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General Discussion

Posted by Don Macarthur
Don Macarthur
28,430 Points

Suspicious of new client enquiries

Hi guys,

I've had a couple of email enquiries for my services over the last week which I am suspicious of and was wondering if anyone had any similar experience.

Basically I have had emails from two people both claiming to be hearing impaired and therefore wanting to communicate by email rather than phone, and both asking if I accept credit card payments.

The first one didn't really raise my suspicions but to have a second one follow so closely behind got me wondering, particularly as the enquiry seems to have come from the US and I am in Australia. To the best of my knowledge I don't have any links overseas to my business website so I have no idea how he stumbled upon me.

My business is in it's infancy and I'm not getting a lot of contact just yet, so to have two similar request so close together raised my suspicions.

The second guy claimed he had a budget of $5,000 - 6,000 which would be awesome, but I don't want to get burned.

Anyone have any thoughts on this?

Cheers Don

1 Answer

Jason Anders
MOD
Jason Anders
Treehouse Moderator 145,860 Points
Jason Anders
Jason Anders
Treehouse Moderator 145,860 Points

Hey Don,

I'm a very skeptical person, sometimes to a fault.
You're right, in my opinion, that this seems to either be a very unlikely coincidence or some kind of scam.

It could very well be legitimate, so I would just proceed with caution and your 'feelers' at high alert. Once you get some more information on the clients, Google can come in very handy to see if there are others out there with the same circumstances. I would maybe get the basics of what they are expecting and needing along with contact info (beyond that of email only) and run all that through Google.
The kind of Scam I could see coming from this is, just because of the Credit Card thing and the declaration of a higher than expected budget would be "Bill me for x amount of dollars so I can write it off, and just send me back the difference." only to find out it is a fraudulent card (or the likes of) and your company gets the chargeback and you're out the difference.

I hope it is legit for your business, but just proceed with caution. But, like I mentioned, I am sometimes overly cynical and skeptical.

Best wishes and let us know what comes of it. :)

:dizzy:

Don Macarthur
Don Macarthur
28,430 Points

Hi Jason,

Thanks for the reply. I hadn't thought of the credit card being used in the way you describe but it makes sense.

At this stage I've decided to just let the contact slide. It originally came through titled "Urgently Needed" and it has been three days now since I've replied and I've had no further contact from the sender. Can't have been that urgent, or legit, IMHO.

Thanks again for the input, it's much appreciated. Don :-)