General Warning Regarding Frauds & Scams
This is a general warning to anyone who posts a listing on the internet, that occasionally you may be targeted by someone wishing to perpetrate a fraud or scam.
The following is an example of a typical fraudulent e-mail. (See below for some anti-hoax sites) Good day -----, and thanks for the mail. Sorry for the short delay in replying to your message. am o.k with the price of the [harp name] harp.There have also been occurences of people trying to scam music teachers. The scammers can get quite detailed in their correspondence (often coming across as much more well-spoken than the example above), while remaining vague about certain key things, which is partly how they manage to string along otherwise savvy and intelligent people. The following is a story that is partly that of a cello teacher (from a post, "Public Service Announcement: Be Wary of Internet Scams" posted on http://www.clickforlessons.com/), and partly about a simliar incident that happened to me (thankfully I became wise to what was going on fairly early in the game, before any actual cheques arrived.) "My name apparently was on a website for music students and I received a message from a young man (he says) [ed. note: in my case a woman who passed herself off as a well-to-do aunt] who was interested in music lessons. He said that he was originally from Texas [in my case, somewhere in the UK] and inquired about fees for lessons [in my case, for her niece who was going to be visiting Ontario]. After advising him about the fees, he agreed to them and then said he wanted to pay for them in advance. I objected, saying that it was dangerous for him to send money to strangers over the internet and also that there was no need to do so; he could pay for each lesson individually. In our correspondence I repeatedly asked for a phone number or an address, and where he would be coming from for lessons. All these questions were evaded. That should have tipped me off, but unfortunately I still have some faith in humankind. [ed. note: in my case, she actually went so far as to schedule the times and days for lessons for a one-month period!] I finally agreed to take a lump payment in advance and sent him my address and phone number. Yesterday, I received 3 postal money orders for a total of $2850 with some weak comments about needing extra money for food and incidentals! This was followed by an email saying that I should immediately wire this money, minus $500 for the 10 lessons he was going to take, to his father in Africa. [In my case, it was the difference between $450 and $4,000 Cdn]. By this time I finally figured out that I had a money-laundering scheme on my hands. I've also been getting phone calls from this guy every few minutes, until I told him that if I heard from him again, I would contact the police and the FBI. Here's the sequel. I brought the checks to the post office and they turned out to be frauds. If I had cashed them I would have been out $2,850." [Further editor's note: if you do in fact actually receive any cheques or money orders, for anything you are suspicious about or for a greater amount than you agreed upon, the best thing to do is to immediately take it to the authorities and get them to check on the validity of the cheques. If it's for a greater amount than agreed upon, this is one of the signs that it's most likely a scam and that the cheques are likely bogus.] For further information on frauds and scams, you can visit the following websites:
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