Website scam?

[Judyc]

I received a telephone call last week from a foreign-sounding man trying to sell me gite advertising on a website. He did give me a name of the company (not the website), but I don't remember it.

I told him that there were so many websites, many of whom offer free advertising to start, that I would not consider paying anybody until I had tried for a few months to see if we got any responses, but he kept insisting on their good results, consistently high placings on search engines etc.

I repeatedly asked for the name of the website so I could have a look at it anyway, and he kept avoiding the question. Finally I lost my patience and said the fact that he refused to give me the name of the website was hardly a good advertisement for his website or his company, at which point he hung up on me.

Last night a friend said he had also received a call and had given the same response, ie no free trial, no interest. (I think the cost was 120 or 120, not sure.) He was actually given the name of a website to look at, but when he tried to find it, failed to access it. On calling back, the company said they were 'having a problem' or had given him the wrong address.

This sounds very much like a scam to me. We advertise on quite a few sites and all have started because of giving a free trial and us being able to see that they gave results. Apart from this man's assurances that they got results, there was nothing to go on. He may have been quite genuine, but his unwillingness to even let me look at the website sounds extremely suspicious.

Has anyone else heard from this foreign gentleman? My friend thought he had said he came from Bulgaria?! I would be vary wary of anyone trying to sell a product that they won't even let you look at.

Anybody know any more?


Judy
47 Lot-et-Garonne

PS Apologies to the company if they are genuine, but if that is the case perhaps a bit of re-training their telesales staff might be in order.

[creighton]

i recieved a dodgy e-mail from someone not very literate after posting an ad on the total france forum,people beware

[Quillan]

A post has been deleted from here as it broke the advertising rule as described in the Code of Conduct.

The author has been informed


Chris
Moderator

[Iceni]

Another good one is if your domain name is due for renewal you get an offical letter reminding you and they ask for 60. One of my names is up for renewal but I just renew with the host at far less than this.

Di
http://www.iceni-it.co.uk

[Darren, Vicky and Amelia]

I read this article with interest today.

This morning, a guy rang and said he was interested in our gites. He then asked if I was the owner, I said yes, he then said are you Darren? I said no it was my husband. He then went into some detail of advertising ( although I didn't really listen, you know what sales men are like, say it all parrot fashion.) i tried to explain that we are very happy with our advetising this year and intend to advertise the same way next year. He then started telling me about a webpage. But I cut him off and told him once again we are very happy, and that there no point in talking to him.
He too was foreign, I thought prob Indian!!

Sounds like we may have uncovered a scam!!

Likewise if this is a genuine company sorry!!


Vicky
47 Lot et Garonne

[Fourwinds]

Hi

I had two phonecalls fropm waht sounds like the same company at the beginning of August. We also have property in POrtugal and it sounded like that it was there they were calling about. My husband took the initial calls, and thinking they were genuine passed them across to me. Neither of us got beyond the info you managed to ascertain - £120 ish per annum, company name that didn't check out.

We took the view that if you publish your personal details then someone is going to try and make use of it in some way these days - sign of the times I think.

It is difficult when there are genuine operators out there but normally you can see something tangible on-line.

[Marie]

Hi,

It certainly sounds like there is something going on as I had a similar phone call from someone (Darren??) in Hungary.  The initial part of the converstion was just enquiring about the gite, but quickly moved onto the sales pitch! Cost was about €130 a year, and the guy was very reluctant to get off the phone.  I asked for the details to be emailed, but he 'couldn't' do this.  He did reluctantly give me a web address, but by this time I'd lost all interest in looking it up. He couldn't tell me where they got our details from (the marketing department just pass them on), but we do advertise on 2 websites. He was very persistent, wanting to call back the next day, so I would guess they work on a commission basis, but if he thought I was going to hand over any financial or personal details to a complete stranger over the phone he must be mad.

 

Marie

[Frogslegs]

I had a telephone call from a french sounding north african! Said he was from the guide de tourist or what ever, said I owed him 300 euros from an advert I had placed in March!!! on and on he went saying that he had allready reduced the fee from a 1000 euros!! he eventually hung up when I said I had been in spain in March and it was impossible for me to have placed an ad! bit of a fib though!!

[Goo_Rat]

Frogslegs - sounds like a different scam all together.

Everyone else, I had a phone call from a chap called Alex from Bulgaria he said the web site address was www.vacationrentals.net, this web site doesn't respond. gave me a phone number 00 36 16 88 70 50

Very persistant chap

[Fil]

Hi,

I too have received a call (on my husband's mobile, in the car) from a guy in Hungary who was very friendly etc but we were of course not interested.  I was however, polite to him, and got the website, which I am about to look at.  It was www.worldvacationrentals.net .  I think it probably is a scam - some east european trying to cash in on western hols etc.  Could it be a crime syndicate?  You never know do you?

Fil

[Miki]

[quote]Hi, I too have received a call (on my husband's mobile, in the car) from a guy in Hungary who was very friendly etc but we were of course not interested. I was however, polite to him, and got the we...[/quote]

Sorry but I don't see how this is a scam?

The site is laid out well and is easy to navigate and does what it says on the bottle.

At around 160 € for one year and with a little bit of hard bargaining, you might even get the first year for less perhaps, it is not that cheap but still consistent with many other similar sites.

Scams mainly consist of receiving nothing in return, this does give you a decent advert. Whether it works is anyones guess but with the sheer number of internet sites offering holidays, either in France or world wide, very few will work that well.

It is a simple case of what works for one may not work for another. Some of the "big" name sites work well for some of the members on here but do nothing for others, yer pays yer money etc....

Having looked at the site, I have seen a few of the usual suspects, that can be seen on many sites, so why not give one or two advertisers a call or email and see how they are doing but don't contact anyone locally, as they may give you a negative reply however they are doing !

[Darren, Vicky and Amelia]

Hello, Vicky again.

Whilst nursing a hangover today I got another phnoe call. I didn't want to talk to anyone today let alone them again.

He said he was calling from Budapest!!?? Sounded foreign too. He said he'd seen our advert and wondered if we wanted wnother 6-8 weeks bookings next year. I told him that i'd already spoken to onw of his collegues?? Told him that we are happy with our advertsing, as I had told his collegue. I then said bye and put the phone down.

So it seems they haven'y given up yet!!

[Janey]

I too had a similar call yesterday from a bloke in Hungary, he had an American accent. I told him we were very happy with  our advertising to which he replied don,t you want to be one of the top 4 on Google?

Explained I was on my way out but if he wanted to phone me later we could go into more details to which he replied..oh..don,t know if I,m going to have time for that ! I said..Tant pis.

Janey

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It's hard to know which things are scams and which aren't sometimes. One thing for sure is that if they want your money, and it's too good to be true, it's probably a scam. My reccomendation is  - if you're supicious then do without it.