Forum Moderators: buckworks
Right away this was strange to me, because people who want bulk quantities want a discount, and they ask for one up front. Then I saw that the emailer was using hotmail. The list of items included extraneous info about the items, info that I have never seen anyone include in an order before. The individual also had a ridiculous name, one that is a common name but with a bunch of apostrophes and doubled letters to make it look exotic. I do get many customers who fancy up their names - it's a part of the subculture I cater to - but this seemed like something an outsider to the subculture would come up with. I could also tell he was not a native speaker of English, yet the name he chose to massacre would be a common name in English. So needless to say, the alarms were ringing loudly.
I emailed the individual not responding to the request for stock on hand but just asking why would a metawidget company be using hotmail?
I received a rather indignant response asking if metawidget companies were not allowed to use hotmail.
I said it seemed very strange to have a metawidget company and not have either a domain or a paid email address. I received no response.
Then I noticed that the items he asked about were in alphabetical order and included only a small part of the alphabetical listing of my stock. It became clear he had gone to one of the index pages on my site and simply copied a chunk of the items. This explained also the inclusion of extraneous info about the items, which is listed on the index. I also realized that although he said he had a metawidget business, he had asked about ultrawidgets instead.
Anyway, I wanted to let people know about this, because this is the first time I have received one of these scam emails that was so specific and so tailored to my site. I guess they are learning.
Usually a few minutes of re-reading or just a couple of reply emails will always tell the full story. It sounds like he almost had his email down.
-Corey
