2019 and 2022 in Portsmouth, Hampshire.
Portsmouth Crown Court was told she would tell clients that they ‘will never lose money with her’ and she ‘just wanted people to be her friend’ as she wanted friends to recommend her to other friends.
Pictured: Shelley Simpson, (blue top), outside Portsmouth Crown Court, Hampshire
Pictured: Victims of Shelley Simpson’s frauds leave Portsmouth Crown Court
Her three children, the youngest of whom is aged 11, attend the £18,000-a-year Portsmouth Grammar School.
Customers booked holidays around the world with her, including trips to Orlando, Tenerife, Corfu and Devon.
One customer, Jodie Stallard, transferred £37,290 to pay for her family holiday to Barbados.
She made additional payments for boat trips and Simpson sent messages showing confirmation of the activities.
At that time Simpson owed around £61,000 in previous fees and was only able to pay it off after Ms Stallard’s payment.
It was later found that the holiday had never been booked and they were unable to go on the ‘luxury, family holiday’ because the company had gone into liquidation.
Simpson said the financial loss caused arguments within the family and led to a significant amount of disappointment for her children.
Another customer, Kersten Hodges-Jackson, organised trips to the Dominican Republic and Dubai with Simpson’s company.
She also booked a ticket to a game at the 2022 World Cup for her client but said that she had ‘erroneously’ bought tickets to the wrong game.
Simpson took £4,500 from Dominic Davies to book a holiday to Corfu and messaged him saying ‘all booked’.
When he chased her for flight details, she said she was on the phone to BA and said it was their fault.
Once in Greece, the last two days of Mr Davies’ family holiday were ‘ruined’ due to the uncertainty about return flights and after booking last-minute travel he was left paying around £6,000 extra for travel.
Andy Fung used Simpson’s company to pay for his honeymoon to the Maldives and gave her £6,000 to book.
However, despite repeated messages, he found out less than two weeks before the trip that the company had gone into liquidation.
Simpson had altered the confirmation message to say that it had all been paid for.
Mr Fung, who had been ‘worried sick’ by the incident, was forced into paying £11,000 for the trip due to the additional costs of last-minute travel.
Simpson’s techniques involved making customers pay in full upfront for what they believed were discounted holidays.
She routinely failed to pay for hotels, airlines and event providers – leaving customers without valid bookings and often facing large last-minute costs.
Pictured: More victims of Simpson’s frauds leave Portsmouth Crown Court as Simpson was today jailed after she fleeced 47 holidaymakers out of £300,000 in a ‘Ponzi scheme’ scam
Pictured: More victims of Simpson’s frauds leave Portsmouth Crown Court. Hampshire Police and Portsmouth Trading Standards received 90 complaints from 47 customers before an investigation was launched
Some customers cancelled their trips after she told them that she could book the exact trip at a discounted rate.
In one incident, customers had tickets to Glastonbury 2022 cancelled – but pictures showed Simpson attending the festival herself.
Hampshire Police and Portsmouth Trading Standards received 90 complaints from 47 customers, and an investigation was launched – leading to her arrest in November 2022.
The police found that she had Googled ‘Prison for fraud’. They also noted that building work was being done to her home.
Simpson, from Portsmouth, admitted fraudulent trading.
She had one previous caution from 2016 when she was caught fraudulently transferring £4,500 into a personal account from the school where she was an office manager.
With around 20 victims sitting in the public gallery, Simpson, who has bipolar disorder and depression, showed little emotion in the dock as she was sentenced to 33 months in prison.
She was disqualified from being a company director for eight years.
Duncan Milne, prosecuting, said: ‘From March 2019 to November 2022 the defendant Shelley Simpson operated a Ponzi scheme as a limited company.
‘She would offer discounted rates and customers understood their money would be used for flights, accommodation and deposits.
‘Safe for some minor discounts there were no discounts done.
‘She often told the customers that there were third-party errors and she would promise compensation. The defendant repeatedly falsified customers.
‘On one occasion, a British Airways flight booking was falsified on three occasions.
‘The defendant falsified her own bank statement to show that she had made the payments.
‘In truth, the money was being used for other matters such as paying for private school fees.
‘The total loss was approximately a quarter of a million of pounds and the cash supply was another £55,000. Overall, there was an accumulation of about £300,000.
‘She gave refunds of £8,444.’
Pictured: More victims of Simpson’s frauds leave Portsmouth Crown Court. Simpson told customers they could make massive savings by using her business to book luxury holidays
One victim, Lorna Slater, who was scammed out of around £5,000 for a holiday to Rhodes and a holiday at Butlins, said via Mr Milne: ‘She was left angry, stressed and anxious.
‘It caused a great deal of distress to her family. Friends had lost money and displayed anger towards her because she recommended her to them.’
Julie Lashley, a friend of Simpson who was scammed out of a holiday to Florida, had a statement read out saying: ‘She describes anxiety and depression and a sense of guilt. The experience has still reduced her trust in people..’
Robert Bryan, defending, said: ‘She was robbing Peter to pay Paul. The school fees were around £12,000 and unlike many frauds, I am not aware of any lavish lifestyle.
‘She was simply getting a high off seeing people enjoying things she had arranged. It is perhaps better described as a concierge rather than a travel agents.
‘She is not bad. She made monumentally catastrophic decisions. Her remorse is palpable.’
Judge William Ashworth said: ‘The relentless nature of your lying is breathtaking. You would lie and lie and lie.
‘You are a compulsive liar with a callous disregard for the expense, inconvenience, distress and loss to clients.
‘Over and over and over again you did this dance of deception. It would have been obvious to you that you were lying.’
Proceeds of crime act proceedings will now begin to attempt to reimburse the victims.
