Wednesday 10th February 2010

The snow came back again today. It was a bit scary driving home. It took me over half an hour. Kat was waiting for me for a lift back from college but she gave up and walked home, and got there before me.

During the day, Christine had a phone call from her father in St Albans. On his way home, he was approached by an Italian guy in a car asking for directions to Luton Airport. After he had given him the directions the guy then offered him 3 leather jackets as a “present”. He then went on to offer him a jacket in his wife's size for £150. As he only had a small amount in his wallet but had a credit card. So the guy walked with him to the local Waitrose and waited while he took out the £150. It dawned on him afterwards, how stupid he has been, but at least he is not injured. He has now lost £150 and is the not so proud owner of 4 fake leather jackets. I had a search on the internet to see if this had reported as happening anywhere else. It appears that this scam has been going on for a while and has even been on the “Big Hustle” TV show.

From Money Saving Expert.com
There is a scam going on at the moment which unfortunately my husband got stung by yesterday.
He is not stupid by any means and is a company director but so good is this con artist that he got caught.
Coming out of car park in Coventry, an italian man approached him with a story about how he was on his way back to Italy after attending a fashion conference at the NEC ( this conference did happen and La moda did exhibit the rep).

He said he was a rep for la moda and he just had these 4 jackets left over at the end of the show. He was on his way to the airport and did not want to pay excess luggage to take them home but would my husband consider having them for the price of his hire car (£260).
the jackets looked good ( or the 2 he looked closely at ) and the guy was very plausible with a seemingly soft sell. He also showed him his passport and pictures of wife and family.
He parted with the money and then rang me. As soon as i put reportage jackets into google it came up with scambusters website with similar stories from around the world. The jackets are PVC not leather and certainly not Armani. Please beware. If this post stops one of you falling for same then i have not wasted my time.
Posted ? Feb 07

From e-goat.com:
Loading up my shopping in Tesco's car park this morning, approached by a guy in a green P reg Rover. I would guess him to be late thirties black hair with a thick Italian accent. He told me that he had just been to a sales exhibition, was going back to Italy tomorrow and didn't need his samples anymore. Showed me a boot full of jackets apparently suede and leather, said he wanted to give them to me. He said that they retail at £150 and that I could have four for that price. I'm afraid I got suckered in but luckily only had twenty quid on me. He said that I could have one for that. So I bought this "suede" jacket for £20.

I knew it wasn't on the up and up, I just got greedy. I put it on when I got home, and to be fair, it's styled for a younger man (without a belly) not my middle aged paunch. My wife turned her nose up at it . Well I could always eBay it, well perhaps not, it's not real suede and there were many similar for under a tenner.

With a little research this evening I have found that this is a worldwide scam and has been going on for a number of years.

Moral of the story, If the deal is too good to be true, it's probably not true.

Now does anyone want to buy a tan suede jacket from a famous Italian fashion house? I'll make you a special deal.
Also 2007

Another one from July 2007: http://bobsalong.blogspot.com/2007/07/targeted.html

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