Is this email a scam?

I posted an ad on gumtree looking for a job and got this email



read from the bottom



GET BACK TO ME?

From: Engr Paul Lawson (engrpaullaw@yahoo.com)

Sent: 20 August 2009 12:58:08

To:



I should provided that there is a post office in the area. In addition to that, I don't mind you doing all of the tasks during your spare time outside of work or school.. I wish I could meet up with you to talk about this job in person but i am currently away on for a Orphanages pedestrian construction. I am in Africa so there will be no interview.I am senior civil engr I will prepay you in advance to do my shopping and have my mails/packages forwarded to your address.If you will be unable to stay at home to get the mails, I can have them shipped to a post office near you and then you can pick them up at your convenience.

All errands will be in your city/town so It is not a must that you have a car for the job, you can go places by bus or taxi.

When you get my mails/packages; you are required to mail them to where I want them mailed to.

You won't have to put money out of your pocket, all you have to do is have packages shipped to your house and do my shopping. You are allowed to open the packages to reveal the content. The content of the packages will be business and personal mails. All expenses and taxes will be covered by me....

You will work between 15 and 20hrs a month. How much will you charge per month? I will pay 500GBP per month. That is not a bad offer is it? I need your service because I am constantly out of town... I am senior civil engr. I will return to UK in September so this process will be on going till then...

If you don't mind, I will meet up with you when I return and then we can talk about the possibility of making this long term.



Well, I will have the mails sent to the post office however, the money to do my errands must be mailed directly to you. I will email you the list and pictures of what to shop for when I am ready. No heavy packages is involved! You can do the shopping at stores. You will be shopping for household items, Electronics and clothings. I will provide you my UPS account number for Shipping. All you have to do is provide my account number to UPS and shipping charges will be applied into the account. I will provide clear set of instructions for each task I need done as well the funds to cover them. If I were to mail you money to do my errands plus upfront payment for your service, how should your name appear on the money? Where should I mail it to?Your phone number. I need your contact address for the cheque to be mail to you. get back to me with the details below,

FULL NAME : THAT WILL APPEAR ON THE CHEQUE .

FULL ADDRESS

CITY

STATE

POSTAL CODE .

MOBILE NUMBER AND LAND LINE ..

AGE

NATIONALITY



Email me your details if you are able to handle the position..

Thanks for your time and accepting my offer.







--- On Thu, 8/20/09, wrote:





From:

Subject: RE:

To: engrpaullaw@yahoo.com

Date: Thursday, August 20, 2009, 9:45 AM





Hi what is the job?







%26gt; Date: Thu, 20 Aug 2009 02:51:46 +0100

%26gt; From: engrpaullaw@yahoo.com

%26gt; To:

%26gt; Subject:



%26gt;

%26gt; Contact: engrpaullaw@yahoo.com

%26gt;

%26gt; ________________________________________…

%26gt;

%26gt; Hi, I saw your placement advert on gumtree,That you are seeking for job,Are you interested apart from job you are seeking for??? Contact for more details if you are interested.

%26gt;







I think it is but im confused, why would people pay to do shopping?

also shall I just reply with my address, or a fake address

he already knows my email and first and last name



what shall i do?Is this email a scam?
Yes - The giveaway is Africa, Orphanage, Going away etc. Visit a website called the Scambaiter if you want to have a laugh at these scammers as they get conned themselves! Not my website, I only found it last week and I have been laughing so hard. It also offers advice on what to do or how to spot a scam.
Assume that any unsollicited email is a scam, any email from Africa or South America is a scam, any email from Russia or China is a scam, any email asking for personal information is a scam.Is this email a scam?
I can't discuss it on here. Please email me your bank details and personal details (DOB, address and employment) to my office here in Nigeria.

:-)
Of course it is a scam.

It is just another variation on the advance fee scam.Is this email a scam?
How many people would one guy need to shop?



This is a scam.
Yes, it is a scam. delete it.
Scam
Scam
People do get paid for being "secret shoppers". But that sounds like a scam.
whats in the packages drugs???
report it to gumtree and yes its a scam, you'd think the nigerian 419 scam was old hat but it seems people are still dumb enough to try and use it still.
This is just an elaborate scam to get hold of your bank details. There will be no money going into it from him but I bet he'd have a good try at taking plenty out of it.
It is a phishing scam. Be aware that Burkino Faso and other obscure locations are havens for these people. The information requested is sufficient to start an identity fraud. Ignore it!
Categorically a scam phishing for your personal details and possibly as a bonus enticing you to advance goods of value before receipt of cleared funds......

XBOX 360 REPAIR? Service request number?

Thanks in advance



This is the number for repairs.



I have been wondering what the service request # is. When i go online and " Check your repair status by using the service request number " the number they gave me on the phone never works. They gave me a straight up 10 digit number that looks like this. 1076*2**3* - the *'s are numbers.



I enter that number and my postal code and it still hasn't been working yet.



Can someone tell me how to retrieve your service request number , and if the number i have is the service request number then how come it's not working?



Also these were received in my email from Microsoft/UPS. Are they relevant to the service request #?

Reference Number 1: 1076*2**3*

Reference Number 2: 61*0*9*6*5*6



I noticed that reference # 2 is my serial # and the reference #1 is the number they gave me over the phone. Once again, the *'s symbolizes the numbers i blanked out.





Thank you very much - will vote best answerXBOX 360 REPAIR? Service request number?
u can call u knwo soon as u call 1800-4my-xbox



the computer takes your phone number and says if your xbox been recived still in repair or sent offXBOX 360 REPAIR? Service request number?
ur a ******* idiot

Report Abuse

XBOX 360 REPAIR? Service request number?
My brother sent his x-box 360 to repair. It took about a week to arrive at the x-box place, then they left a message on our answering machine about how they recieved the package. They fixed it and sent an email that they were sending it back after a little under another week.

Maybe you missed the message and they already have the package, you just cant track it?

I'm not completely sure what you're asking about, but that was how we did it....
Call them back and ask them for the information. they can look it up by your phone number or serial number..../

Will USPS cancel my shipment in time?

I sent a very expensive shipment to Nigeria yesterday, stupid craigslist scam, at 11am via USPS Express Mail International (yes I NOW know everything going on in Nigeria is a scam). Anyways, I realized that it was a scam last night after post office closed. I then submitted my PS1509 first thing this am to my local consumer affairs office. I also sent some emails to the Nigerian Postal Service at the border, although I doubt that will do anything. Has anyone had any experience with the recall process or can give me an idea of my chances for recovery? Thanks for any information!!Will USPS cancel my shipment in time?
If the package has left the country then it's too late to ever get it backWill USPS cancel my shipment in time?
Hey Mark, I'm in the same situation right now. I just wanted to know if you were able to recover your shipped item or if Kittysue is correct? I kind of have lost all hopes by now.

Report Abuse

I applied for jobs and received this email offering me a mystery shopper job.It asks for my info is it a scam?

Job Details





Dear Sir/Madam,

Our Consulting Firm needs mystery shoppers From any where in Canada, as part-time worker. No application fee Required,Applicant must be 18 years and above, must check email 2 -3 times in a day to read updates from us and be honest. You will earn $300 on each transaction by being our mystery shopper.Your employment packet include business evaluation form and a training Instructions which will be sent to you via email

after you have received payment.A Paycheck or money order will be sent to you for the first Evaluation by our finance company,you are to deduct your $300 commission, and the rest will be used for the evaluation at the store that you will be instructed to go.This Evaluation can take place five times or more in a week so you can end up earning for yourself close

to $1000 or more in a week.



1. Business evaluation form: This is the form you are required to fill after you visit any shopping mall in your area as directed,you will be given the store name and address which you are required to evaluate its customer service and quality

control after their services are rendered to you. You will be required to fill a form to rate the employee(s), the form will be given to you after the evaluation at the store.





2. Training Instructions: You are hired to evaluate the quality of services of the store or mall that will be selected by you and very nearest to you . You are needed to rate the employees.Interested shopper should please Enclose their information below for you to start with us.



First Name:

Last Name:

Full Contact Address (P.O.Box Not Required):

City:

Province:

Postal Code:

Home Phone:

Cell Phone:

Age:

Sex:

Email Address:

Present Occupation:

Marital Status:

Best Times To Call:



Thanks for responding, We will wait for your full details .

P:S: After you have emailed your information to us ,You should endeavor to check your email 2-3 times in a day to read updates from us.



Best Regards,

Sincerely

Consultant / HR Manager

Mary Stewart

Delivering simple solutions and achievable business objectives!

Secret Shopper庐

www.mysteryshoppercanada.orgI applied for jobs and received this email offering me a mystery shopper job.It asks for my info is it a scam?
100% scam.



There is no mystery shopper job.



There is only a scammer trying to steal your hard-earned money.



The next email will be from another of the scammer's fake names and free email addresses pretending to be the "secretary/assistant/accountant" and will demand you cash a large fake check sent on a stolen UPS/FedEx billing account number and send most of the "money" via Western Union or moneygram back to the scammer posing as the "supply company" while you "keep" a small portion. When your bank realizes the check is fake and it bounces, you get the real life job of paying back the bank for the bounced check fees and all the bank's money you sent to an overseas criminal.



Western Union and moneygram do not verify anything on the form the sender fills out, not the name, not the street address, not the country, not even the gender of the receiver, it all means absolutely nothing. The clerk will not bother to check ID and will simply hand off your cash to whomever walks in the door with the MTCN# and question/answer. Neither company will tell the sender who picked up the cash, at what store location or even in what country your money walked out the door. Neither company has any kind of refund policy, money sent is money gone forever.



When you refuse to send him your cash he will send increasingly nasty and rude emails trying to convince you to go through with his scam. The scammer could also create another fake name and email address like "FBI@ gmail.com", "police_person @hotmail.com" or "investigator @yahoo.com" and send emails telling you the job is legit and you must cash the fake check and send your money to the scammer or you will face legal action. Just ignore, delete and block those email addresses. Although, reading a scammer's attempt at impersonating a law enforcement official can be extremely funny.



Now that you have responded to a scammer, you are on his 'potential sucker' list, he will try again to separate you from your cash. He will send you more emails from his other free email addresses using another of his fake names with all kinds of stories of great jobs, lottery winnings, millions in the bank and desperate, lonely, sexy singles. He will sell your email address to all his scamming buddies who will also send you dozens of fake emails all with the exact same goal, you sending them your cash via Western Union or moneygram.



You could post up the email address and the emails themselves that the scammer is using, it will help make your post more googlable for other suspicious potential victims to find when looking for information.



Do you know how to check the header of a received email? If not, you could google for information. Being able to read the header to determine the geographic location an email originated from will help you weed out the most obvious scams and scammers. Then delete and block that scammer. Don't bother to tell him that you know he is a scammer, it isn't worth your effort. He has one job in life, convincing victims to send him their hard-earned cash.



Whenever suspicious or just plain curious, google everything, website addresses, names used, companies mentioned, phone numbers given, all email addresses, even sentences from the emails as you might be unpleasantly surprised at what you find already posted online. You can also post/ask here and every scam-warner-anti-fraud-busting site you can find before taking a chance and losing money to a scammer.



6 "Rules to follow" to avoid most fake jobs:

1) Job asks you to use your personal bank account and/or open a new one.

2) Job asks you to print/mail/cash a check or money order.

3) Job asks you to use Western Union or moneygram in any capacity.

4) Job asks you to accept packages and re-ship them on to anyone.

5) Job asks you to pay visas, travel fees via Western Union or moneygram.

6) Job asks you to sign up for a credit reporting or identity verification site.



Avoiding all jobs that mention any of the above listed 'red flags' and you will miss nearly all fake jobs. Only scammers ask you to do any of the above. No. Exceptions. Ever. For any reason.



If you google "fake check cashing job", "fraud Western Union scam", "check mule moneygram scam" or something similar you will find hundreds of posts from victims and near-victims of this type of scam.I applied for jobs and received this email offering me a mystery shopper job.It asks for my info is it a scam?
100% SCAM



First of all, real mystery shopping pays $5-10 per shop. $25 is the most I've ever seen offered for an assignment. There is no mystery shopping in the world that pays $300



Second, no mystery shopping company contacts random people by email to offer them a job. You always have to contact them directly or be referred by a current shopper and go into their office to fill out an application and attend a training/orientation before you are offered any assignment



Third, you can tell this is not a professional email from a legitimate company by the poor grammar and punctuation used. No real company would ever send out an email that looked like this



Fourth, it's against the law for any employer to ask your age, sex or marital status



The fact they mention a money order is all you need to know this is a money laundering scam -- one that can land you in prison or at least bankrupt you

http://consumerist.com/2009/07/victim-of鈥?/a>



DO NOT send any personal details - this is all anyone needs to steal your identity. Report this ASAP to the site where the job was posted and to the Anti-Fraud Centre for investigation

http://www.phonebusters.com/english/home鈥?/a>I applied for jobs and received this email offering me a mystery shopper job.It asks for my info is it a scam?
100 percent scam. You are going to be asked to evaluate Western Union or Moneygram by sending money to somewhere overseas (I'd bet on Nigeria). They send you a fake cheque to cover what is being sent, but by the time your bank bounces the cheque, you're out the money.

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I got this email and want to know if its a scam?

DEAR BENEFICIARY!!! Congratulations to you as we bring to your notice the

results of the World Bank Promo and your email Address was selected

through a computer ballot system lucky draw. We are happy to inform you

that your email address has made you a winner of the sum of $800,000.00

United States Dollars.



However,a Confirmable Bank Draft of $800,000.00 United States Dollars, has

been deposited with FEDEX EXPRESS DELIVERY, West Africa, I will travell

out of the country for a Month Course and I will not come back till end of

this year.



What you have to do now is to contact the FEDEX COURIER SERVICE as soon as

possible to know when they will deliver your package to you because of the

expiring date. For your information, I have paid for the delivering

Charge, Insurance premium and Clearance Certificate Fee of the Cheque

showing that it is not a Drug Money or meant to sponsor Terrorist attack

in your Country.



The only money you will send to the FEDEX COURIER SERVICE to deliver your

Draft direct to your postal Address in your country is ($180.00 US)

Dollars only being Security Keeping Fee of the Courier Company so far.

Again, don't be deceived by anybody to pay any other money except

$180.00US Dollars. I would have paid that but they said no because they

don't know when you will contact them and in case of demurrage. You have

to contact the FEDEX COURIER SERVICE now for the delivery of your Draft

with this information bellow;Finaly, make sure that you reconfirm your Postal address() and Direct

telephone number to them again to avoid any mistake on the Delivery and

ask them to give you the tracking number to enable you track your package

over there and know when it will get to your address.



Let me repeat again, try to contact them as soon as you receive this mail

to avoid any further delay and remember to pay them their Security

Keeping fee of $180.00 US Dollars for their immediate action. You should

also let me knowthrough email as soon as you receive your Draft.



Yours Faithfully,

Mr. John Smith.I got this email and want to know if its a scam?
Scam! Scam! Scam! Scam! Scam! Don't fall for it. It's meant to rob you of your hard earned money. Don't be fooled!
It is scam. You can always track IP address from email sender by yourself to come behind who is really who want to scam you with this excellent email tracker:



http://www.ipaddresslocation.org/email-t鈥?/a>I got this email and want to know if its a scam?
Scam definitely. And I didn't even read through 1/4 of the thing. You can also tell because of the name, John Smith (that and John Doe are the two names that almost all places use as examples and pseudonyms).
it's a old trick if you call them they will get money just like the tv prizes you call them they get like $2 - 10 per call don't do that epic spam



they make lots of money.I got this email and want to know if its a scam?
Definitely!! send it to your spam handler (or trash)
Scam
Got one just like it today - they only want $205 and I get $800,000 - WOW!!! Same old story..If it sounds too good to be true, it usually is.



Dear Customer,



We have been waiting for you to contact us for your Confirmable Package that is

registered with us for shipping to your residential location.We had thought that

your sender gave you our contact details.



It may interest you to know that a letter is also added to your package.However, we

cannot quote it's content to you via email for privacy reasons.We understand that

the content of your package itself is a Bank Draft worth of $800,000.00 USD. As you

know, FedEx do not ship money in CASH or in CHEQUES butBank Drafts are shippable.

The package is registered with us for mailing by your colleague as claimed, and

your colleague explained that he is from the United States but he is here in

Nigeria for a three (3) months Surveying Project as he works with a construction

firm in the Nigeria West Africa We are sending you this email because your package

is beenregistered on a Special Order. ETC.



Another words - SCAM

What would happen if you took down your mailbox? I'm so sick of all of the snail mail spam!?

I didn't see it personally, but I heard there was an episode on Seinfeld where Kramer went to the post office and told them he wanted to "close his account". Personally, I think that's a great idea. Somehow, this "privilege" that the government once gave us has now become just an unhindered avenue for personal invasion. We have become inundated with junk through our mail system and it is costing the taxpayers millions in taxes being paid to the postal service so that the handlers can HANDLE all of that crap. Seriously, I want to know what would happen if I took the mailbox down off of the front of my house and dealt with my bills online only. Gee, I wonder what would happen if a large group of people protested the current system in that way...the postal service would be forced to make changes in how they handle the junk! We can make requests not to receive junk phone mail, junk email...but what about regular mail....tell me what YOU think!What would happen if you took down your mailbox? I'm so sick of all of the snail mail spam!?
Get a PO Box at the Post Office, then take down the mailbox - - you wouldn't want to miss out on legitimate mail, for instance, mail from the government, tax returns (you probably e-file), how about a recall on your automobile? Other notices about your community - community hearings on water prices, special taxes, etc. Maybe special mailing from the state - voting pamphlets and info? Make sure you have somewhere for the mail to go, it's still valuable.What would happen if you took down your mailbox? I'm so sick of all of the snail mail spam!?
You are seriously mistaken in your knowledge of the postal system.

Not one penny of taxes goes to the USPS. All of the money that the Postal Service gets is through the sale of postage, stamps, etc. When you, or your brother, or Sears, or Capital One, or any mailer mails a bill, parcel, catalog, brochure, they are the one's paying the freight. The Postal Service has to deliver the mail, that is why they are in business. Is there any business around that would take payment for a service and then NOT provide that service? Um....No.

Maybe you shouild just shout 'Serenity Now', per Mr. Costanza, and your life will take a turn fo rthe better. Until then, don't let your life be guided by a sitcom.

What would you prefer and why?

would you prefer Instant Messaging and Email, over Face To Face, and Phone Call, and Postal Service or other means of communications and why? What are your opinions about your answers :)



thank you in advanceWhat would you prefer and why?
face to faceWhat would you prefer and why?
In person or physical voice of someone I personally know.



WHY?

Victim of:

Electronic Harassment/Manipulation

Organized Stalking

Psychological Warfare (which includes technology nowadays)

Cyber Warfare



All others can and are manipulated.What would you prefer and why?
Face to face communication is best because body language plays a large roll.
face to face