Are you being taken advantage of? Have you signed up for an internet business that almost seemed too good to be true? Did you find out it wasn’t good. In fact, did you actually lose money?
If you have been scammed on the internet don’t beat yourself up too bad. The fact is, thousands of people have lost money to unscrupulous “businesses”. It is not the customer’s fault. These online predators are extremely good at sweet talking people into dumping their hard earned cash down a black hole.
Our Online Christian Business Opportunity blog is for Christians and run by Christians. Everything we do here is based on the teachings of Jesus and is Biblically based. Our mission is to help you make money on-line in a legitimate business and to hold on to the money your already have. If you want a light in the darkness of the internet this is the place to visit. We pledge to help you be successful any way we can.
Today a new scam is being targeted at Christians. Actually it is a new twist on an old scam. Here is how it works. This scam is based on the Mystery Shopper idea.
A mystery shopper is someone who is hired by a business to shop at their store. The idea is the shopper will take note of the shopping experience and then report back to the managers of the store on several aspects of the purchase. Was the store clean, were the clerks friendly and helpful, was it easy to find and buy the item? There are many legitimate opportunities like this for a part time business, but some of them are anything but legitimate. The following news report is an example.
Recently a woman in Oregon answered an opportunity for a Mystery Shopper program on the internet. A few days later she received a letter saying she was chosen for the program and in the envelope was a check for $3600.00. She was instructed to deposit the check in her account and then go to Walmart and use their money wire service to send $3200.00 back to the Mystery Shopper office. The letter made her believe she was testing the customer service of the Walmart employees. The remaining $400.00 was hers to keep as her fee.
A few days later she received a notice from her bank that the original check from the Mystery Shopper service was no good. Since she wrote a check on her account for the money transfer, she was now liable for the $3200.00. This woman does not have $3200.00. In fact, she no longer has money to pay her mortgage and may lose her house. The Mystery Shopper business is located in Canada and thus can’t be brought to justice.
This is a variation on the scam of sending people a check and then having those people send part of that money to someone else. A friend of mine was scammed like this a few years ago. He advertised a trailer for sale on ebay. Two days later a message arrived from a buyer saying he would pay full price for the trailer and would send a check immediately. When the check arrived it was written for $2600.00 more than the cost of the trailer. A note instructed my friend to deposit the check and then send the $2600.00 to a transfer company that would haul the trailer to the buyer.
My buddy sent a $2600.00 check to the hauler and then a few days later found out the original check was no good. By that time his $2600.00 check had been cashed and he was out the money.
Please, never send money to anyone unless you are absolutely sure you know who they are. A big red flag should go up in your mind whenever someone sends you money and then asks you to send part of that money to someone else. This is not how real businesses work. I hope this Scam Alert will help keep you from being taken advantage of.
Our pledge to you at the Online Christian Business Opportunity blog is we will not promote any business that we have not checked out to be legitimate. Visit us often for more tips on making money in a successful online business and on how to keep the money you already have.
Our prayers are with you.
