On June 1, the "Regulations on Supervision and Management of Online Catering Service Operators' Implementation of Food Safety Subject Responsibilities" was officially implemented, requiring platforms to conduct real-name registration and qualification review of online merchants, and to rectify ghost takeaways from the source.
Just before the new regulations came into effect, Shanghai police uncovered a case of online catering certificate fraud. A company applied for licenses for unlicensed small workshops to enter the takeout platform. The company involved was associated with more than 200 takeout shops across the country, and 33 of them were found to have forged licenses.
Teahouse address "grows" a burger restaurant?
The so-called license agency is actually a fake
A catering management company headquartered in Shanghai specializes in cooked food products such as steaks and cold dishes. In the name of brand franchise and food supply, they recruit some small merchants who want to take out food but have no qualifications. The company claims to be able to handle a full set of licenses, but the so-called "handling" means forging or tampering with business licenses and operating permits.
Police investigation found that a hamburger steak restaurant in Baoshan District, Shanghai, was suspected of using a false certificate provided by the company. According to the address on the fake certificate, the police visited the site and found that this address was actually a teahouse in normal operation.
Some online breakfast shops use the address of an offline breakfast shop, but in fact the offline shop has long been closed.
Under the operation of this catering management company, unlicensed small workshops without any qualifications can be transformed into compliant catering stores on the takeout platform.
“One store opens multiple stores”
There is a burger restaurant hidden in the Malatang shop
In addition, the police also found that some stores were involved in the problem of "one store with multiple openings". The same physical store is registered as multiple stores with different names and categories on the food delivery platform. For example, a store may be a Malatang restaurant, or it may be a burger or other restaurant. "This burger restaurant cannot be seen on the actual road. They will tell the rider that after receiving this order, go to the Malatang restaurant and I will take out the burgers from inside. This is actually a 'ghost takeaway'."
The police handling the case pointed out that such stores are seriously out of touch with market supervision. For example, if a burger restaurant does other catering, it is not in the business catalog of the Market Supervision Bureau, so it is unable to conduct daily supervision of the additional stores opened, and there are hidden dangers to sanitation, personnel, and safety.
More than 200 related stores nationwide
It was found that 33 store licenses were suspected of forgery
The police compared and verified the store licenses handled by the company involved in the case one by one. After investigation, it was found that there were more than 200 takeaway shops related to the company involved in the case across the country. It has been found that the licenses of 33 stores were suspected of forgery.
On April 10, the Shanghai police launched a network closing operation and arrested seven people involved in the case, including company leaders He and Li. They also found a large number of forged business licenses, food business licenses and other state agency documents on site.
After investigation, the criminal suspect He and others solicited catering merchants who wanted to join the takeout platform through offline telephone sales and online network drainage. He and others knew clearly that the relevant merchants did not have legal and compliant business qualifications, but still used upstream Gu and Luo to create fake certificates, forged business licenses, food business licenses and other business licenses in batches, and even made fake photos of real-life stores to handle the procedures for entering the takeout platform on their behalf.
In the process, He et al.'s company also supplied its own steaks and other supplies to these "ghost stores" and took 5% of the actual turnover in return.
Subsequently, the police followed the lead and arrested Gu and Luo, the criminal suspects who produced false evidence upstream, and implemented a full-chain attack. At present, 9 criminal suspects including He Mou have been subject to criminal compulsory measures in accordance with the law on suspicion of forging state agency documents, and the case is under further investigation.
▌Source of this article: CCTV News WeChat official account
Producer/Wang Yuan
Editor/Misha
Editor/Guan Xin
