I received a letter a few days ago, that was pretty convincing, even to my jaded, suspicious old eyes. But when I thought I smelled a rat, sure enough, there was a dead rodent just around the corner!

Here's how it was supposed to work: the scammer sent me a letter with a very real looking check for 2498.00 inside, with instructions to call this phone number to verify my name, address, etc., and to deposit their check and use those funds to wire back to them that ammount to cover the taxes and surcharges on the total winnings of 72,000.00. When they received my wire transfer, they would then send me the balance of sixty something thousand dollars by transfer back into my account, but, I was instructed to be cool and confidential, keep it all hush-hush until after it was completed so I would not attract undue attention by my local media....

I spent some time this afternoon looking up the companies involved and they do not seem to exist, or at least, not these exact titles of companies, and not in the exact towns where they are listed. And the email address I was supposed to contact is a gmail account. I am pretty sure that a real sweepstakes company would have contacted me by certified mail, and would have had some very clear contact information on their correspondence!

Beware, folks! There are lots of unscrupulous people in the world that are dying to separate us from our hard earned money.

Allison, the disgusted.