Home business protection – traits of scam artists

While this topic is not necessarily unique to home based business, I think that it’s important for work at home moms & dads to be aware of some common traits to scam artists.

Back in 2005 I received over $20,000 in fraudulent payments, from fake postal money orders, forged cashiers checks and business checks written using hacked bank accounts using the formerly popular qchex.com system. Recently I listed a vehicle for sale on my local craigslist.org, and once again I was confronted by a scammer offering to send me a “certified check” for my vehicle, and shortly thereafter they’d arrange for someone to come and pick it up. Of course I am familiar with their tactics – but others unfortunately fall prey.

I spoke with a local police detective about the issue and he stated that he had 5 similar incidents on his desk involving amounts greater than $10,000 – these are real people who have lost out huge due to fake check scams, and the city has less than 10,000 people in it.

The point is, it doesn’t matter where you live – you’re still vulnerable to these scam artists. I do think this topic is especially important for home based businesses because of the likelihood of accepting payment from strangers.

While each of these traits individually might not be a big deal – if a transaction that you’re considering involves one or more of these traits – it might be a good idea to tread carefully.

Celebrity Name
I’m not sure what the significance of using a celebrity name is, but I’ve found that a lot of scammers will use well known names. My recent scammer was named “Paul Harvey”, though in the past I’ve been contacted by “Mike Jordan” and “William Clinton” as well as “Bill Clinton” and “George Forman”. Now, it’s not impossible by any means to have the same name as a celebrity, only I’ve noticed a pattern is all.

Free email address using numbers
Scammers seem to like to keep the same identity. Now, they’ll often times eventually get caught somewhere and their email address will get shut down. However, something I’ve noticed is that some of these scammers will use their name and a consecutive number. For example, recently I’ve encountered paul.harvey200@gmail.com – likely this person also has paul.harvey201@gmail.com, paul.harvey202@gmail.com, etc. This is not something that I’ve noticed only once, it’s happened a number of times.

Broken English and Non – North American English
A common trait amongst would-be scammers that intend to send fraudulent payment is that their messages are generally short and they typically write in broken English. On top of that, they will often use proper English terminology, but it doesn’t match the broken English that they use. The majority of the scammers that I’ve encountered seem to have a British English slant to their writing. Of course, this is relative. I am in the USA & I typically deal with local US citizens when doing transactions using my local Craigslist. Now if you’re in London, of course you’ll expect a British English response.

Offering more money than you’re asking for
Scammers will often offer you more money than you’re asking for when selling a physical product. It really depends on the situation, but sometimes the “extra money” is intended for some other individual that lives within your country; basically they ask you that once you’ve received payment to keep your share and send x amount to their friend, co-worker or business partner.

Overly eager for you to ship merchandise
Often times when you sell a physical item that needs to be shipped, a scammer will insist that you ship an item once you’ve received the payment or even once you’ve received the “payment confirmation”. This tactic is widely used with Western Union Payments or PayPal payments. Basically the scammer will send you a fake confirmation email & tell you that in order for funds to be “released”, that you must supply the tracking number.

Strange business opportunities
If someone contacts you and states they are an international business person seeking some help locally with their business, this might be a setup to take your money. A couple of years ago I was seeking some particular part time housing & I was contacted by an individual about some property locally where they stated I could stay free. I figured there was a catch – it ended up they claimed they were a jeweler from Sweden & had significant business in the States, but due to banking costs of cashing US checks in Sweden, they needed someone local to accept payment. For my troubles of receiving the checks and cashing them I would get 10%. . . any similar “opportunity” is likely a scam. What the person finally told me is that the checks would be written in my name & I was to cash them and send cash to a separate address in the UK. Maybe some people think this is ludicrous, but people fall for these schemes all the time.

This list is not exhaustive by any means – these are just some of the common traits I’ve noticed in scammers that have tried to get the better of me. There are undoubtedly a number of other traits that might be common to scammers – and if you know of any, I would love it if you would comment here.

Bottom line – if you ever have even the slightest thought that something might be a scam, or some transaction with a stranger doesn’t quite seem right to you; it is best that you hold off on that transaction and consult with someone more knowledgeable than you about things such as these. If you choose to ignore your gut feeling – you might very well be the latest victim of these scam artists.

[tags]scam artists, home business scams, fake check scams, scammers[/tags]