A Scam On The Roof Of The World

From AFP's Correspondent, Sept, 18:

Kathmandu -- It started amongst rumours together with numbers that didn’t add together up. It led to hours scanning reviews on TripAdvisor together with weeks hiking around Mount Everest. But when I started looking into insurance fraud linked to helicopter rescues inwards Nepal, I didn’t intend it would cease amongst a authorities probe together with an ultimatum from global insurers that could hold upwards a decease knell for the Himalayan nation’s vital tourism industry.

Hundreds of thousands of visitors flock to Nepal each year, drawn past times the Himalayas. The scam that I uncovered affects them all: huge numbers of trekkers are existence pressured into expensive helicopter rescues that they don’t need hence that a coterie of middlemen tin cash inwards on the insurance payout. Some are fifty-fifty existence made deliberately sick for the scammers’ profit.

When I commencement arrived inwards Kathmandu inwards Nov 2016 to caput upwards the Nepal bureau, I made it my line of piece of occupation organisation to larn to know every bit many people every bit possible linked to the lucrative Everest industry, which nets the impoverished terra firma millions of dollars a year. The saltation climbing season, when hundreds of mountaineers assemble at the pes of Everest amongst their sights assail reaching its 8,848 metre summit, is our busiest fourth dimension inwards the bureau. Each twelvemonth records are broken every bit men together with women force themselves to the limits of human endurance. Many fail. Some pay the ultimate price, losing their lives on the flanks of the world’s highest peak.

As a journalist, Everest had me hooked. It has all the ingredients of an amazing story: large personalities, large money, together with an fifty-fifty bigger mountain.

But every bit a ‘civilian’ (and an avid trekker myself), the Everest circus horrifies me. In many ways it represents the worst of humankind: greed, corruption, together with man’s wishing to command together with conquer Mother Nature.

The helicopter rescue scam, which primarily targets trekkers hiking to Everest’s base of operations camp, exactly also has links to climbers trying to attain its summit, is in all likelihood the almost brazen illustration of fraud together with corruption linked to the industry. And for me, it has come upwards to typify Nepal’s mercenary mental attitude towards its greatest attraction, Everest.

It’s similar the goose that set the golden egg. We all know how that floor ends.

A strangely lucrative helicopter business

Not long after I arrived inwards Nepal I started hearing rumours of middlemen profiting from the insurance payouts linked to unnecessary helicopter rescues of tourists. But it was 2 stats that initially spurred my investigation: first, that twenty novel Airbus B2 together with B3 choppers had been delivered to Nepal inwards 5 years. And second, that individual helicopters inwards Nepal wrack upwards to a greater extent than flying hours per twelvemonth than anywhere else inwards the world. Those 2 figures suggested to me that Nepal’s helicopter line of piece of occupation organisation was disproportionately lucrative compared to the size of the market.

I started digging.

Many of the people I commencement spoke to tried to enjoin me that the fraud was an onetime problem. It had been brought nether command years ago. No floor here. That type of reaction was something I oft came upwards against during my investigation every bit people tried to dismiss my questions, telling me that I didn’t empathise Nepal.

But existence brushed off similar that is a ruby-red flag to almost journalists. I presently realized that the scam had evolved, becoming harder to evidence – together with fifty-fifty to a greater extent than lucrative – inwards the process.

Rewind 4 years. There were a handful of helicopter operators together with their brokers charging insurers exorbitant together with inconsistent rates for chopper rescues. I saw the invoices: a rescue from nigh Everest billed at $10,000 together with and hence a few days after a similar rescue billed at $12,000. Another mightiness come upwards inwards at a larn by $6,000. The truthful cost of the flying was closer to $4,000 exactly the insurance companies were coughing upwards together with the divergence was existence spread betwixt the helicopter company, trekking conduct together with the broker.

At that point, a few forward-thinking brokers waded into the market. They realised that insurers were catching on to the scam because of the inconsistent billing. So they did 2 things -- they negotiated a unified cost grid amongst some helicopter companies at the start of the master copy trekking seasons (spring together with autumn) hence prices were fixed. And they built relationships amongst international insurance companies to allay whatsoever other concerns they may have.

As a result, prices came down, hence the insurers were happy. So were these astute brokers who had priced inwards a per flying cutting for themselves.

And that’s where the novel scam took off. Instead of charging crazy rates for a few flights, these brokers pushed guides to bring every bit many people every bit possible rescued, often amongst multiple tourists crammed into i chopper (each trekker’s insurance society would hold upwards billed for the total flight). In return, they would larn a cut.

Most trekking guides brand Rs2,500 per solar daytime ($22) during the 2 brusk trekking seasons, exactly tin brand upwards to $500 inwards kickbacks from a unmarried rescue. The broker amongst a charter society together with the trekking means managers inwards Kathmandu bag fifty-fifty to a greater extent than inwards committee from the hospital....MUCH MORE