Another Mystery Shopper Scam? With Money Orders!

So I come home today to a Priority Mail envelope. In the envelope is a letter on Corporate Research International Letterhead with instructions to deposit and blah blah blah...plus two U.S. Postal Service Money Orders in the amount of $970. These might be the best fakes I've ever seen, complete with watermarks.

Ofcourse, no one answers at the phone number for the company that I found on the internet. There is no number on the letter, only emails for James Fisher. An email at aol.com and surveyreport.org (which appears to be a bogus site).

So....what do I do with these things? Just discard? Contact the local authorities so they can do absolutely nothing about it?

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Turn them over to the authorities. Since you have not "cashed" the money orders, the authorities would have a better chance of tracing them before the fact.

Better yet, turn them over the investigative part of your local news channel. See if they run with it!

When you learn, teach, when you get, give. Maya Angelou

Wow they are getting good when they know how to add the watermarks. Shoppers beware of these scams.

Yeah...cops just left. They want nothing to do with it and refused to take a report. I have to get to the Post Office and report it to the Postal Inspector. Glad I have a post office shop scheduled for Friday. LOL.

The money orders were pretty realistic, I have to say. There is the Ben Franklin watermark and "USPS" Security to the right of that. The back writing is messed up and looks like it printed over itself twice so that was a big give away. Just really creepy to have it mailed to your home.

I'd report it to the postal authorities since it came in the mail.

These creeps are really getting good at it, aren't they? I bet some will still fall for this scam.

dmh426 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Yeah...cops just left. They want nothing to do
> with it and refused to take a report. I have to
> get to the Post Office and report it to the Postal
> Inspector. Glad I have a post office shop
> scheduled for Friday. LOL.
>
> The money orders were pretty realistic, I have to
> say. There is the Ben Franklin watermark and
> "USPS" Security to the right of that. The back
> writing is messed up and looks like it printed
> over itself twice so that was a big give away.
> Just really creepy to have it mailed to your home.
>

So how do you think they got your home address and the fact that you are/were a shopper for CORI? Does that mean that their info was breached somehow? Do we need to be concerned about our info with these companies? They have my SSN/EIN and everything.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Could I have a receipt please?

I contacted CO RI and am wiring for a call back. Not impressed with leaving a voicemail and email and still haven't heard back.

Yes if you look at them closely there is something a little hinky-somewhere on the money order. Just feel sorry for the desperate shoppers who take the bait.

What does the postmark say? Was it by any chance Lagos?

There are two types of people in this world: Those who can extrapolate from incomplete data.

I was told by my police department to always notify them.

It was mailed from San Francisco, with a person's name, address and phone number that I was able to confirm through White pages.com. Of course, the phone just rings.

I called CORI again today and am extremely displeased. I told them to deactivate me.

EVERYONE BEWARE THEIR SYSTEM HAS BEEN COMPROMISED. Social Security numbers and all. I confirmed that with the of so non-chalant person I finally got on the phone. The mail I received had my name, shopper ID, address and phone number between the envelope and the letter inside.

CORI DOESN'T REALLY CARE is the impression I got and "they are looking into it".

Wow. I just recently signed up with several companies and wasn't completely comfortable giving all of the information required, but I did it trusting that they had security measures in place. After the fact is unfortunately too late to deactivate yourself as the information is already compromised.
I put a fraud alert online with the credit reporting agencies.
Incidentally I just had to have my ATM card replaced after a weekend in Las Vegas, as BofA notified me that my information was compromised and is under investigation. *sigh*
If the criminals would put as much effort into legitimate jobs as they do stealing from us...

You would think that CORI could notify those of us who are signed up with them. Finding out on a forum is just not appropriate. I guess I will also put a fraud alert on my credit bureau--although I don't think a criminal would want to steal my credit.

DanceMom- I put a detailed response under the Company Forum. The CORI rep I talked to couldn't have cared less. That was the person I talked to after leaving two messages, two emails and then finally getting someone on my third call. I am not happy.

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Another Mystery Shopper Scam? With Money Orders!

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