Conversation

DO NOT BLINDLY TRUST GOOGLE REVIEWS. Scam attempt story.

Story:

Me woife tried to book a children's character to attend one of our kids birthday parties. She checked out the company on Google reviews and it had five stars with a bunch of positive reviews. Seems like a safe bet right?

We paid a deposit for the character with a card on file to pay the balance when the performer showed up.

Less than 48 hours before the scheduled appearance, me woife got a text in broken English stating that: (and I shit you not)

"We apologize performer decided to move out of state and take costume as is his. However, We have another performer with same costume who can do it but she does it for different rate."

Essentially, they were trying to lead my wife to believe that our scheduled performer "a guy" was moving out of state and couldn't do the performance!

It's crazy how we book them over a month out and then less than 48 hours before the schedule appearance they are suddenly announcing that they are picking up their lives and moving out of state that very day and they can't come! Crazy!

But wait! We can actually help you out! We have ANOTHER performer that's a girl! She just so happens to have the same costume! (What're the odds!) The only difference is you'll have to pay about 75% more than the agreed upon price just because it's such short notice. : 👉🏻 🥹👈🏻

The moment I saw the broken English text to me woife I was immediately suspicious. I checked out the company's Google reviews.

Interestingly a lot of them seem to have a very similar last name and skin tone as the owners. Crazy! You dig a little more the people doing the reviews are not only friends on Facebook with the business page, But also, the personal page of the owners. What are the odds?!? Oh look they've tagged each other in family photos too! Weird!

Then it hit me. This was all planned from the start. This was a scam they regularly run on White people.

Probably the majority of their customer base is suburban Whites trying to give their kids a memorable party.

There never was two different performers with the same costume. There never was a "guy" who wanted to move out of state but a "girl" that could fill in last moment.

They know that sending that dreadful text to a parent trying to bring joy to their child will elicit them to do nearly anything.

They knew if these people are willing to pay $300 to have someone dress up in a costume and come to their kids party for an hour? Surely They would pay $500 at a last minute's notice if they had no other options.

Think about it. They've already paid for the party, the invitations are out, the other parents have been notified of the very special guest. They've spent all this time and money setting up the party for their child. Surely they won't stop now for 200 bucks more right?

I'm assuming this works way more often than not. It's just another lesson that you have to trust your instincts. You have to try and support only your people. If you're going to do business with someone local you need to find out who that business owner is. Stick with your own kind. Do not give business to brown people. Do not give money to the invaders.

Not everybody has the time to do autistic sleuthing. But now I have an axe to grind.

Now I'm going to make sure we file a chargeback through our bank to ding their payment processor. Chargebacks can do serious damage to a small businesses. It can even get their merchant to drop them, raise their rates, or force them to put down a larger cash deposit in the event of a big chargeback.

I'm going to file complaints with the BBB for unethical business practices and fake reviews.

I've also basically sealed the deal on me woife never wanting to do business with non-Whites again.

So for you fedi friends out there, Do research on anybody you're willing to give your money to. Do not support non-White businesses. Spend the 5 to 10 minutes to find out who owns the business you're working with. Check out the reviews. Look at the name of the reviewer. Is there a common thread? Do a bunch of them happen to have some extremely common name like John Smith or Bill Williams? Probably fakes. Are they all an Alvarez or Reyes? Definitely brown.

Do not support invaders.

Public

Notices

Feeds