Diana Posted October 22, 2004 Share Posted October 22, 2004 I have just received a phone call from a gentleman in Hungry wanting to rent our french house he said he was phoning from a company, this is strange because we are no longer advertising it for rent. As I was in a meeting I could not talk and just said it was not available without going into further details. I seem to remember reading about a scan on here a few months ago about dodgy web-sites and another about people phoning and wanting to rent your property for many weeks and at a much higher rate than you were advertising, they would send payment from a third person and you had to refund the difference. In the process they got your bank details and the contence of your bank balance. Am I being paranoid?Diana Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dick Smith Posted October 22, 2004 Share Posted October 22, 2004 Probably not.I received an email today, supposedly from Barclay's bank, saying that some men had gone into their London branch (sic) and tried to extract money from my account. In fact, I quote:"WE WRITE TO ENQUIRE FROM YOU IF YOU HAVE SENT SOMEBODY FROM SWITZERLANDMR SCHEMIRLT AND SOME LONDON REPRESENTATIVE MR CHELSEA TO MAKE CLAIM ONYOUR BEHALF.TODAY AT ABOUT 10.00 AM LONDON TIME, MR SCHEMIRLAT AND YOUR LONDONREPRESENTATIVE CAME TO THE BANK SAYING THAT YOU HAVE SENT THEM TO MAKE CLAIM ON YOURBEHALF ON YOUR CONTRACT FUNDS. I INITIALLY INSTRUCTED FOR THE RELEASE OF THEFUND TO THEM AS THEY CAME WITH ALL OBLIGATORY DOCUMENTS, BUT ON CROSSCHECKING YOUR CONTRACT FILE, I DISCOVERED THAT THE BANK ACCOUNT NUMBER THEYPRESENTED WAS DIFFERENT FROM YOUR OWN BANK ACCOUNT AND THE BENEFICARY OF THEACCOUNT THE BROUGHT IS CHANGORI AND CHANGORI THAT'S MAKE US TO SUSPECT THEM,THIS IS A SERIOUS MATTER IN THE BANK NOW AND WE HAVE GIVEN A MANDATE TORELEASE THIS FUND TO YOU."He then goes on to ask for my bank details (I don't bank with Barclays).Pathetic. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paolo Posted October 23, 2004 Share Posted October 23, 2004 Diana,What would ring alarm bells for me is the mention of Hungary. There was someone from Hungary calling round a list of rental properties on the net asking you to advertise on his site. Is this new call unrelated? If your house no longer features on the internet, he is almost certainly calling a list compiled when it was. That's unless he printed off your details when you had a site (unlikely) or he used the Wayback Machine internet archive (preposterous).Dick,It's lucky for us that scammers haven't learnt spelling, grammar and lower case yet. When they do, they will be very much more successful. If my mother received that email (and she banked with Barclays) would she have deleted it? Not sure...Paolo Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Iceni Posted October 23, 2004 Share Posted October 23, 2004 DianaThe con trick of paying in advance with a large cheque, requesting a refund of the overpayment and then cancelling the cheque featured on a Watchdog type prog this very week. Sadly some people are unable to smell a rat.John Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
I1 Posted October 26, 2004 Share Posted October 26, 2004 [quote]Probably not.I received an email today, supposedly from Barclay's bank, saying that some men had gone into their London branch (sic) and tried to extract money from my account. In fact, I quote:"WE WR...[/quote]An idea:Respond with a valid bank, valid branch, valid address, etc., (not yours) though random account number (i.e. not valid but with the correct number of digits). Maybe include a PIN number (random 4 digits) in the response to get them really keen.This would encourage them to visit the wrong bank with rubbish details (you could even even warn the bank in advance about it to catch them). Worst case is they would waste some time, best case is the back would take some notice of your warning and catch them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cabman Posted October 30, 2004 Share Posted October 30, 2004 There is a scam similar to your experience, usually applied to used cars.I guess it would work just the same with rentals.Read all about it here: http://www.used-car-advisor.com/car-buyer-scam.htm Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Owens88 Posted November 1, 2004 Share Posted November 1, 2004 I have just spent two days in e-correspopndence with a chap who wanted to rent for three weeks but for me to effectively bank a cheque for him (i.e. return him the balance out of £3k). As it happens he was from Nigeria.Strangely enough I had a similar thing last year. I chose to explain that I may fall foul of the anti money laundering regulations were I do do as requested. He declined to proceed. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paul Carmel Posted November 29, 2004 Share Posted November 29, 2004 Take good look at this site http://www.419eater.com/forum/index.php It will expaln nearly every scam in the book!! CheersPC Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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