New Scam?

[jomaxx]

I got a letter this week headed "i will like to donate to further your works". The person wanted to send me a donation and only needed my address and the name to make the cheque out to. (BTW that's not completely ridiculous; I do get unsolicited donations once in a great while.) The email was vague but was addressed to me from a real email address. Anyway that information is available, or else fairly guessable, from WHOIS data anyway, so I sent it on to him.

Today came his reply with the kicker: "as soon as you get the money order cleared,i will want you to deduct $300 and wire the balance of the money order via western union money transfer to my agent". I can only assume that the cheque will be either invalid or drawn on some third party's account without their knowledge.

Is this a well-known scam? I haven't encountered it before.

[Frequent]

Very well known scam. Do not participate in any way. You should likely turn the info you have over to the authorities ASAP.

[belladonna]

Sounds like a variation on the Nigerian Scam [snopes.com].

Run away! Run away!

[Macro]

Yup. it's a common con :)

[Corey Bryant]

If it is a true money order and not forged, then the money is yours. But still sounds like 419

-Corey

[Rugles]

I bet the money order is a forgery.

[monkeythumpa]

I am curious, if you cash a bad money order, does it cost you anything? What would happen if you were to do as he says and not wire the $300 to his agent, just go home? What is your bank going to do?

[Frequent]

I'm sure if you cashed it the bank would be beating down your door to get it's money back in a few weeks. Not sure if charges would be levied...

Although, around my area I don't know if they would even cash it. The last time I was at the bank they had a sign up notifying customers not to try to cash or deposite moneyorders originating from questionable sources. They also had a brief description of the scam in question.

Freq---

[bird]

There's no such thing as a "new scam"... ;)