a couple of years ago my friend got scammed in a similar manner. She is forever looking for love and met some guy online. They talked for a while and he told her that he needed to get money to africa to take care of his daughter to have a surgery or something.... yes my poor friend is so looking for love she fell for it. She cashed the first set of money orders for 2500.00 then he sent her more! she actually went to cash those but the bank happened to notice they were bad. She had to pay all the $2500.00. I felt bad, but boy oh boy was it a dumb thing for her to fall for. So this scam is everywhere and they must be successful because they keep doing it.
That is so sad that she fell for that. So now not only is she out the money, but she also feels like she's lost out on love again. Sending good thoughts her way!
So this scam is everywhere and they must be successful because they keep doing it.
And that's what gets me. In this day and age, with the technology and the wonderful tool called GOOGLE....how on earth don't people do some research?
It's as easy as "money for surgery in Africa scam"
Betcha SCAM pops right up in the results!
You shouldn't reply to these people. If it sounds like a scam, you can research it first. Just do a google search "Ben Parker scam" and 29,200 links appear. You can google phone numbers, and e-mail addresses too and you might find out exactly where the computer is located that generates these scams. (my scam came from someone at Microsoft in Seattle, WA.) If you're so inclined, you could report them to authorities and let them handle it or inform the company with a heads up if the source is found.
Sorry Unlimited,
we live out in the boonies of NE Colorado. So we aren't actually expecting this sort of thing. My boss didn't even know about the scams. He had heard something about it on the John Tesh radio show but didn't think anymore on it.
I saw red flags immediately but in deference to my boss I wrote the person back (afterall he did talk on the phone to my boss). But I made it quite clear in a very professional manner what is expected, that we only take cash, and that we don't ship and that wedding cakes are delivery only. So hopefully we've dodged the bullet, so to speak. I told my boss what they do, that they will send a check for way over the amount of the cake and expect us to cash it and send them the difference.
I told him that if they do send a check, hold it and the email and we'll take all of it to the cops.
You shouldn't reply to these people. If it sounds like a scam, you can research it first. Just do a google search "Ben Parker scam" and 29,200 links appear. You can google phone numbers, and e-mail addresses too and you might find out exactly where the computer is located that generates these scams. (my scam came from someone at Microsoft in Seattle, WA.) If you're so inclined, you could report them to authorities and let them handle it or inform the company with a heads up if the source is found.
HUH?? How would a person who hasn't heard ANYTHING about these scams know not to reply and to research it first? Unfortunately, I was very trusting at the time and had never even HEARD of this scam! This was about a year ago. Since then, I hear it every other day from my son (using Craigslist), friends and CCrs. It's unfortunate that we can't just TRUST people. Yes, I have my rose-colored glasses on as I write this. 
Well, in my case, I received two e-mails on the same day from two different e-mail addresses with two different names and two different contact numbers... the common "red flag" that I first noticed was that the exact same subject title appeared on BOTH e-mails that was poorly written:
"I will like to buy it If you still have it up for sale."
First of all, no one really talks like that, they would have said:
"I would like to buy it..." and most people don't bother asking "If you still have it up for sale", of course it's still up for sale until it has actually sold and then the listing is cancelled, expired, or removed.
Secondly, what are the chances that both people would choose the same poorly written subject title... not very likely, so perhaps it looks like a scam. Common sense tells me that I may want to do a little research first because it SOUNDS like a scam to me and I wouldn't want to get my hopes up and believe it's true only to later find out that it wasn't really on the up and up.
I was lucky, I had two e-mails to compare. Not so sure I would have been smart enough to recognize the scam without the other one that matched!!
Yes, a lot of these scams are automatically generated when you've listed something on Craigs List, and most of them use poor grammar as well. Usually, the high dollar amount listings are the ones they go after first.
Aside from googling each and every strange e-mail you receive, I'd at least consider further researching the fishy sounding ones. Now that we all know these scams do exist, there's nothing greater in this world of technology than having a computer and the internet at our fingertips regardless of where we live, work, and play on this planet!! My kids don't answer the telephone unless they recognize the LOCAL number on the Caller I.D. I NEVER answer my business line if it's not a local number calling because I'm only a LOCAL business. If it's important, they can leave a message and I'll have time to check it out and call back if needed (it's hard to ignore potential business calling, but I have to remind myself that's what voice mail/answering machines are for)!
In a perfect world there would be no need to be leary or paranoid of untrustworthy people, but in this one we need to BEWARE & BE SAFE! (Yea, they should just get a real job!!!)
The reason it should be such a dead obvious give away is the awful grammar and spelling. These morons go to something like www.babelfish.yahoo.com and have whatever moronic thing translated into whatever language they are scamming in that day. So, it doesn't always translate correctly. And they (usually) give themselves away.
Thank goodness I read this! HE EMAILED ME THIS WEEK!!!!
I got four emails from a scammer today, but it wasn't the happy marriage life thing. A variation on it, but not nearly as detailed. I didn't have time to mess with them, which I generally enjoy doing, so I just deleted them.
A friend of mine's elderly mother was scammed last year. She received a call from someone saying "Gramma?" When this poor old lady said "Jimmy, is that you?" the caller said yes it was and he had been in an accident (in Canada) and needed money wired to him immediately to help fix his car. She actually wired him $2500 and the guy had the b**ls to call her the next day and tell her he needed another $3500. Poor old thing was actually leaving to wire the second amount when her daughter (my friend) stopped by and found out about it all. This lady has very little savings and felt so bad when she found out the grandson was not in Canada and she had been swindled. So please warn all the elderly as well.
Yesterday I responded to some guy who wanted a cake that I was busy in October, and at the time I thought that it might be another scammer. Turns out he was, since he answered me back as if I'd said I'd do the cake. He replied that he was going to send the shipping company information for the cake pickup. They obviously can't read English, so this was my reply to him:
Suck it, scammer. If you can read you would have seen that I won't do a cake for you or any of your scammer friends. No, wait. I will do a cake, payment due is $10,000,000 in cash only, no fake credit cards or fake bank accounts that will require me to send you the balance of your overpayment.
Think he might get the message?
Edited to add: Nah, as I think about it, he won't get the message.
Just wanted to chime in with my experience with this.
I found a kitten in a park, I posted her on Petfinder.com hoping someone would want her as I already had 2 cats and a dog. In the advertisement I specifically stated that I would not ship the cat and needed to meet and do a home inspection because I was not giving this kitty to just anyone.
I got one email from a 'Dr' in Texas claiming he wanted a kitten for his daughter. He asked the color of the cat - which I had in the add, ignored my 'will not ship' statement, and his spelling was horrible! He wanted the cat shipped, money sent Western Union . . . blah blah blah.
I responded - essentially asking where he got his Doctorate from because I was surprised there is a college that does not teach English. I also told him to stop scamming. I also got another email along the same lines asking for the cat.
Anyway, just wanted to show that the scamming stretched to pet adoption too.
Happy ending though - I talked my husband into keeping the kitty so she has a good home anyway 
I found this scam too, but not related to cakes. There was an ad in MY LOCAL NEWSPAPER looking for a tutor for a 5th grader and a 1st grader. Everything about the ad sounded legit, except that it said contact by email, not phone. So just for grins I sent an email.
Got an email back within a day. Same grammatical errors that y'all have reported.. this man said he was living in Britain, but was sending his son here to start school. He would mail me a check, I was supposed to cash it, then give half to the "nanny."
Luckily by this point I knew it was a scam. I confirmed it when I emailed him back, asking specifics.. "When will your son be arriving? What is the name and contact information of the nanny? Where will he be living? What is your name, phone number, and address in Britain?"
I never gave him any info about me. He never responded back. Soon after that I read that this scam was happening all over, in many different ways. Like tiggy said.. If it sounds too good...
Its called a Nigerian Scam. I just got a similar email....poor grammar, poor spelling....saying they are out of the country on business but will send a check. I was trying to sell some baby items online. I turned them into Craigslist, but its rampant with them.
Thank goodness you didn't cash the check. A relative of mine did that (without knowing what it really was) and got into some big trouble with the law (until they got it all figured out).
Good luck!
WOW!
It just happened to me today!! I posted an ad ,selling a treadclimber. And this guy emails me telling me he wants to buy it but will send a check for the amount of the equipment + extra money he wants me to forward for his pick-up service!!! Honey I was born at night...BUT it wasnt last night!!!!
SOrry to hear you were almost taken!!
I'm sorry that happened to you! I saw that same scam last year on Craigslist, only it took the form of 'Clean my apaartment, I'll send you a check, send my friend half of the money' type thing. I reported it as soon as I saw it.
Just be glad that you caught it in time!!
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