A private investigator has spilled the beans about his bizarre job which sees him planting trackers, spying on partners and busting a man who claimed to be his own brother.
Daniel Anderson - who has a background in security and close protection - launched Anderson & Co Surveillance and Private Investigators Ltd in 2019.
Since then his firm has helped almost 2,500 people in the UK and abroad, with trips to Lisbon, Malta, Thailand and Croatia all made in aid of finding answers to his customers' burning enquiries.
Many of Mr Anderson's clients include women with questions about partners, who often turn out to be not quite what they seem, HR departments also use his services to find out if workers off sick are really as ill as they say.
While parents ask him to audit the lifestyles of the nannies they leave their children with, Birmingham Live reports.
Cases of cheating partners - dubbed matrimonial surveillance - form the bulk of the company's work.
Some women have been left so distraught after asking Mr Anderson to pry into the lives of their significant others, they have screamed down the phone or vomited after hearing the revelations they had hoped would turn out to be untrue. Mr Anderson said: "The subjects, they are always one step ahead, and our clients, they are stuck - their backs are up against a wall and they are desperate.
"I have clients whose lives have been turned upside down. It's about being able to give people the answers they need and that clarification.
"It's a nice feeling when we are able to do that." The private investigator told of a woman who was concerned about a man she had been dating for about six months prior to the Coronavirus pandemic.
It turned out he had been pretending to be a London property developer who later faked his own death and then 'returned' as his brother - in a tale reminiscent of a soap drama. Mr Anderson uncovered how the man even had a history of targeting single, wealthy women on Instagram.
Recalling the case, the private investigator said the man sent pictures lying on a hospital bed before the woman was left convinced he was dead. Soon after, the man contacted her and pretended to be his own brother.
He claimed he just wanted to gift her some of the late man's clothing and a Rolex, before later requesting £10,000 to help a fundraiser supposedly set up in his memory reach its £100,000 goal. Luckily, the woman never transferred any cash.
But desperate for the truth, she organised a meet-up with the 'brother' at London Euston. During their get-together, he claimed he worked for MI5 and was forced to fake his own death due to a job which had gone wrong - but warned her to keep quiet about the whole mishap.
Mr Anderson said: "He faked his own death and then came back as his brother. The client went into a state of shock, she thought he died of Covid.
"When he came walking down the platform, she said she went into a state of shock, she couldn't believe it. This guy was a psychopath.
"At the same time, she was in love with him. She went through a period of mourning and now he is alive." In another case, a woman called on Mr Anderson to carry out a background check on a man who ended up blackmailing her.
The "intelligent" businesswoman had sent him X-rated pictures and videos after meeting online during their six months of contact. But he turned out to be a serving prisoner, nearing his 60s, and a convicted sex offender who preyed on women from inside his cell.
Mr Anderson said: "I remember talking to her when we handed the background check over. She was physically sick on the phone.
"She was screaming. It was as if somebody had died. She was saying 'no Dan, tell me it's not true'."
Recalling a case he is currently working on, the private investigator told of a woman who has got in touch after fearing the man she is dating is leading a double life. She has never seen where he lives as he always makes excuses and can often hear him standing outside when they talk on the phone.
Mr Anderson said: "We do deal with catfishing cases with women who have met guys on Tinder, Bumble and Muzz. Some of the background stories are totally bizarre."
Bug sweeps for listening devices and hidden cameras within buildings including hotel rooms and offices are carried out by the firm every month. Celebrities, including footballers, plagued by stalkers and threats do call on the firm to support them in their ordeals.
Some private investigations also require trackers to be covertly placed on vehicles - something Mr Anderson insisted is not illegal, with the firm ensuring no laws are broken with their use. Corporate jobs, insurance fraud and rogue traders who have fled are also on the private investigator's list.
Employees off sick and on full pay have been caught in the gym and out drinking, Mr Anderson said. One worker was due a £150,000 payout after claiming he was "incapacitated" and could not leave the house.
But Mr Anderson's firm busted him smoking a spliff before spotting him walking without crutches and hauling a concrete slab over his shoulder as he worked in a garden. He never received any money.
Mr Anderson added: "There's no such thing as a typical day. People don't realise there is surveillance going on around them all the time.
"What we do is very niche, but we are busy all the time." But there are also many happy endings, with Mr Anderson successfully tracing a number of missing people and long-lost loved ones.
This included a pensioner who was reunited with her sister after last seeing her in the 1950s. Mr Anderson said: "It's brought them all back together in their eighties and the client was over the moon."
