Mystery Shopping Scam-beware!

[Insane]

UGG.... How horrible...

http://www.ottawacitizen.com/technol...970/story.html

OTTAWA — Single mom Louise Capello was only looking to make a little extra money for Christmas gifts.
Instead, the Kanata woman has a lingering $3,975 headache over a “mystery shopping” job she applied for on the Internet. As it turned out, it wasn’t a job but a scam, robbing Capello of the money.
As a result, she is now that deep in debt with the Royal Bank of Canada, which was telling her this week that it wanted the total amount back by Friday.
Capello deposited a $3,975 cheque sent to her by the crooks in November, and then discovered it was counterfeit — but only after she used her bank overdraft on bogus job assignments.
Capello feels RBC owes her some kind of break. She says she had reservations about the cheque and called an RBC 1-800 number before she made any transactions. She says she was told it had cleared. She says RBC later told her too bad, that any misinformation passed on to her by an employee didn’t make the bank responsible in anyway for a bad cheque.
Though the Better Business Bureau says there are many legitimate mystery shopping operations, there are also numerous swindlers who trick job seekers with bogus websites. Within days of making initial contact, the sting is complete, and victims have no way of tracking down the anonymous perpetrators. Police say it is usually a waste of resources to try to find the scammers. They often operate in other jurisdictions, sometimes in the U.S. or overseas, and provide their victims with fake addresses and numbers for cellphones they eventually ditch.
Capello reported the fraud to Ottawa police in early December. They say her case is still “in the queue.” A fraud investigator for Metro Toronto police says for the most part, his force doesn’t bother with such complaints unless it is clear the crooks are operating in the city.
Mystery shopping is an evaluation tool used by many legitimate consumer companies. The “mystery shopper” receives a fee for posing as a customer who is really in the store to secretly collect information on various aspects of an operation, including products, customer service and cleanliness. The mystery shopper provides a report of the findings.
Capello, who works full-time for a Kanata dry cleaner, says she went on the Internet last fall to look for a moonlighting job. She found a website offering mystery shopping employment. She applied.
In a Nov. 5 letter from TSCC 2095 West Harbour City 1, which provided a Toronto address, Capello was told that following “a thorough review” of her resumé and references, she was “selected to participate in a paid Consumer Research Program” near her home.
Included was a cheque for $3,975, of which $450 was pay for her “training exercise” jobs. If the company liked her work, she could stay on and be earning $550 a week in three months.
Her assignments included “shopping” at any one store that was on a list. After that, she was to make money transfers at Western Union, Money Mart and MoneyGram. The real purpose of making the money transfers, she was told, was to check whether employees were asking for specific identification, as required by law. She was also told to watch out for “unprofessional interrogations” by employees, as there had been complaints.

She was told to call a number with a 519 area code in order to have the $3,975 cheque activated before depositing it in her account. Capello says when she called, she spoke to a woman who identified herself as co-ordinator Sarah James. James sounded very professional, says Capello.
But Capello was uneasy about the $3,975 cheque. Even though it looked authentic and appeared to be on a Scotiabank account, Capello decided to call RBC to see if the cheque had cleared. She says when she was told the money was in her account, she went to work.
After completing her assignment at a Best Buy, where she bought a $200 Nintendo game player, she went on to her next job. On Nov. 26, she transferred $1,350, through MoneyGram, to John Mebeki in Aberdeen, N.J., $900, through Western Union, to Tishia Collins in Buffalo, and $900, through Money Mart, to James R. Bennett in Brooklyn. Service fees for the three transfers came to about $180.
The next day, she wrote reports and faxed them and the receipts to a number with a 514 area code. Soon after, James called to see if she had completed her assignments. James was calling from a 514 area-code number, not 519, and on a phone registered to Charlene Powers.
Capello found out from her bank on Nov. 30 that she had been swindled. Her account was frozen because the $3,975 cheque was a fake. She was told a letter would be sent to her with instructions about what to do next.
In early January, a stern letter from RBC advised that she had 15 days to make payment arrangements.
When she called the other day, she was told the bank wanted all the money by Friday or a collection agency would be sent after her. Capello says she argued the bank should be responsible for at least some of the amount as an employee had given her wrong information. As well, she says she asked that she be allowed to repay the debt in instalments. The bank refused, she says.
RBC wouldn’t comment, but a media contact said he would speak to Capello and put her in touch with customer service to arrange a payment plan.

[jennypooh123]

I got a cheque for $3,000 two weeks ago in the mail. And I dont even remember giving out my address at all...I wouldnt usually do that. It was a legit cheque. I was to cash it and send $2000 of it back to some person.

It was a very obvious scam. Its still on my counter that will be going into the police when I get a chance.

Thanks for posting this though

[Darth Penguin]

If it sounds too good to be true..it's probably a scam

Her assignments included “shopping” at any one store that was on a list. After that, she was to make money transfers at Western Union, Money Mart and MoneyGram. The real purpose of making the money transfers, she was told, was to check whether employees were asking for specific identification, as required by law. She was also told to watch out for “unprofessional interrogations” by employees, as there had been complaints.

AKA money laundering. Lots of scammers use WU, MM and MG to transfer dirty cash into clean money.

[ellis123]

Every legitimate mystery shopping company will tell you that they will never send you money/cheques for shopping purposes. The purpose of mystery shopping is to shop as you normally do and make observations. This is an old scam for the truly unaware who have no knowledge of mystery shopping. I always say go on the site where all mystery shoppers share news and updates about companies to see if the company you are dealing with is legitimate. You will find out which companies pay on time and which ones are tardy making payments. Find a current listing of companies through volition.com or go to the Mystery Shopping Providers Association (MSPCA) to get legitimate information before you start taking jobs. Beware- if it is too good to be true, it is not true.

[Insane]

Definately-too good to be true, then it is.

I also think it's sad that she checked with her bank to make sure it had cleared first. At least she had some forsight. Too bad it didn't prevent this.