deKay's Blog

I got a very strange email yesterday:

From: clement boot
Date: 8 March 2010 12:15
Subject: Order

Dear Customer Service

My name is Rev Clement Boot with the Boot’s & Company Inc and i am
sending this email to your business as per regards to the order for
some ((Bar Grating)) . I will want you to send me an email response
back with the types of ((Bar Grating))that you carry as well as their
prices that you carry in stock now so that i can make my selection and
let you know the type that i am looking for so that we can proceed
with the order and i will also like to know the forms of payment that
you accept so that we can proceed with the order.

Best Regards
Rev. Boot

Since, bizarrely, I also happen to run a company that make gratings and fences (not actually true), I thought I’d best email him back post haste!

Hello Dear Mr Rev. Boot,

I am very glad you have the time in contacting our company for the very purpose of enquiring about the products in the type of Bar Grating that we are producers of. We have many Bar Grading products suitable for floors and fencings. We have thicknesses for you from 10MM to 500MM and make curves to a degrees of 90%. Bar Gratings can be made from steel or 17% iron alloy bronze.

Payments can be made by PAYPAL or WESTERN UNION, in advancement of your shipping.

Please supply the specifications of the Bar Grating you wish to buy from us and our sales will invoice you with pricings for our produce.

Best Regards,
Mr. Harry Bloxham
Gratings and Fencings GMBH.

Could be onto a bit of cash here!

Update at 09:30!

Seems I’m not the only person the very Rev Boot has been contacting! This guy was asked to provide details of his kayak products, and this one was asked for 200.000pcs of iron! Clearly Clement is a terrorist.

Our school was billed this week for entering into a “membership” contract with teaching-resources-uk.com. Except, of course, that we didn’t.

Or did we?

It seems that the email they spammed one of our teachers with contained a link which read “Simply click here to access your 14 day free trial of these resources”. So, this teacher clicked it. And so we were billed.

The small print (and it is pretty small print too) says that clicking the link starts a “free 14 day trial”, after which the school is automatically invoiced. To not be invoiced, you have to contact them by email asking to cancel your trial. Not illegal, but this “opt-out” method is decidedly underhand, and very strange for an educational supplier. Not least because most schools have a finance system in place where orders have to be signed in triplicate, goats need to be sacrificed, and stars need to be aligned before any order can even be placed, let alone stuff paid for.

Be warned then, if “Teaching Resources UK”, otherwise known as “PDC Education” and “Gapwork”, contact you. They’re not strictly scamming you, but they’re not exactly clear about what they’re offering you “for free” either.

Some stuff for Google to find relating to this:
PDC Education, Leeds, 0113 266 0880
Mention on the TES forums.
Referenced on CanYouTrustThem.

What I like about this, is that not only do I get an huge cash sum, but I bag myself a gen-you-wine Nigerian woman into the bargain!

See also the amazing nonsense about my file (marked X!) and the released disk (painted RED!).

From:     janejames08@gmail.com
Subject:     Jame J
Date:     5 June 2009 14:20:52 BST
To:     Undisclosed recipients: ;
Reply-To:     janejames01@hotmail.co.uk

I am Miss Jane James.. a computer scientist with central bank of Nigeria.

I am 26 years old, just started work with C.B.N. I came across your file which was marked X and your released disk painted RED, I took time to study it and found out that you have paid VIRTUALLY all fees and certificate but the fund has not been release to you. The most annoying thing is that they cannot tell you the truth that on no account will they ever release the fund to you, instead they let you spend money unnecessarily. I do not intend to work here all the days of my life, I can release this fund to you if you can certify me
of my security, and how I can run away from this Nigeria if I do this, because if I don’t run away from this country after i make the transfer, I will seriously be in trouble and my life will be in danger.

Please this is like a Mafia setting in Nigeria, you may not understand it because you are not a Nigerian. The only thing I will need to release this fund is a special HARD DISK we call it HD120 GIG. I will buy two of it, recopy your information, destroy the previous one, punch the computer to reflect in your bank within 24 banking hours. I will clean up the tracer and destroy your file, after which I will run away from Nigeria to meet with you. If you are interested.

SPECIAL INFORMATION:YOU WILL SEND THE FEE FOR THE HARD DISK FIRST BEFORE I MAKE YOUR TRANSFER.DONT CONTACT ME IF YOU CAN NOT SEND THE HARD DISK FEE FIRST.AS SOON AS I RECEIVE YOUR EMAIL I WILL LET YOU KNOW HOW MUCH THE DISK WILL COST YOU.

Do get in touch with me immediately.

Regards,
Jane James.
Computer Scientist
janejames01@hotmail.co.uk

I got another one of those read-it-or-fall-for-it domain name expiry scam at work emails today. Like the last one, it relies on you panicking when you read it and think your company’s domain name is due to expire – today – and you hurriedly send off your pennies to this company in order to keep your site running.

Of course, that isn’t what’s happening. This company are actually selling you a search engine submission subscription. Something which is pretty useless these days anyway, even if that is what they actually do (I doubt it).

To add to the panic, I received this today (12th May) with the subject “This is your Final Notice of Domain Notification”. Look at the deadline for when my domain registration expires: today.

Helpfully, there’s no company name on the email, although the sender is a dead giveaway something is up – Domain Services <domsrvcs72@hotmail.com>. Then there’s the “unsubscribe” link at the bottom, which uses the email address wdsrv278@operamail.com. The address for the company is given as 47-47 36th Street #16452, Long Island City, NY 11101 in the US. Another giveaway, as the domain is UK registered. Finally, there’s a fax number: 1-646-385-7542.

(click for bigger)

Two almost identical scams in two days! Actual, in one day, as this arrived in my home post yesterday. Bundled in with the latest catalogue for The Book People, was this flyer:

As with yesterday’s scam du jour, I was told I’d won an amazing prize! Of course, in order to claim the prize, I’d have to ring 09061 562911, paying ¬¨¬£9.30 for the phone call. Then, I’d no doubt win “an MP3 Player”, probably of the sort eBuyer sell for a fiver, and then have to pay ¬¨¬£9.95 delivery and insurance. Bargain.

A search for The Prize Registry, PO Box 78, Ross-on-Wye, HR9 9ZU brings up plenty of references, including this from The Motley Fool.

This appeared in my pigeonhole at work today. I’m assuming it was put there because it mentions computers, and therefore is obviously my responsibility. Anyway, as is always the way with these things, it’s a scam.

The company, TLAC Ltd, at Kemp House, 152-160 City Road, London EC1V 2NX (address included for the benefit of Googlers) appears to offer “thankyou prizes and awards”, not unlike Survey UK. As before, I hunted around on the internet, and found this message on The Guardian’s website.

To cut it short, you ring up a premium rate number to claim your “award”, spending more money on the call than the value of the “prize” you actually receive. Note the footnote for the digital camera (the cheapest of the “prizes”), which states “all electrical items require a payment of ¬¨¬£6.50 which includes insurance and delivery”, thus grabbing more of your cash for rubbish.

So it’s not a “prize” or and “award” – it’s a lottery. A rubbish one at that.

Aside from blasting off and nuking them from orbit, is there any way of stopping these people from calling me?¬¨‚Ć I’m set up with the Telephone Preference Service, but I still get people ringing. Usually, no one is on the line when I pick up (or I don’t pick up at all), but they shouldn’t be calling at all.

Today’s offender is 01563 556366, which (according to other posters at WhoCallsMe?) is yet another company pretending to be T-Mobile.

Thankfully, I was busy and didn’t notice my always-on-silent mobile buzzing like a bee. Today’s assailant was 0845 4122700, and once again, here’s the WhoCallsMe? link.

I got yet another call from one of those scamming companies trying to sell me a mobile phone contract. Would you all just leave me alone now? I’ve no interest in taking out a contract with any company who feels the need to ring me at 3am or 11pm. Or any time, in fact.

This post was brought to you by the number 01254 277069, and the letters F and U.

Oh, and here’s the Who Calls Me? page for this number.

Yeah, it’s another one of those numbers again. Got a call in the wee hours this morning, but didn’t answer. From the look of Who Calls Me, it’s another (or possibly the same) scamming company trying to swindle me by selling me a phone contract.

01254277054 – who calls me?