STEVE WALLACE ! ! Remember this name ! !

uncle Alan

uncle Alan

Joined
Jul 11, 2004
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Stepdaughter answered an ad for "Secret Shopper" .

Supposed to shop stores report on courtesy,cleanliness ,displays,etc.

Got 2 USPO money orders totaling almost $2,000 to deposit & forward half to a 3rd party via Western Union.

I presented the money orders to both our banks & they were validated as real.

Today my main bank sent me copies of fraudlent money orders. They withdrew the money & fined me $5.00 each.

Last night she got an urgent message to send 1/2 of the money to 3rd party ASAP. Thank God she didn't


Really no free lunches,eh ?


Uncle Alan :o
 
This is, unfortunately not an uncommon swindle. "I'll send you $X. You send someone else (who is really me) some fraction of it." The funds they send you are well-done forgeries which the bank initially accepts but will catch up with. Of course, what you send them is legit.

File a report with your local police. If postal mail was used, contact the Postal Inspectors Office.
 
The name Steve Wallace is the prefect con man name. it's unusual enough not to be obvious -- think of John Smith or Bob Brown -- and yet common enough (and also a successful NASCAR driver) such that there only 4 1/4 million hits for it on Google. Your chances of ever having turned up anything suspecious were zero.
 
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The big red flag is Western Union. If you send money by Western Union, you will never see it again. If you send money by credit card or even a real USPS money order,
you are somewhat protected.

I often wonder if people really fall for these Secret Shopper scams. Now I know.:rolleyes:
 
This is a fairly common scam unfortunately. The professional scam ring will steal a company's or person's checking account number and send off a bunch of checks drawn off that accounts to folks that have responded to secret shopper or lottery scams. They off course want a cut of the money. As a banker my general advice is for folks to not try to deposit one of these checks. If you feel comfortable you can go to the bank that the check is drawn on and report the scam, that way the bank can flag the account.
 
My daughter's boyfriend fell for a variation of this. He answered an ad from overseas. The ad said someone was overseas on a long term assignment and he wanted a piece of stereo equipment that was only sold in the US. He sent a cashier's check for $2,000 to buy a $1,400 piece of equipment to be shipped to him and said the buyer could keep the rest of the money for doing him the favor. I told him it was a scam and explained how it worked. But, he did it anyway - he's an idiot. If it sounds too good to be true, it usually is.
 
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