# Cheque for £1000 received in post



## jewley99 (4 Feb 2010)

Yesterday I received a cheque in the post written to me fpr £1000.
No cover letter, cheque is from Headstart (GB) trading as Hatpoint. So I googled them and found absolutely nothing.

I didn't enter any competitions.
Anyone shed any light on this.

I presume its a scam


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## pjmn (4 Feb 2010)

Be careful...

Not accusing those people of anything (because I know nothing about them) - but a scam I have heard of is - innocent party (you) receives cheque - follow up communication asks you to send back a certain percentage of same to whoever - you lodge cheque and send them the percentage - then (you've guessed it) - cheque bounces and you are caught for the amount you've sent them...

hold for a few days and see what happens.... but don't enter in to correspondence with anyone...  post update here....


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## jewley99 (4 Feb 2010)

Ya I'm not going to do anything with it because I know it can't be real.  Thing is I haven't been contacted by email or anything yet.

How do these people get names and addresses.

I will post here if and when I am contacted.  It'll be interesting to see what they say,


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## pudds (4 Feb 2010)

There is no such thing as a free lunch unfortunately  sadly there are a lot of vulnerable people out there now who are easily taken in by scams like this if indeed it is one,  but will be very surprised if it ain't.


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## clonboy (4 Feb 2010)

sounds like its a scam for sure, cant wait till they make contact


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## jewley99 (4 Feb 2010)

I'd be afraid to, in case they arrived at my house since they have my address.


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## becky (4 Feb 2010)

This is just a guess here. If it's cashed, would the payer be able to trace the account it was lodged into and then try and withdraw money?


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## Towger (4 Feb 2010)

Is this you, or did someone else get a cheque?


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## jewley99 (5 Feb 2010)

Thanks for link, no thats actually someone else, exact same company, wonder are there any more?
Still haven't been contacted, nearly wish I was cos Im going to enjoy telling them what they can do with it.


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## csirl (5 Feb 2010)

If the cheque isnt a payment that you are expecting to receive, then the best thing to do is rip it up and put it in the bin. 

If you cash it and then the sender seeks to retrieve the money back (saying sent in error) or it bounces and returns to the sender with your bank details, then you are putting yourself at risk. The less contact you have with potential scammers the better as any contact puts you at risk. Dont give them excuses to contact you or obtain more of your details.


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## jhegarty (5 Feb 2010)

Don't cash it.

Chances are you will have someone looking for you to western union some money to Nigeria very shortly.


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## chlipps (5 Feb 2010)

Defo dont cash it.. hand it in at local garda station and let them investigate further


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## MandaC (5 Feb 2010)

csirl said:


> If the cheque isnt a payment that you are expecting to receive, then the best thing to do is rip it up and put it in the bin.



Best advice.  I would not waste my wit even waiting for them to contact you.  If it is not to do with you, don't entertain it whatsoever.  Maybe you will get a letter to contact them and when you do, it will be a premium rate number or something like that.....Rip it up (or post to Garda Fraud Squad) and think no more about it.

Have just tracked them down through UK Companies house - clothing retail?

HEADSTART (GB) LTD 
Company Number:06240714
Company Categoryrivate Limited Company
Status:Active
Date of Incorporation:09/05/2007 
Address:10 LINGWOOD RD LONDON E5 9BN
Country of Origin:United Kingdom
SIC Information:5242 - Retail sale of clothing


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## jewley99 (11 Feb 2010)

Was finally contacted via email by 'Thomas Smith'  a courier will call to collect £900 and I can keep £100

Emailed him and said husband working with C.A.B. and was trying to trace the cheque.

Dying to heatr reply


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## MandaC (11 Feb 2010)

What reason did they give for sending you the cheque.  This is the same scam over and over again.


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## mathepac (11 Feb 2010)

jewley99 said:


> ... Emailed him and said husband working with C.A.B. and was trying to trace the cheque. ...


It may not mean anything - try SOCA / ARA.


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## chlipps (11 Feb 2010)

jewley99 said:


> Was finally contacted via email by 'Thomas Smith' a courier will call to collect £900 and I can keep £100
> 
> Emailed him and said husband working with C.A.B. and was trying to trace the cheque.
> 
> Dying to heatr reply


 

Good response.... 

Did they say why they want 900 back?... Definite scam


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## mukki (17 Feb 2010)

they want you to lodge the cheque, then pay them 900, you keep 100, but the cheque will bounce costing you even more


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## sinbadsailor (17 Feb 2010)

jewley99 said:


> Ya I'm not going to do anything with it because I know it can't be real.  Thing is I haven't been contacted by email or anything yet.
> 
> How do these people get names and addresses.
> 
> I will post here if and when I am contacted.  It'll be interesting to see what they say,



There must be some information leak somewhere. The other night I received a text message in the form of those 'money needs to leave the country etc...20 million with your name on it' on my company mobile. It was about 2am! And I would be one of those types that actually try their best to guard personal and contact information as best I can, it's obviously not possible in this day and age?

But with regard to your cheque, I would say keep it for record or if you hear anything in media in future , don't ever answer any correspondance from these guys, you are only letting them know that an address was correct etc if you do. They work on percentages whereby a return of 4-5% is enough to net then the massive profits they make from scams. They literally have a whole organisational structure for this.

An typical setup would be in some African country:

* groups of teenagers scouring social networks, sending emails to validate addresses, basically gathering possible information on victims
* they pass on this info up the chain to the guys that prepare the emails/letters etc (better English but not always great as we have seen with grammatical errors)
* if a reply is received, it goes up the chain again, to someone trained to get you to bite... 

and so on and so fort. There are even levels above this where they have people that can pretend to be law enforcement and government officials, all designed to convince you that what you are doing in legitimate.

It is a well oiled and very profitable enterprise


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## JoeB (16 Mar 2010)

test...

What's wrong with lodging the cheque, and refusing to pay back the scammers... can you be charged in any way for lodging a cheque which bounces?

(sorry, this thread was showing a page two, however when the two was clicked on it kept going back to page one.. so I was seeing if there was indeed a page two, and it seems that there wasn't.. so there may be a bug in the software!!!.. if moderators want to PM me I can send more info on what happened...)


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## Complainer (16 Mar 2010)

JoeBallantin said:


> (sorry, this thread was showing a page two, however when the two was clicked on it kept going back to page one.. so I was seeing if there was indeed a page two, and it seems that there wasn't.. so there may be a bug in the software!!!.. if moderators want to PM me I can send more info on what happened...)


Me too.


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## Brendan Burgess (17 Mar 2010)

That is odd, but as it's only a once off it's not worth investigating. If it happens again, please let me know.

Brendan


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## Complainer (17 Mar 2010)

Brendan said:


> That is odd, but as it's only a once off it's not worth investigating. If it happens again, please let me know.
> 
> Brendan


Strangely enough, I had the same problem on politics.ie this week also.


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