Surprise! I am not blogging about Aromatherapy tonight! However this can help you big time and that is what my business is all about. It’s about helping people through all of life’s major hurdles.
Having an online business comes with many hurdles just like a brick and mortar business. However online you are open to the entire world 24/7. People can access you whenever they want. They can see your items whenever they want. Your doors are always open. They are open to anyone and everyone. You can’t boot anyone out for being drunk, disorderly or trying to steal. And yes people look at our stores drunk, naked, what have you all of the time. We just don’t know. They also try to steal from us. Crazy huh? Only online they can try to steal from us with stolen credit cards. We can’t see them. How do we know if it’s really them? When your doors are open to the entire world 24/7 you must rely on your instinct. Watch out for red flags and do what you feel is right. It is fine to turn down a sale! You might be turning down a major headache for yourself and your business.
Why am I blogging about fraud? This morning I woke up to a potentially large sale, that was ultimately a scam that appears to be quite prevalent and it ate up my day. I had hoped it would be real, but I was leary through the entire process and did some serious research in between emails with this person. I am sharing the emails and situation in detail so that if you get anything similar you will recognize it right away.
Here is the email I received from the contact me page on my website:
send page: Contact
from name: Jerry Spin
from email: jerry_spin@hotmail.com
phone:
comments: Hello
Do you ship to Czech Republic and accept Master,Visa and Discovery cards as method of payment.
Warmest Regards
Jerry
Entertaining this I replied that I do take credit cards and as long as everything was paid for I didn’t see why I couldn’t send out of the country. The next email I got was the red flag that this could be iffy. I always check things out. I seem to attract these kinds of things. Unfortunately I have quite a few of similar tales. The next email read:
Hello Sales,
Thanks for the response. Below are the items list needed
Calm, Cool & Collected Inhaler .... 60 Qtys
Calm, Cool & Collected Roll-On .... 60 Qtys
Don't Dessert Me Inhaler .... 60 Qtys
Bye Bye Stinky Fingers Inhaler .... 60 Qtys
Shipping Address:
Company Name: Lights Contractors Inc
Adddress: 852/82 Milady Horakove, Prague 17000
Czech Republic
Concerning the shipment, the likes of UPS, DHL and others always don't take care of the charges down here. Charges like handling, customs and duties etc. We have experienced such situation before and we don't want to experience such a thing again. We will be glad if you contact this shipper Air Shell Freight for the shipping quote. Here is there email address( AIR.SHELL@AOL.COM ), Note that we can't deal with the shipper but they always deal with the company where they will be doing the pick up in other to reduce the customs duties and other charges down here in Czech Republic. By indicating in the paper works that the payment was received by the shipper from the point of purchase, it will reduce the charges and if we(owner of the goods) wanted to pay for the custom duties and other charges, at times it is more than the whole package amount. We do trust ASF and if we didn't wouldn't have ask you to contact them in the first place. They are very reliable and fast. They will take care of everything including handling, customs and duties,Tax, insurance etc. . Always send us the copy of email you send to them.
COST OF THE ORDER
COST OF THE SHIPPING VIA AIR SHELL LOGISTIC
TOTAL COST (ORDER + SHIPPING)
Once i have these details, i will get back to you with my credit card details immediately. so you can charge and make the necessary shipping arrangements.
Regards
Jerry
Ummm, why would Lighting Contractors be interested in Aromatherapy products? Why so much information about the shipping? I sent an email telling them that there’s no way to get shipping costs until an order is filled and can be weighed and measured. I would require a 50% deposit to even start on this. I would not use PayPal and they needed to call me with a credit card or send the information via email. They actually called! So hey maybe it is legit? An inkling of hope? NOPE! In the meantime someone had found the exact names on a blog talking about fraud. DO NOT charge that card my helper said. I hadn’t charged it. The baby was screaming and so I had written down the information that I would need if I was to charge it. When I talked to them I told them that I had to call my Credit Card company before I processed the card. Their voice sounded a little nervous. I waited and then sent them an email that it didn’t seem right and that I would not be charging the card they gave me. I am declining their order and something about protecting my business and family against fraud. =) I didn’t hear anything back. Yeah!
This was still bothering me hours later. I just can’t let people get away with such a thing and I know I can’t stop them, but I figured I might as well try to do something. They told me it was a Mastercard. So I Googled Mastercard and called the phone number, punched in the credit card number they gave me, it gave me the phone number to the credit union that issued the card. Wow! Fancy. I called there and talked to someone explaining the situation that they may have issued a card to someone who is doing very bad things with it or it’s been stolen from one of their clients. It took about 35 minutes to make the call. They went back and forth with the fraud department who just this afternoon had discovered odd activity on the card and was grateful I called. They were contacting the client immediately and shutting down the card. So in the end I didn’t stop the thieves. Well from making this $2500 transaction on someone’s card, but I like to think I helped a stranger today. I hope this blog helps too.
IF I charged it and filled the order what would have happened? They would have tried to get money from me when it came time for shipping. Also, I would have put a lot of time, effort and money into filling a large order that I would have potentially either been stuck with or would have gone off to who knows where. I am very glad that my gut, my sleuthing, my helper sleuth and I were savvy enough to not get that far!
I am going to make it clear on my website and the contact page that we do NOT ship out of the country. Just don’t even ask! Please! If you get such an email you probably want to just junk it. Unless you enjoy such a thing and want to try to get the credit card information and spend the time with the credit card company. It’s up to you. I can’t say it was an enjoyable day.
Watch out for Jerry Spin, Mike Spin, Air Shell, Air Shell Logistics. Any company that uses yahoo, gmail or hotmail instead of @theirbusinessname. Especially a shipping company. Oh here’s what you get when you email the shipping company. I had to see!
Dear Client,
Thank you for contacting Air Shell Freight for your service.We do deliver to most business outlet in Czech Republic And rest of the countries, so getting your shipment to your client won't be a problem.
We will like you to do all the packing and weight the boxes and get back to us with the total weight of all boxes and also the full address of were the goods will be picked up with the value of the goods ordered. and the delivery address in Czech Republic. Our local agent will arrived at your location once the items are ready for picked up Please let me know how we can be of more service to your company. Thank you and looking forward to hear back from you
Sincerely Yours
Gibson Lee
Air Shell
15 Homestead Lane,
London,
Greater London,
Post Code : N6 4RU
Tel: +447024036739
Yes it is formatted like that! I could point out so many little details, but I won’t! Now you know what to look for.
By the way, don’t be afraid to check out who you are sending or selling to. We really don’t know who is behind the screen. You can easily google an address and see if it matches up with a business you may be sending to. You can always call the credit card company to verify that they are who they say they are if they are wanting to pay over the phone. Perhaps they want to pay over the phone to avoid having the IP address captured. Trust your gut and sleuth if you need to. It’s best to protect yourself.
I also got hornswaggled on Ebay a few months ago. I won’t go into those details. Just don’t buy software from Ebay. I ended up waiting three weeks for a counterfeit disc to arrive from China when it was supposed to be coming from Chicago or somewhere in the US. Yup.
Soooo… wasn’t that fun? How about an aromatherapy recipe????
I made this amazing body scrub and I absolutely LOVE It! It feels amazing, it’s smooth on the skin, easy to make and all natural. I won’t be selling it as I am not real sure how long it will stay good. I have had it for several weeks and so far so good.
In a Blender add:
½ cup Oatmeal
½ cup Coffee Beans
BLEND
Add
2 tablespoons Jojoba Oil
A Few droppers of Vitamin E Oil
2 oz. Nature’s Sunshine Concentrate ( You can use any liquid soap of your choice)
I added water, but not much. It’s lumpy bumpy!
You can add it in the blender or mix it in a bowl. It takes a wide mouth funnel to get it in to a bottle. I used an old aloe bottle that still had a little aloe in it. It won’t squeeze through the pop up top. It makes a royal mess, smells fab if you like the smell of coffee and polishes your skin amazing! You can play with it to get it the consistency you like. ENJOY!
Love and Light!
