Clinics often face high traffic, be it from walk-ins or through appointments.
This is why it’s usually good to book treatments or appointments early to lessen the waiting time.
But have you ever encountered a situation where you simply could not book an appointment at all?
Customers of Novu Aesthetics, a chain of clinics under Novena Global Healthcare (NGH) are facing this issue, but the problem runs way deeper than that.
Clinics by Cousins Who Wanted to Buy Newcastle Receive 35 Complaints As Customers Allegedly Cannot Book Treatments
And to say they aren’t doing well is an understatement.
The Straits Times reported that the Raffles City and Northpoint branches of Novu Aesthetics have both shut down, leaving only four of them left.
And between 1 Feb to 8 March, there have been around 35 complaints from customers that treatments cannot be booked.
Some of them attempted to go for said treatments but said there were no doctors to attend to them.
The contractual value of all complaints even came up to around S$43,000.
Several customers also tried calling to check with outlets were open but to no avail.
The Straits Times even went down to Bedok to check out the situation and found five customers there with only one therapist on 8 March.
A lot of staff had apparently left or did not turn up for work due to not being paid.
Meanwhile, the therapist who was there allegedly just wanted to help customers despite not being paid, and was kind enough to work without receiving a salary.
Deal Gone Wrong
All of this was apparently from a potential investor Novu Aesthetics was dealing with.
A spokesman said that the company engaged them sometime in February.
“However, after visits to clinics, detailed discussions and a signed term sheet, this investor could not show proof of funds and did not conclude a transaction that would have led to a timely injection of funds.”
The funds would have helped with lease renewal, rostering of doctors, and paying staff salaries, as well as for maintenance works for the Raffles City clinic.
In light of this issue, Novu Aesthetics stopped rostering doctors in March.
They’ll apparently do so again when business is more stable.
Currently, Novu Aesthetics is looking into other investors in order to financially recoup from this loss.
Last year in December, NGH was reportedly ordered to wind up by the High Court after failing to pay more than $14 million in debt to DBS Bank.
Owners In Financial Trouble
And speaking of money, the two owners, who are cousins, aren’t doing so well in that aspect too.
Nelson Loh, 41, was previously declared bankrupt after failing to pay DBS back for loans.
Amidst the financial mess, he left Singapore in November 2020.
The other owner, 43-year-old Terrence Low, also owes Maybank around $3 million and has till next month to come up with a repayment plan.
And for those of you who were wondering if the names sound familiar, the answer is yes, they are.
These were the same two people who wanted to buy out the Newcastle Football Club.
That bid was made under the Bellagraph Nova Group, set up with Chinese entrepreneur Evangeline Shen in July 2020.
Which didn’t work out too well especially after they got exposed for doctoring an image of meeting with former US president Barrack Obama.
Not too long later, the Loh cousins’ partnership fell apart.
Mr Nelson Loh transferred all his shares in Novena Global Healthcare Group and all its units to Mr Terence Loh for $1.
The latter then transferred all the shares he owned in the Bellagraph Nova Group to his cousin for $1 and resigned as its director.
At this time, Novena Global Healthcare Group, the parent firm of NGH, is under police investigation.
They supposedly used unauthorised signatures of accounting firm Ernst & Young in financial statements.
The company is now not officially recognised by organisations like CaseTrust.
We guess that Newcastle dream is still going to be just a dream for now.
Feature Image: charnsitr / Shutterstock.com
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