So a few weeks back someone tried to scam us.
Erik - our baseball playin', tenor singin', music recordin', choir directin' (and darn good-lookin') director of sales and marketing - signed us up for an advertising service that posts us on a bunch of "Craig's-list-like" online pages (including Craig's list). A few days later, he was contacted about booking GvG to provide a live band for a wedding ceremony and dance reception. The English in the email was broken and the details were very vague. Still, we always want to believe the best in people and we moved forward with booking the date.
The man said his name was George Benson (yea... not the guitar player) and told us his wedding was going to be in Kalamazoo at a location YET to be determined. When we asked him what type of music he wanted for his ceremony, he simply said "music that would be good for my wedding". When we asked what type of music he wanted for his reception, he simply said "music that would be good for my wedding". Yes- perhaps the suspicions should have started here... but again... believe the best in people. So I began to book a very standard ensemble using a book of music we had put together for a wedding earlier that summer.
Mr. Benson then said that he was out of the country and would be until very close to the wedding. He said he wanted to pay us and take care of the money WELL in advance (which of course is fine with us!) However, he did have one strange request... apparently his "cake-baker" was from England (which seemed reasonable for this world-traveler) and he really needed to pay him at the same time as he paid us. He kept insisting that "business is all about trust" and then sent us a cashiers check for well over double the amount we had quoted. At this point we had no contract for services yet, and no music selected... He told us to take out what we needed from this check including a large extra amount and wire the rest to a random address in London. Erik went back and forth with him about our policy for not handling anyone else's money and for not being willing to wire money at all. But again, believing the best of people, trying to please a client, taking "every gig you can", we decided we would try... but only if the check he sent us cleared!
The check cleared... so the next day, Erik sent out a check to the address given for the remainder amount. We had to pay a bit for the overseas certified mailing, but not much. When we told Mr. Benson, he was very polite but said it MUST be wire transfer and that overseas checks take too long to clear and that he didn't want to push the wedding back! We stuck to our guns and told him that the check was gone and that he would get it soon. He still kept insisting we stop payment on the check and wire the money. Well after a few days, the check that had cleared had a "hold" put on it... and sure enough... it was a fake. The scam was to have us wire money to the thief before the bank noticed the fake check! We stopped all payments and our bank took VERY good care of us. By sticking to our guns, we were able to avoid a BIG loss, a fraud investigation, and major embarrassment.
I have noticed lately ALOT of scamming going on. Really well crafted fake emails. Fake IT companies to fix computer errors. Hacking of Facebook and Twitter with spam messages! Has anyone else noticed this sudden spike of sliminess in the online community? Keep your guard up and stick to your guns. Remember... if you won a bunch of money from something you have never heard of before... you probably didn't... don't click on links that take you to free ipads... and always copy a hyperlink into another window and LOOK at it first, before clicking on it and destroying the universe. Practice safe surfing!
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