a Scam i haven't seen before

[Tac]

so i get this phone call at the shop today. they say they're a relay center. i've dealt with this kind of call before....they relay calls for speech, or hearing impaired people. they let the people type, then read what was typed. so far, pretty normal.

 they tell me the guys name(first only, and i can't remember it), and that he was recommended to me by a customer. he wants the brakes fixed on his escalade if i do brake work, and can i handle this. still cool so far. i say that i can do brakes on anything. here's where it goes to poop.
 he says that he's just relocated to here, and is going in for surgery in 3 days. he wants to have the escalade towed to my shop from north carolina. suspicious. he now says that he'll give me a credit card number over the phone, and wants me to run it for $3k, $1k of which i will keep to pay for the tow(because the towing company doesn't take credit cards....bs), and deposit the balance in his account, so he has money for the surgery.
 since he's popped about a dozen red flags now, i ask who recommended him to me. he says "dave". ok....got a couple customers named dave. so i ask, dave who? silence. then the operator tells me that he disconnected.
 i told her, "you know that was a scam, right?" she goes "really?". i said yes, it was a modified version of one of those nigerian lottery scams, and that she may want to pass this on to the other operators in the company, and her supervisor.

 it's getting pretty effed up, when i think i'm getting a good job in, and then find out it's a scam....and a poor one at that. wish i had a way to track his bellybutton down.....i'd turn him in..............

The relay system uses very specialized equipment that must be registred with a central database. Its like a modem for all purposes except its very easy to trace.

You couldve asked to speak to the relay person's supervisor and reported it as a scam. That will make them disable that device from their system and investigate/report to authorities.

[CAP1]

The relay system uses very specialized equipment that must be registred with a central database. Its like a modem for all purposes except its very easy to trace.

You couldve asked to speak to the relay person's supervisor and reported it as a scam. That will make them disable that device from their system and investigate/report to authorities.

 i hadn't realized that. i'll call the company back today, and give them the info with an approximate time, to see if they can still do something......

[Penguin]

but as someone up the page mentioned.....if those making the calls only manage a 3% success rate, that will still net them massive amounts of money.


 me personally.....i don't do anything with credit cards anymore. i don't have any. if i can't hand you cash, or a check, then i can't afford to buy whatever it is.

Wait, so what if you want to buy something online, like a book?

-Penguin

[Shuffler]

Insert P. T. Barnum quote here.....

[guncrasher]

I buy everything with credit cards.  any problems I don't have to pay.  cash is gone, same for checks.  in places where I don't trust to use my debit like gas /restaurants then it's cc only.

what you guys don't understand is that for any fraud/w wrong charges on cc all it takes is one call and they get reversed.  cash our check good luck getting your money back.

semp

[CAP1]

I buy everything with credit cards.  any problems I don't have to pay.  cash is gone, same for checks.  in places where I don't trust to use my debit like gas /restaurants then it's cc only.

what you guys don't understand is that for any fraud/w wrong charges on cc all it takes is one call and they get reversed.  cash our check good luck getting your money back.

semp

 i do understand that. i've never had a problem with paying by cash or check. in stores, i see lines held up though, due to people having to punch in pin numbers, or having a card declined.......in the time it takes them to handle one of those, 3 or 4 cash customers can go through.
 they also charge the merchant a percentage, and a service fee for being allowed to accept your card, along with the interest you pay for carrying the balance.

 for some people, cards are ok.........but all in all, i think they suck.

[dedalos]

i hadn't realized that. i'll call the company back today, and give them the info with an approximate time, to see if they can still do something......

Psssst!  It was not a real relay system foo 

[CAP1]

Psssst!  It was not a real relay system foo 

 it was.....i called them back and they explained to me what they do......or possibly that was part of the scam.......hhmm.........

[Shane]

i hadn't realized that. i'll call the company back today, and give them the info with an approximate time, to see if they can still do something......

it's not quite that easy and it depends on what nbr showed to you, the relay nbr or the actual ph nbr being used - it's very possible the person was only pretending to be a relay service and actually using their own phone.

also, an actual relay operator only relays what's being said, without judgement or prejudice, so calling the "relay company" won't do much good.