A mobile phone dealership has been accused of using “dirty tricks” to obtain information from its rivals.

Sales staff working for Hove-based Autocall posed as a new kitchenware company called Ice Bright Kitchens and invited representatives from different dealers to pitch for mobile contracts for dozens of handsets.

Salesmen sent to the meetings, which were held in Shoreham, were met by three men calling themselves Mark, John and Geoff, who said they had 17 new staff who needed phones.

According to Seb Birch, who works for Focus 4 U, also based in Hove, they asked a number of probing questions into his own background and the business practices of his company. These included questions on Focus 4 U’s turnover, the number of staff it employs as mobile account managers and whether it employed an administrative team to act on after-sale inquiries.

Mr Birch said he vaguely recognised one of the men as having worked for Autocall, although this was flatly denied when he mentioned it.

Mr Birch said: “When we confronted them they were like a teenager who had been cornered. They didn’t stop lying even though we knew who they were.

“This industry can be quite cut-throat and you hear about some dodgy things but I never expected anything like this.”

Jonathan Skinner, director of Lewes-based Think Telecom, used to work for Autocall more than a decade ago.

He also fell victim to the ruse and said his and other dealerships, some of which had travelled more than a 100 miles from Hampshire for the appointment, felt “cheated”.

He added: “They have walked with size ten boots over any degree of principles or ethics you would think a company of that standing would have had.”

Autocall sales director Geoff Allen admitted the decision to set up the meetings was his idea but denied his methods were underhand.

He said: “It was not quite like that but I can understand ‘other dealers’ painting that sort of picture.

“I have been tasked to grow the company and one of the exercises we did was to look at other companies and ask them to pitch to us to see how they did. We wanted to see how professional they were so we could set ourselves targets of where we need to be.”

Mr Allen told Autocall bosses about the plan and they gave it the go-ahead. He believes the exercise was comparable to the “mystery shopper” exercises used by major shopping chains, although he said they would not being doing anything similar in the future.