Category: Business

Tembi’s Story of a Business Scam

Tembi is a self employed business woman in South Africa.

She received an email asking her to make a bid to a government department to supply a number of specialist water pumps. Tembi guessed it was a scam message even though her name and contact details are registered on a government web site for suppliers.

However, the next day, a lady phoned to chase up the email and convince Tembi to put in a bid to supply the units.

Tembi agreed and filled in the necessary forms and filed them at the address specified. She was awarded the contract and she purchased the items and had them delivered as instructed.

This deal was worth about US $15,000.

Another person supposedly from the same government office then phoned Tenbi and congratulated her on successful delivery on time asked her to supply a much larger consignment of items and that she would paid for both deals at the same time.

Tenbi agreed, purchased the items and had them delivered to the specified address.

This deal was worth about twice the first deal.

The scammers had the items to sell and Tenbi was left with the bill to pay.

She visited the supposed government office in Pretoria and discovered many other people had fallen for the same scam. Scammers take advantage of other people’s hard work.

These scammers had clearly been very organised and kept on using the same scam on a lot of people.

You can find more such stories at http://skywomen.co.za/index.html 

If you have any experiences with these scams do let me know, by email.

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Fake Business Opportunity

There are numerous versions of this scam but a typical one is to offer a distributorship for some standard business product or a franchise for a successful business or a reseller opportunity.

The price is kept low so as entice people who are desperate to make money.

A typical example email:-

Hi,

I wanted to follow-up from last week.

28 year old U.S. company needs additional distributors world-wide.

US distributorships not available.

We make dangerous, slippery floors slip resistant and safer.

Our customers include McDonalds, Burger King, Holiday Inns, Toyota, Pfizer etc.

Award winning safety products. Big profit margins.

Minimum $500 product investment required.

…………………………

There’s no company name, no contact details, no website for the product, no photos of the product etc. so clearly it’s all just a simple scam.

The email address is @yandex.com which is one the biggest Russian Internet businesses and is a favourite for scammers to use for their email.

No thanks – you can keep you safety products, even if they exist.

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Stupidest Spam of the Week Professional Who

Some people in business love the idea of public recognition and fame and some regard such accolades as just a part of Marketing their business and some hate the whole idea.

Scammers create fake organisations supposedly giving out awards to business people and directories of the top businesses and Who’s Who registers etc.

This latest scam starts with ‘Congratulations! You have been chosen for inclusion in America’s Professional’s Register “.

The salutation is “Dear valued Customer” which means the sender has no idea who she is sending the message to and hence it is a simple scam email. She is supposedly from a professional body but her email address is a give-a-way (selfdefensecare.icu) so she’s reusing an old scam email address.

The reader is supposed to be flattered at the idea of inclusion is a prestigious register and magazine and click the link to add more details to their profile (which of course they do not have as they don’t know my name).

Only a moron would click such a link.

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The Amazon Business Account Scam

Amazon provides a business service called the Amazon Business Account and it is increasingly popular for people keen to spend a significant proportion of their business purchases with Amazon.

The real Amazon business account does offer free shipping, cheap prices, pay by invoice etc. and it starts at £80 per year for Amazon Business Prime – which gives the free shipping etc.

However, scammers have realised this is another target market they can go after.

Emails appear to be from Amazon and extol the virtues of opening a free business account with Amazon.

But, they are scammers looking for your login and password and payment details.

The link you click may get you to a website that looks like Amazon, but it’s a fake. Once they have your details, they can set up accounts with Amazon and lots of other retailers in your name and you will get the bills to pay.

If you want to try Amazon Business then go to the Amazon website directly – do not click on links in emails that may be from scammers.

If you have any experiences with scammers, spammers or time-waster do let me know, by email.

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Lekoil Scammed

Lekoil is a  Nigerian oil company and their share price dropped 73% on the London Stock Exchange, on the announcement that it had been scammed to the tune of $184.

Lekoil needed a huge loan and was approached by Seawave Invest Limited acting on behalf of the Qatar Investment Authority.

Negotiations ensued and went on for months as executives sorted out the fine details of the loan, which was needed to pay for development of the Ogo field within Oil Prospecting Licence 310 in Nigeria.

Lekan Akinyanmi, the Lekoil chief executive led the negotiations for the company and in time a formal agreement was reached.

Control Risks, a consultancy headquartered in London, prepared a due diligence report that did not raise red flags. Analysts said the loan’s relatively low interest rate of 3.72 per cent should have raised suspicions.

Norton Rose Fulbright, an international law firm that has previously worked for Lekoil, provided legal advice on the deal.

Control Risks, a consultancy headquartered in London, prepared a due diligence report that did not raise red flags, the people said. Analysts said the loan’s relatively low interest rate of 3.72 per cent should have raised suspicions. Norton Rose and Control Risks declined to comment.

But it was all fake – the people claiming to be from the Qatar Investment Authority were criminals, who went to great lengths to appear genuine.

Lekoil was left desperately trying to find money or be forced to sell off assets.

OOPS. Better do better checks next time someone offers a huge loan.

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Business Distribution Fraud

This fraud is where criminals pretend to be a well-known UK retailer and order goods from suppliers (usually overseas). The goods are delivered but payment is never made as it’s the criminals who received the delivery.

A recent example of this fraud was perpetrated on Moon Buggy which is a German company making child buggies.

Moon Buggy were contacted by a man they believed to be the purchasing director for John Lewis and they sent him 2 lorry loads of buggies worth £214,000 to a warehouse in South London.

They should have noticed that the man’s email address wasn’t @johnlewis.co.uk but @johnliwes.com  and they should have checked he was the real deal but they didn’t check sufficiently and are out of pocket for a serious amount of money.

The Police response to the crime was not convincing and Eddie Prendergast working in the UK for Moon Buggy started to search for the stolen prams.

He found them on sale on eBay and bought one so he could check the serial number – he had found the stolen prams. He identified names and addresses of the sellers and reported this to the Police.

Again, little response from the Police – just ongoing investigations.

There are numerous examples of this distribution fraud – always make sure to verify who you’re talking to where shipments of any kind are concerned.

If you have any experiences with scammers, spammers or time-waster do let me know, by email.

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