A popular counterfeit cheque cashing scam is making the rounds in Calgary again.
The goal is always to get you to deposit the fake cheques in your account and wire them the money before anyone discovers the cheque is counterfeit.
Larry Etiene received several of those cheques along with an offer for him to work as a secret shopper.
The first assignment was to evaluate the service provided by Western Union. The letter directs the shopper to deposit the cheque into their account, wire most of the funds to a given address and fill out a questionnaire.
For that, the shopper gets to keep $135.
Etiene received several of the cheques and letters because his address was mistakenly used as the return address, so he got back any letters that were returned to sender because they were undeliverable.
He also noticed the contact phone number provided to the shoppers for the company was a 403 area code.
While we usually think of these scams as coming from Africa or eastern Europe, it would appear the con men were in southern Alberta.
There are also several warnings from the Alberta Securities Commission.
The ASC has extended its cease trade order against Calgary businessman Hugo Pittoors and his Panamanian company, Humanus Initiative while it continues to investigate allegations that Pittoors and Humanus illegally sold securites to Alberta investors.
The ASC has also extended its cease trade order against Edmonton businessman Ronald Cloutier and a number of companies owned or controlled by him, including Venture Contractors, Viva Communications, Sunterra Resource Audit Equipment and Sunterra Seismic.
The order is based on allegations that Cloutier and his companies illegally sold securities to Alberta investors.
Anyone who has been contacted concerning investing in any of these companies is asked to call the ASC at (403)355 4151.
The commission has also handed down a judgment against Paul Whitelaw, David Harris and Planned Legacies, as well as Francois Michaud doing business as Righthedge Investments, for illegally trading in securities and making untrue statements to investors.
The companies raised $7-million from Alberta investors to trade in foreign currencies. The whereabouts of Michaud and the money are unknown.
