I've got a weird feeling about this ...

Earlier this week I put ads for the kittens on Petfinder. This morning I had this email in my inbox, followed by a bad—very bad—poem that was supposedly by the author of the email. I think that whatever this person's intentions are, they are not good. What do you guys think?

""*** I want to adopt your pet as part of my family***
Hello Friend.
Å¡Å¡Å¡ I'm very much interested in adopting your pet to my
humble home. I'm us citizen. I live at delray beach FL,Å¡ but
presently in ontario canada to accept a job offer with the
american christain missionary as a clerk. I'm happily
married with a kid. I want to re-home your pet as part of my
family. I lost my most adorable pet some couple of days ago
on the way to the Vet clinic, the tragedy was so painful for
me to bear as a pet lover, so i need yours in replace to
minimise the lost. I assure you a 100% loving forever home
for your pet and i want youš to consider the pet sold to a
pet lover. Pls, briefly tell me these: adoption fees,mode of
feeding, present health condition, breed. I have a
recommendable pet transpoter that will come for the pick-up
right from your home. I'll have to act fast about the
payment, so forward your name, address and your phone number
for onward payment.
Å¡Å¡Å¡ I'll send a check or "MO" which'll cover the adoption
fees + $50 as reward offer for the up bringing of the pet +
the shipping fees."

Scam.

Yeah i don't like the sound of it either?!.

She doesn't need to have a poor kitten shipped, surely they have them where she is?!. She wants your address and phone number as well, pffft right!.

Sounds like a scam to me. I would report this to Petfinder.

There is a type of scam that has been going on for years. People read ads online for items for sale. They offer to buy, and send a money order. The money arrives, and is often the wrong amount. The person supposedly making the purchase says to cash it anyway, and give the extra money back to the person who will be picking up the purchase. And because of some personal tragedy, this has to be done in a hurry.

Once the item and the extra cash have been handed over, and the person long gone, the person with the item for sale finds out that the money order or cheque is forged.

The wording, the need for urgency, the personal tragedy, the offer to have someone pick up for them, and the extra money offered, the fact that the person is supposedly out of the country, with some job that seems beyond suspicion. all raise red flags to me.

The other thing that makes us suspicious is that these letters are often written in a way that makes it clear that English is not their first language, but they have a very very Anglo name. And the address is a webmail account.

Oh, and the extra money offered is often scaled relative to the original purchase price. So, in your case, $50. People selling cars on the internet have been scammed for several thousand dollars. In my business, we had one crook offer to buy about $30,000 worth of items, and the "certified cheque" he sent was for $70,000. In that case, he wanted us to cash the cheque anyway, and send him the difference, and could we please do that in a hurry because his boss was out of the country, and he didn't want the boss to find out his error. Sure. Too bad the bank that the cheque was drawn on didn't exist.

it sounded like a poor soul the first few lines but towards the end it sounds bad.. plus whats with all those S's

Trust your gut feeling on this one. It sounds a little strange to me too. I would ignore it (definitely report it).

I worry about it becasue it doesn't even list the type of pet "cat" or "dog" or go into detail about the pet that is lost. It looks like a form letter to me.

I would also say trust your instincts about that one...something just doesn't seem right.

I think you're right to be suspicious about this. Go with your instincts.

The wording, the need for urgency, the personal tragedy, the offer to have someone pick up for them, and the extra money offered, the fact that the person is supposedly out of the country, with some job that seems beyond suspicion. all raise red flags to me.

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Go with your gut feelings!

Its so sad that there are people out there like this, go with your instincts-definately!!

Don't even answer it. My guess would be that this is a variation of the "Nigerian" scam and others which any time you put something for sale (or in this case, adoption) up on the 'net you'll get a few of these. We got two or three of these things from various sources when we had a motorcycle on eBay. If you don't sell things over the 'net much (or at all) you wouldn't be familiar with it. It's all too familiar to some of the rest of us .

Originally Posted by Sammie5

Sounds like a scam to me. I would report this to Petfinder.

There is a type of scam that has been going on for years. People read ads online for items for sale. They offer to buy, and send a money order. The money arrives, and is often the wrong amount. The person supposedly making the purchase says to cash it anyway, and give the extra money back to the person who will be picking up the purchase. And because of some personal tragedy, this has to be done in a hurry.

Once the item and the extra cash have been handed over, and the person long gone, the person with the item for sale finds out that the money order or cheque is forged.

Click to expand...

Okay, THIS makes sense. I was thinking that if they wanted cats for nefarious purposes that they could generally get them for free, so even though there are lots of red flags in that email, I was confused because I couldn't think how they'd benefit from it.

I don't think reporting it to Petfinder will do any good, though, because those ads are viewable by anyone. I will, however, report them to their ISP. I LOVE getting scammers in trouble.

This is a scam I have read reports on this before and this is always how they try to get you to cash money orders for them over the amount you requested. ignore it and report it.

The reason I thought of reporting it to Petfinder is that these people are obviously trolling the Petfinder ads for easy victims. So, if Petfinder has other reports, they may put a warning on their front page.

This sort of thing goes around for horses a lot. You get stuck with the expenses from the fake check, and nobody ever comes to get the horse. I had a dog up for adoption, and had all sorts of emails like "How much do you want for the dog?" or "What's your lowest price for the dog?" Or worse yet, they used "it" in place of dog! And this one guy from Canada wanted her. But siad nothing about why he wanted THIS particular dog. I mean, there's dogs looking for homes in Canada, right?? All of the emails I recieved, except one, were bogus. And the one that wasn't ended up not wanting to take her. LOL, a year later I still have the dog!

Amber

Yeah this isnt the first time, someone has come on here distressed about this exact email.....

word for word.....its a total scam......report this to petfinder

we've had lots of these. total scams.

Originally Posted by George'smom

Trust your gut feeling on this one. It sounds a little strange to me too. I would ignore it (definitely report it).

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I totally agree. And what about the poor cat that gets stuck in the middle? Doesn't sound safe for anyone.

That sounds just like this email my stepdad got when trying to sell his truck online. The guy offered to send a money order-"but could he please send the truck as soon as possible- will pay for shipping!" My stepdad refused to send the truck until the check cleared. The check was a fake and the guy was caught. He had done this to several other people and managed to get away with it. Just ignore the email.