Tuesday, February 26, 2008

New Scam: Bonanza Form

I've just received a phonecall with the communications as follows: -

Stranger: Hello, is this 01#-### ####?
Me: Yes
Stranger: I'm calling from Migrant Marketing (sounds like that). Did you fill up any form in Giant, Tesco or Carrefour in the past few months?
Me: Not that I can remember. Maybe or maybe not, because it's usually in a rush to leave, so maybe I did.
Stranger: Ok, because I received your form here. Your form was chosen to win two prizes, one is a 5 days stay in any hotel within Asia, and a RM350 shopping voucher for oen hypermart in Malaysia. Don't worry, this is not a sales or tele-marketing. We won't ask anything from you, only that you come over to get your voucher and stay for a 45 minutes talk.

Now, I'm familiar with this approach. They will try and convince you to purchase some kind of tourism package, or whatever package during that 45 minutes talk. Some talks are filled with thugs, some are not, but in this situation, you have all the power to request the talk to be held at cafes. Why? If they say that they need to use projector, say that you can just view with them at their laptops because all insurance and unit trust agents nowadays are already doing that. So why not these packages?! Also, right before you say "Ok", you must ask "The talk is only for me alone anytime?", if they say "Yes", later they cannot say "Oh, you must sit in a meeting room because others are joining you." Back to conversation.

Me: This talk, what are the times to attend?
Stranger: You can come anytime and straight away just sit for the 45 minutes talk and then collect your voucher.
Me: Okay, maybe I'll come during the weekend.
Stranger: That's good, ok, we just need a few information from you.

This is the place where the spider sense tingle. Earlier ones I don't mind so much coz I have friends who went for the 45 talk and walk out with voucher, albeit being scolded and pissed by the 'company'.

Me: What kind of information do you need that's not on the form you received?
Stranger: Like your full name?
Me: What name did I put on the form?
Stranger: It's not clear, so we need your full name.
Me: So, the only thing that's clear on the form is my phonenumber?
Stranger: Yes.
Me: Ok, please fax the form back to me and I'll write it clearly and fax back to you.
Stranger: It's ok, we can just take it via phone.

I knew then that this company simply call any phonenumber to start the scam, therefore I can easily lie about who I am. They don't even know my name!

Me: I'm a lawyer, so this involves some legality issues. I need the fax.
Stranger: The fax machine is in another department.
Me: That's ok. I'll wait.
Stranger: Ok, we'll fax back to you later in the day. I'll call you back after we fax. Thank you.
Me: How can you know my fax number when only my handphone can be seen clearly?
Stranger: *Hung Up*

Beware of random dialed calls. I think the next time, ask them your name and your address if they claim that you won something.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

haha this is funny!