The relationship between Zebra Finance was openly discussed in the Sales Team.
According to Zebra, Wynford Dore provided X amount of money , held separately, to cover any possible ‘debt’ that Dore clients might fall into.
Zebra’s credit scoring was adapted to enable some of Dore clients to take out a loan for the programme. Many of these client would have been considered as “high risk” and credit scoring would normally have been more stringent but for the “safeguard” pot of money, provided by Wynford Dore.

I wonder if that “safeguard” is still in existence? I would have thought Zebra had the financial acumen, insight and foresight into the impending doom of the green Dore slamming!

As for the rest, I would hope that the mainstream media that have the resources and interest will follow this up.

1. Bad publicity. specifically the recent (about 6 months ago) ABC program, this came just before a large number of the australian centers shut.

2.Gloabl credit crunch. It seems more of Dores clients are low income families, the sort of people for whom getting credit is now near impossible, or prohibitivly expensive, like alot of businesses now. Without the HP the people able to pay for Dore have dried up.

3. there is a new consumer selling act comin into force in the UK soon, this could cause problems for what dore are selling.

4. an ex employee, Bob Clarke was due to have an employment trbunal shortly, Dore may have been concerned about what he was about to expose.

What I dont believe is that Dore was running at a loss. The variable costs for the program were a couple of hundred pounds and they were charging 2500. Any ‘hole’ in thier accounts is probably more likely due to the money being moved to another company etc. Dore states that he never took a ‘salary’ but there are plenty of other ways of getting money out of a company. And there are plenty of companies that have gone under and still made alot of money for thier directors.

Its just very sad for the clients that wont get anyhting back, in particular, the MyDore thing is just a way of telling clients that they are continuing the program and have no claim. I also find it disgusting that, according to a number of ex employees, they were not allowed to ring clients and tell them not to travel for thier next appointment, instead let them turn up and find an empty office, no notices. This is just a way of stalling people to invalidate any later claim.

I am surprised at how well people are taking this, saying that they have faith in Wynford Dore and they will be able to complete the program, although I am not sure if these are real people, maybe just part of the marketing.

Well, it _should_ rely on adequate research, but in practice the government funds many things on a basis of pure hunch, guesswork or dogma.

I think that most of the commentary that I’ve read has been clear that they think the science is scant and of poor quality. As a separate issue, they have been concerned for some time that Dore was not using a sustainable business model. However, to some extent, the science and business model were intertwined because it seems as if Dore were assuming that there would be government funding at some point. However, the government funding would rely upon an adequate research base and in the absence of this, no funding was available and thus the business eventually collapsed.

Judging by the comments from ex-employees, it does seem as if the price-tag was inflated by some poor business judgment. You can have something that is simultaneously too expensive and yet losing money – the UK car industry in the 70s comes to mind.