A google search on UK phone numbering led to a search page which stated that the number was a personal “find me anywhere” number in the +44 7000 range, originally assigned to “Magrathea Telecommunications”. Heh.
Magrathea Telecom led me to this service: uknumber.co.uk, which can provide a UK phone number, including a +44 7000 number, which routes through to your foreign number.
So, as expected, the scammer could be anywhere.
Bluebird Travel seems to be a fairly common name. Now, searching on Wale Adams yielded interesting results.
All I know is, if I was a member of the legitimate non-scamming government of Nigeria, and trying to encourage actual economic development, I would be royally pissed at this whole situation.
Come to think of it, if I was just about any non-scamming Nigerian, I would be pissed.
A veritable polymath!
Wow. That’s impressive. They time-travel now.
By the way, are you familiar with the Nigerian car/motorcycle scam? Here’s how it works:
You have a car for sale. Let’s say you’re asking $10,000. The Nigerian contacts you and agrees to pay full price, and have an American associate pick up the car from you. The only hitch is, there’s an American that owes Mr. Nigerian $20,000. This American will send the check directly to you. When Mr. American Associate arrives to pick up the car, give him the car and the $10,000 change. You find out a week later that you were paid with a forged check. You’re out one car (which is usually just abandoned somewhere), and $10,000 cash.
Ouch.
You’re close, but there’s usually an element of greed in there to really seal the deal, i.e. the friendly Nigerian will happily give you an extra $2000 out of that 10 for your troubles.
Me too; every time I think I have the modalities in place, it all falls apart.
Assumes facts not in evidence.
They don’t do forged checks anymore. They do cashiers checks.
http://www.snopes.com/crime/fraud/cashier.asp
Forged cashier’s checks, to be precise.
Jayrot, many thanks for the awesome link- that has got to be the best website ever. I have only read one of the letters (the copy the entire Harry Potter book) and it is some of the funniest shit I have ever read. Are any dopers doing this good work?
I am still corresponding with my Nigerian friend after reading the website. I just told him the price of the used car is $64000 including shipping (the price advertised on the website he saw was $19000). He just sent me the following e-mail:
hello lance
how are yopu doing i hope all is moving on smoothly,the payment will be sent out by monday moring unfailingly and you will recieve it in 2 to 3 days time ok please go and get the car ready for shippment and once you get your money make sure you ship out the car as fast as you can ok get back to me asap
best regards
I asked those same questions before.
I asked those same questions before. I hope to see some answers, I am just as curious.
Okay, I have one client here who is of Nigerian heritage and I just called him to ask him the question. Usually we are very wary of dealing with Nigerians, but this gentleman has a reputable company and has also referred three other Nigerian-Americans to purchase cars from me.
He put it like this: Reputable companies in Nigeria tend to deal with people they already have connections with, i.e. Nigerians abroad who have started businesses or can put them in contact with others. My customer runs and architect consulting company, but does have clients in Nigeria.
So I would assume from that, and from the lack of trust in the overseas markets of Nigerians in general (due to bad experiences from groups of scammers and a nice marketing scheme), most legit Nigerian companies deal with Nigerians overseas.
How many legitimate manufacturing concerns are there in Nigeria to begin with? I can’t think of too many widget containing items I have that are stamped “Made in Nigeria”…
This seems to present a bootstrapping problem: How does a new Nigerian company build the connections needed to do legitimate business?
I would assume this can go in circles. It had to start somewhere. This gentleman I referred to in my previous post had his business incorporated about ten years ago. How long has Nigeria been know for scamming people? The banks probably do their background checks, etc. when someone applies for business loans. I would think it impossible for a bank or any institution to say no to someone just because they are of Nigerian heritage, if they have the proper documents to be a resident or citizen of the United States (Social Security Card, Immigration Documents, etc, established credit).
Seems like in this case there’s no way to “eliminate the middleman” – everyone would have to work through a reputable, trusted “middleman” company that on the upper end can do business normally with the rest of the World, and on the bottom end can perform the necessary Due Diligence in Nigeria to ensure the prospective local entepreneur is on the level.
As I mentioned earlier, people in developing countries tend to have very large social networks and will call on each other- even if their connection is somewhat tenuous- in situations like this. In India I was traveling with an Indian friend of mine- nobody special, a 19 year old who worked at Pizza Hut- and we went all sorts of bizarre places neither he nor I have ever been. And yet, if we ever got in a jam no matter where we were, he’d have somebody’s phone number, or manage to recognize some rickshaw driver from some rediculous incident that happened ten years ago in another state, and they would help us out. I swear that kid knew half of India, and if he didn’t know someone, it’d only take them five minutes to find a mutual connection.
I’ve witnessed this in other countries and various immigrant communities in America.
If you are a Nigerian (or whatever) who lives in California, and you find yourself in Houston one day, chances are you can walk down to wherever the Nigerians hang out in Houston (usually a local restaurant, coffee shop or bar) and find someone who will put you up for the night. Stay long enough, and you will find people who will help you get a business started. And for a Nigerian in Nigeria, it really only takes one connection to the US (or whatever country you want to do business with) to open up connections to basically the entire Nigerian community in that country.
This is why it’s so common for a single group of immigrants to control an industry (Indian hotels, Chinese laundries, Vietnamese salons). People help each other establish businesses and will draw upon their connections in the community to do so.
Just the other day, I stumbled in to the local Eritrean hangout. There were boards posted with housing rentals, job offers, personal ads, airfare consolidators, immigration lawyers, etc. A whole Eritrea world smack in the middle of Oakland. I’m sure for business people that are part of this community, their business contacts inside and outside of Eritrea are essential.