Swa Group
Sausalito,#2UPDATE Employee
Mon, August 03, 2009
SWA Group is a 50-year old international landscape architecture and urban design firm. We have nothing at all to do with the content of this report, nothing to do with consumer research, and indeed are a victim of the illegal action outlined in the report. The address that is on this report is the authentic address for one of our US offices, however everything else mentioned in the report relates to someone who has used our company name in a scam operation. The scam is apparently based out of Canada and has involved sending out bogus checks in our company's name. The scam artist is asking recipients of these checks to deposit them and quickly send a portion of them to others via Western Union. While the checks are being "cleared," the recipient's own checking account funds are being used for the Western Union transactions. Once this money is wired by Western Union it cannot be retrieved. This has been reported to the Sausalito police department in Sausalito, California (case #09-939). Anyone with information regarding this scam should contact the department at 415-289-4175. SWA Group www.swagroup.com
Mrs. Pdizzle
Sterling,#3Consumer Comment
Sat, July 25, 2009
I too received this letter. The only difference was that I was not asked to contact two coordinators, and the dollar amount was slightly different, and my check was for a lesser amount of $3,785.00. The format of this scam is very impressive. It is very believable down to the Market Report Form that is for your results from "secret shopping". I found a public safety log online while searching for the legitimacy of this letter: Public Safety Log (June 30) ... Fraud An Albany man was the victim of a scam when he cashed a check he received in the mail in the amount of $3,948.03 from a group claiming to pay people to be secret shoppers. The company, believed by police to be a front for scamming, is listed in the letter as The SWA Group of Sausalito, Calif. The man told police he used the money to pay for a vacation he recently took. He told police the bank notified him the check was fake on Wednesday and it wanted its money back. Police advised him he would need to work out the matter with the bank. http://www.democratherald.com/articles/2009/07/05/news/local/6loc02_safetylog063009.txt Hope this information is helpful!