A CHILDMINDER has claimed her business has been smeared by an online troll.

Shelby McCrindle, says her childminding service Shelby’s Bonny Bairns has been subject to false comments, where it was claimed she was “smoking” in front of kids.

The Girvan based childminder, who also runs a community information group on Facebook says she started to receive unusual requests on childminder.co.uk where she advertisers her services.

She told the Advertiser: “A person using one of many fake names, asked have you any spaces for my child Jackie, she is very shy. I thought well that’s weird because normally mums would say the times and how many hours for so I just ignored it.”

Shelby claims that her Facebook page where she shares fun posts of the activities she does with her children was then targeted, with the alleged offender accusing her business of being overcrowded.

She added: “They somehow managed to find out that I’ve got that page and basically said they wouldn’t recommend me because I had their child and when they came to collect their child, there was 12 children there when I’m only supposed to have six, and that I was smoking.

"They also said their kid had head lice and the family were infested with fleas.”

Shelby believes that she has been “harassed” by the same person who was commenting on her Girvan information page. And she claims that she has been stalked with several alleged new profiles set up to target her and her business.

She added: “They have been adding themselves back to that site. I know it’s a fake profile it says ‘set up 41 minutes’ ago there’s no friends in common or anything like that, basically all day I have been harassed by this person. Every time I block them, they use a new name and a new profile picture.”

Shelby feared that the alleged comments could ruin her work and she says she had to contact the Care Inspectorate to assure them none of the accusations are true.