Are You Being Scammed?
Okay, we’re all adults here so we should be able to handle the truth. The truth is that if you get an email saying you’ve won the German Postal Lottery or that somebody in Africa wants to give you millions of dollars, you’d be smart enough to immediately recognize it as a scam. However, I’ve heard about some printers lately who have nearly fallen for an equally unlikely pitch just because it has been posed as a request for proposal — in other words, new business that has come knocking without any effort. Free money.
Yes, I know. In this Internet age, business in no longer restricted to geographic areas. If you have a Web presence, you are open to the whole wide world. But ask yourself, why would a missionary in Ghana or a social worker in Nigeria pick your particular Kansas or Idaho or Mississippi print shop out of the 2,720,000 printing companies that pop up when one Google’s “printing companies.” Is your website that good?
I don’t know of any printer who has actually bitten hook, line, and sinker and lost money on a printing-specific scam, but I bet you there have been some. And for anybody who thinks printers might be an unlikely target for Internet scammers, Google comes up with 1,380,000 hits for “printing scams.”
Now, pardon me while I send my banking information to that nice widow in Rwanda who wants me to launder the $3,576.898 (U.S.) her former husband embezzled from the finance ministry. What could go wrong?
Bob: Not really a comment, just hoping you can help. In the September issue, Digital Color article, Color Copy News is mentioned. I would like to contact them, subscribe, but can’t find any information either in the issue or if I try various web addresses. It would be greatly appreciated if you can send me a web or email address for them. Thank you very much. Pete
Great article. Few comments and similar experiences:
We get emails like this often like print 80000 flyers on astrobright paper with just few letter in black ink. First time I got this I got excited because of the legitimity of the email. But then on serious thinking and more digging on the email - found it to be a scam.
So here is one day one of our trade customers calls me and asks me for a quote to do the same job. i.e. 80000 flyers on astrobright - I picked up the phone and called her and she said about the same email. I explained to her about the scam.
So it is true that anybody will fall into the trap, but make sure to collect payment and if you get a cashier’s check - call the bank and verify the check before you lift a finger on the job. Beaware there are lots of scams out there.
Thanks Shawn
printpapa.com