Tuesday, October 20, 2020

The Mystery Shopper Con

A few days ago, a friend of mine told me about a scam that somebody she knows almost fell for.

This occurred in the USA. I'm unsure whether it has made its way to these shores yet, but it's worth keeping in the back of your mind just in case.

The trick is they send a person a cheque for $2,500 and ask the potential victim to be mystery shoppers. They ask the recipient of the letter to go to a store and purchase $2,000 worth of gift vouchers. The shopper must then take a photo of the voucher codes before they are 'allowed' to cash in the cheque. 

Therefore, the mark expects to walk out of this deal $500 better off. 

Not so fast.

As you've probably guessed, the cheque is a fake. By the time the victim realises this - if they haven't done so already - the scammer has gotten away with the $2,000 from the gift card codes.

No comments:

Post a Comment