I’ve seen this scam before in the rental properties industry. Now it is targeting recording studios. Many of us have home-based studios, with a setup only large enough to accomodate one person. But the scammers don’t know that. Yesterday morning I received the following email from a Yahoo-UK address:
“Hello, I am Mr. Craig Ladwig, I want to have a studio session booked in your studio from 7th June 2008 to 20th day of the same month excluding Sundays 8hrs per day. Please get back to me with your total cost so that we will proceed with booking immediately for our recording. Sincere regards, Craig Ladwig. “
It looked strange, but for entertainment’s sake and my curiosity…I replied. I shot over a high figure, and requested a deposit. Today:
“Hello,
Good to hear back from you. This is concise information you might need for proper arrangement on your side regarding the session I want to
book for my clients in your studio.
The name of the band is Voice of The Cross Band from Greece.
They will record 8 to 10 Hours daily/6 days weekly excluding Sundays for the number of days they are going to stay in your country.
It is going to be recorded/mixed and mastered in your studio.
They will record 8 songs in that album which will be gospel.
It will be overdub (They will record one after the other).
The band members are 5 in number and they will arrive in your country four days before they start with their recording session.
Please feel free to email back or call me if you have any relevant question regarding to this session. I hope the provided information will assist you to evaluate the total cost… “
I Googled Voice of the Cross Band from Greece and found a long and lively discussion thread on this topic on the Gearslutz Board, titled “Our Studio is being scammed” at:
http://www.gearslutz.com/board/moan-zone/153377-our-studio-being-scammed.html
For those unfamiliar how these things work: the “client” will agree to send you a check for say $10,000 USD, but when it arrives and it’s made out for $15,000. Oops they say, it is a mistake, but go ahead and deposit it into your bank account, and then will ask you to send back the $5000 overage using Western Union, after the check clears. Then after the payment clears the bank, it is later found to be fradulent, and you and /or the bank are out the 5K.
The scam can morph into other scenarios involving phony credit cards. Always look for stilted use of the English language, bad grammar and/or spelling as a clue.
If this information helps to raise awareness and learn the pattern of how these scams are crafted, that’s good for all of us.
received the same emails on 14. 2. , 13. 2. and 16.2.
with absolutely the same contend, seemed to be only copy and pasted into a new mail