Fidelity Trust Inc., David Morgan, Helen Anderson Facing foreclosure, received notice I had won $150,000 in a lottery which Fidelity entered me in. London, United Kingdom
The too good to be true letter from Fidelity Trust Inc. was received one week after my impending home foreclosure was made public. The drawing was held in Australia according to the letter and also according to the letter every year they enter 50,000 names from different sweepstakes and lottery databases worldwide. It stated that I 'won' on November 18, 2008 and that I did not respond to a letter that was sent to me on December 22, 2008. My prize winnings will be released to me as soon as my clearance fee is deducted and paid.
It further states that my clearance fee is provided for me and is a calculated amount based on the size of my winnings. I did not receive any check/cheque in the letter as others have. The letter did advise me to keep my winning confidential until my clain has been fully processed and my money received. This is purely security protocol to avoid double claims and unwarranted abuse of this program by some nominees. The letter states that the payment office is located in Buffalo, NY but I am supposed to contact David Morgan or Helen Anderson in London, UK. Thank God my parents didn't raise me to be a fool!
Pattie
Huber Heights, Ohio
U.S.A.
1 Updates & Rebuttals
Dw0905
Piqua,Ohio,
U.S.A.
Fidelity Trust INC.
#2Consumer Comment
Tue, August 11, 2009
My mother received the same letter that you mentioned and wanted me to find out if it was a hoax. It said that she had won a monetary prize of $150,000 on November 18, 2008 and still hadn't claimed her prize and has 3 weeks to claim it from a prize office in Buffalo, NY of a company in the UK that has Australian Lottery drawings.
My own personal read through of this letter had me 90% sure this whole letter and corporation was a complete hoax. Just looking at the format of the letter you can tell it's a horrible attempt at a business memo, i.e. the different fonts, shadings, margins, the poor choice of words that seemed to be trying to answer questions someone would ask if they thought it was fake, and the signature of 'David Morgan' couldn't be any faker because not even doctors sign so you cannot at least make out the first letters of their names(it looks like an A for the first name, E middle name, and B last name). In other words the letter does not look professional at all and any Business Major, like myself, that has gone through the courses knows what a business letter/memo should look like.
Sorry for the ranting about this horrible attempt for a scam but I wanted to make sure good people like my mother do not get taken advantage of by unethical crooks.
I do have more on the issue.
After finding my own flaws with the letter and pretty much knowing it was a too good to be true scam I went online and found many postings with reference to the address in London, the name of the trust, and the international phone number. I linked the address in London to incorporate more than just one name for the Trust Corporation, e.g. Access Trust INC., Standard Trust INC., Guaranteed Trust Security INC.,... Also, when you can start to type an address into 'Google' like this one[35 Brookham House, Blackhorse Road, East Ham, London E13 2LB UK] and it completes it for you that's a tip-off that it's fake or very popular because it's been researched that many times that the search engine recognizes it. Also, I found many laws, by reading posts, that pertain to the reason why there are so many shell corporations set up for this scheme because it is otherwise illegal when set up in one country. Which makes the letter sound even more alarming when reading it because of all the loopholes created by setting up an Australian Lottery Drawing funded by a London, UK Trust Corp. which has American winners paid by a North American payment office in Buffalo, NY.
All the information I have found by researching brings me to believe it is some group or an individual with an education in international and domestic laws governing these types of acts and is trying with this well thought-out scheme to steal people's identities. With everything they have set up I imagine it would be hard to track a paper or digital trail to prosecute someone.
So I hope with the information I have compiled, this response can be used as a warning and to ultimately put an end to this illegal scheme in the Dayton, OH area and hopefully the U.S.
*Though I have not and will not make contact with this so called Fidelity Trust organization I did read a post online that someone did make contact and receive a check for substantially less money than promised, but when they tried to cash the certified check the teller said it was a real check and wasn't deemed counterfeit till the bank tried to contact the international bank to clear the funds and found out the account did not exist, thus putting a red 'counterfeit' stamp on the check.