For  many weeks innkeepers have reported scams galore every morning in their e-mail boxes.  Our friends at Select Registry recently prepared this fact sheet for their members and have granted us permission to pass it along to all PAII members.

To: All Membership
From: Sarah Vollink, Director of Marketing and Media Outreach
Subject: Select Registry Members Comment on Industry Scam

Greetings,

We hope you all had a wonderful holiday! We are thankful for everything you do to help strengthen this Association and our network of innkeepers.

Thank you all for sharing your comments and emails concerning the most recent industry scam (previously sent to membership on November 18, 2004). We received a multitude of emails from our members outlining a tremendous amount of information concerning this issue. Below is an overview of those member emails.

WHAT
Innkeepers are receiving emails from various potential guests requesting long lengths of stay and promising that payment will arrive shortly. For a variety of reasons, the supposed guest cancels their stay and/or requests a partial or full refund as cash back. The original method of payment is eventually declined and some innkeepers have suffered significant loss after honoring the refund. The emails and requests seem legitimate, especially to unsuspecting staff.

EMAIL MESSAGE
The messages are often written in broken English. The guest seems very friendly, appreciative, and accommodating. Often, the email arrives typed in all capital letters. Usually, the stay is in the very near future.

SUBJECTS
Reasons for the stay include lengthy honeymoons, a business trip with a client, travel with a lawyer, Pastors visiting a church convention, a woman whose husband takes ill and requires emergency surgery just before she is to leave, and/or someone who has visited your area before and speaks very highly of it.

WHO
The guest never actually arrives at an inn. Everything is handled via email, fax, and occasionally phone conversations. Guest names on emails include Phil Smith, Jerry Anderson, Rosan Berg, Sister Mary Halberg, Dyna Smith, and Becky McBeal.

LENGTH OF STAY
Requested reservations range from 14 days to a month and often require 2 rooms.

FROM WHERE
Guest emails are coming from the United Kingdom, The New Faith Christian Bible Church and Germany. We have obtained that the ring of scam artists are potentially operating in California, West Lafayette, Indiana and London.

AMOUNT OF MONEY/METHOD OF PAYMENT
The amount of money being transpired is usually several thousand dollars. The guest either requests a refund directly for the entire amount or offers to send more than is necessary for the stay; requiring cash back upon check-in for shopping, plane tickets, expense money sent to you in error or to pay for additional nights at your inn. Usually, the guest suggests using a cheque, cashiers check, money order, bank draft/foreign check or certified check and receiving payment back via Western Union or other wire service. Unfortunately, some banks are initially cashing their checks without question, later to be declined at your loss. The guest often offers to FedEx the initial method of payment. The only check mentioned by name was from Velocity Credit Union of Texas.

EMAIL SERVER
Often the email server is fastermail.com, mmail.com, or yahoo.co.uk (all with different identities and agendas).

SUGGESTIONS
Require advanced, approved credit card payments and account numbers from any suspect email and/or cash payment in full upon check-in [as the guest never actually checks in]. You could also require travelers checks vs. cashiers or certified. It is probably a good idea to stipulate that no refund will be available in any amount, but that you could credit their stay and honor it at a later time. Usually, when they hit this type of wall, they will stop emailing your inn.

In an effort to stop this scam and help your fellow innkeepers, you could also alert the party that you have concern that their request matches an industry scam alert and that as a precaution; a copy of their correspondence has been forwarded to the authorities for review. This scam involves the counterfeiting of cashiers checks which is a felony. Should you choose to forward your emails, contact your State Police Department, your Attorney Generals office [http://www.naag.org/ag/full_ag_table.php] or State Banking Departments [http://www.csbs.org/links/state_links.asp] for further investigation.

Please understand, there are probably alternative versions of this scam with additional information not reflected in this email being sent to our innkeepers. In any case, we hope that this compilation of information has been helpful.

Finally, one of our innkeepers alerted us to another troubling scam re-surfacing around the country. Apparently, someone calls your inn, usually when you are traveling, claiming to be a fellow area innkeeper with urgent need. They have been able to convince staff that either they are hurt or you are hurt and need money wired immediately to help with hospital bills and return travel. Although this sounds far fetched, the scam artist is extremely convincing as your fellow innkeeper. Unfortunately, this often happens during national conventions or other meetings that innkeepers attend collectively. The best advice is to make your staff aware of this potential fraud and request that they take a moment to call the other innkeeper to confirm and/or your cell number/location before actually wiring money.

For more information about these types of fraud, contact the Western Union Fraud Department [http://www.westernunion.com/info/helpContactUs.asp].