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A Botley Consulting Inc. Alexander Botley "Esteemed Secret Shopper" Scam Middletown, New York
I received an email from alexanderbotley@aol.com offering to make me an "Esteemed Secret Shopper". It indicated I would receive $250 for evaluating money transfer businesses. I had done some focus groups in the past, so I assumed this was legitimate and my name was obtained from a focus group company. I responded that I would do the requested survey and the email response from "Evelyn Pickup" stated I was "appointed as a Private Evaluator/Secret Survey Agent".
2-3 weeks later I received an express mail package from Jocelyn Theisen, 5 Karen Drive, Middletown, NY 10940 containing a bank check for $2,331 and a letter with instructions. The bank check was issued by Space Coast Credit Union. I was told to deposit the check immediately and make 2 separate money transfers the next day via Western Union and Money Gram. The recipients listed are Leroy Davis, 211 Brickell Avenue, Suite 2100, Miami, FL 33131 and Asshay Guyton, 18857 SW 117th Avenue, Miami, FL 33177. Each transfer was to be for $1,000 and I was told to keep the remaining $331.
I was suspicious so I called Space Coast Credit Union to verify the check was legitimate. They told me the check was phony, and they had been seeing a lot of fraudulent checks like this lately. They told me if I had cashed the check my bank would have likely released most of the funds for my use pending clearing of the check. If I had followed the instructions by the time my check realized the check was phony I would have wired $2,000 of my own money! Beware of this scam!
1 Updates & Rebuttals
jt27
Alabama,Information stolen
#2REBUTTAL Individual responds
Sat, August 31, 2013
I am the person named in this report and had nothing to do with the secret shopper scam. I came home from work one evening and found a bunch of packages marked "return to sender" in my mailbox. The sender had used my address as the return address. When I opened the materials, it was evident right away that this was a scam, complete with fake checks made out for large sums of money. I immediately went to the police and filed a report.
According to the police, the senders of these mail scams will frequently access databases (spokeo,etc) and randomly select a name and address to use for their scam. I, unfortunately, was the unlucky one. I asked the police to patrol frequently, and made sure to keep my doors locked, as I obviously feared that someone who fell for the scam and felt cheated out of money might come to my house very angry. Needless to say this was an unpleasant and scary experience for me.