I thought this might be an interesting topic. I find scams fascinating and like to watch how scammers operate. I figure many of us have seen various scams out and about (not limited to Taiwan) and some might be worth sharing.
Here is one to get going:
London, Oxford Street, Summer 2001.
I was walking along and right in the middle of the sidewalk was a small table with various consumer type goods like digital cameras, CD players, mini TVs, watches etc etc.
There was 2 guys. One on a loud speaker announcing a liquidation sale, closing down sale, all those sorts of things. The other guy was holding up the various products while the guy on the microphone was saying stuff like “Would you like the opportunity to buy this Mobile phone for 5 Quid? The auction starts in 10 minutes”.
These guys were standing in front of what looked like an empty shop. Like a place gone bust. There wasn’t much in it except for a raised counter along the back wall with a few piles of boxes here and there, and a door going “out the back”. The glass doors to the street were open.
There was a small crowd gathering and as it got bigger the guy behind the small table would slowly move it backwards, in very small increments toward the open door. As more people gathered, he would move it back a little more.
Right away I thought this was dodgy as shit, and decided to have a look later on and see what was going on.
When I passed by half an hour later, the glass doors were shut and inside was a huge crowd of I guess 60-70 people and they were actually running an auction. And people were buying stuff and leaving. No one was allowed in once the auction started.
I was pretty intrigued by this. I felt like I’d missed my chance to check out this dodgy auction, so went over the road to have a coffee. I could watch it all happening from the window.
Anyway, eventually, everyone streamed out and left. About 15 mins later they set up the table again with the stuff on it, and the guy started his pitch again. I thought this time I would take a closer look, but luckily for me I’d seen the cycle and figured I could watch it thru once more without giving anyone any money just to see what happens.
So I was in the crowd, and I watched as people picked up the stuff looked at it, called up their mates etc. The crowd grew and the table was moved slowly inside until the stuff was eventually gather up and put onto the large raised counter at the back and the small table was packed away.
There was a fair bit of hype about the auction starting in x amount of minutes and the guy said it is a closed auction so the doors will be shut during bidding etc etc.
The doors were closed and the auction got underway.
So I watched the routine. More and more goods were brought out and held up for a few seconds. The guy said something like “if you want the chance to buy this for 5 quid, then raise your hand now”. Most people raised their hands. Anyone that didn’t was singled out by the auctioneer and asked why they didn’t want to buy it for such a low price. The auctioneer said he would only sell goods to people who raised their hands from now on. So, those people who didn’t raise their hands were basically told they were wasting their time being there,and were welcome to leave.
It was very intimidating, but I figured I had to see it thru. I raised my hand. Some people left.
The crowd got smaller and moved in. The next item up for bid the same thing was said. The auctioneer picked out one person who wanted a discman for 5 quid, and the deal was done. The guy paid his money, was given his box, and then he went on his way out onto the street.
It seemed that you had to fight to buy this stuff for a bargain.
I think it happened again to another guy.
Then they moved up a notch and got into bigger stuff like stereos and DVD players. The auctioneer asked for hands who wanted to be able to buy this stuff for whatever the low price was. He then went on to say that buyers had to get a bidding voucher for 5 pounds to be able to bid. So about 10 people or so paid their 5 quid. They figured if they were going to save 100 quid on a product, then what is 5 quid. Oh, the auctioneer said the voucher cost was fully deductible from any goods won at auction. At this point, I didn’t buy one of these vouchers, but those that did had to hold them up. All of those people were told to come forward, and those without couldn’t bid and had to step back or leave. Some people left, but I figured I might as well stick around.
So the bidding carried on, bigger products, bigger money. They started bundling several boxes together and the bidding would go higher. Some guy won the bundle, handed over his money, and they stuffed all the boxes into a black polythene rubbish bag which the guy then walked out with.
I could see the remaining bidders were hyped to the max. The Auctioneer was a real showman. Full of funny jokes about people in the crowd, or stories about how this or that ‘fell off the back of a truck’. Of course he would also bully some people, so it was a pretty weird sort of atmosphere.
To proceed, bidders now needed to buy vouchers worth 15 pounds. Some people started to get pissed off, and the auctioneer ridiculed them and basically told them to leave if they didn’t want to bid. I was amazed that there were people willing to buy the 15 pound vouchers even when they hadn’t got anything so far.
More bidding, huge bundles, big money (but still a 'bargain). “1000 pounds worth of stuff for 80” and eventually some guy won it. And again, the stuff was bundled into a black bag and the guy would leave.
Then the guy announced the auction was over. As soon as he did that the doors to the street we flung open. From out of nowhere ‘staff’ seemed to be ushering people out of the shop. There seemed to be a pretty big presence of big guys in leather Jackets and sunglasses all around the place telling people to leave. If needed, they would grit their teeth and quietly say “Fuck OFF”. Obviously a few people were pretty pissed off, but most figured they were conned and decided to get the hell out of there. So, I left, really trying to get my head around what I saw.
I went back over to the coffee shop and watched the place to see if they were going to run another auction. At that point it seemed to me that to get this stuff, you needed to be the top bidder, otherwise you’d lose the 5 or 15 quid. Then I saw a familiar face. The guy that bought the bundle of stuff at the end brought it back, and then they unpacked it into the cartons at the back and they all stood around having a smoke. Holy Shit, NOW it all made sense.
I was due to meet a friend anyway, so when I caught up with him, I told him about the scam. His first reaction was “there is NO WAY anyone would get sucked in like that would they?”. So, sure enough, the table appears again and the 2 guys started their routine.
I urged my mate to check this out for himself. He said he wanted me to go with him. I grabbed his laptop bag and slung it over my shoulder and we headed over. This time I stayed right up the back and leaned against the wall.
Exactly the same routine took place, and by this point I was keen to get the hell out of there as soon as it ended.
As it finished, I turned to leave and the auction guy pointed right at me and YELLED “Hey you, stay right there!!!”
Obviously, I needed to get out to the street at least. I briskly walked out outside and soon enough about 3 of these big bastards were around me saying “What the FUCK are you doing mate?, Do you want to get yourself killed” and shit like this. I was freaking out a bit. The auctioneer guy came out and grabbed my arm and tried to pull me back in, and I said “DONT fucking touch me” He asked to see into my laptop bag. I refused. I was worried they would swipe my mate’s stuff. He was saying “It’s just a laptop”, but they wanted to see inside. The heavies closed in a bit and everything was getting pretty weird. The the auctioneer guy said “Are you filming me?”. We unzipped the bag and showed him the laptop and then they just said “Fuck off. Don’t fucking come back OK?” along with the typical gangster type of grimace.
We quickly walked off along oxford street and turned around to see one of the heavies was following us. By this point, there were people EVERYWHERE, so it was very difficult to tell who was who, and if we were being followed at all. We got to the Tube and made a couple of tricky train switches on the way home just to be sure.
Made for an interesting afternoon.
Anyone else?
). She then took out the money and gestured I dropped it, but eventually handed it over. As I got it back and didn’t want to bother with the police there I left it at that.