Read? 'People are gullible to believe whatever’s told to them': Inside the mind of an ex-scammer
In Jon’s case, his scams involved timeshare membership - a ‘vacation package’ where one pays in advance to use a resort or hotel overseas for a period of time at a price below the market rate. He had conned victims into believing they could recover money from terminating their membership.
But he believes no matter the scam type, victims share similar characteristics that might make them more susceptible to scammers who tend to be “very good in human psychology” and know how to “trigger emotional states”.
WHO FALLS PREY?
Greed is one notable characteristic.
Jon recalled a bulk of his victims as “rich, but want to save so much”. Couples, especially the newly wed, also tended to be more greedy when it came to affordable holidays.
“They would start asking us, how much would it cost to bring my parents or if I were to go every six months? What is the discount? Usually we don’t tell them these things (upfront), but when we observe their eyes light up as we do the price comparison, we know they’re greedy,” he said.
“For young couples, we’d mention the product they purchase can be passed down to future generations. We told them if there were inflation, prices would go up, but this holiday price will stay the same. Now when I think back, that line is very stupid.”
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Read? Better safe than sorry: Resist urge to invest in too-good-to-be-true schemes
Be careful of "kind" people who voluntarily stepped in to help us when we are kena scammed! Red flag! We kena scammed before could mean that we have flagged out as easy prey for the next scammers!
Real People. Real Losses
CW8888: Time-sharing scam; one ex-colleage lost money his money. One agency stepped in and called for a meeting for investors to put up $5K each and collectively the agency would have enough fund to fight the case and retrieve some lost money.
The Agency subsequently also disappeared.
Beware! There are scammers looking for a kill and scavengers looking for your dead bodies too.
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A person is vulnerable when he wants something badly. Good to be self-aware.
ReplyDeleteOne good takeaway from the article is not to be pressured by a skillful snakeoil to BUY TODAY. If the product/service is really so good, why is the salesman so worried about customer spending some time to do due diligence?
CW,
ReplyDeleteYup, good salespersons can size up a customer from the first few minutes. We then tailor our sales pitch to trigger the hole in their hearts.
Gold diggers are good at it too.
Remember the gold trading scams? Some victims instead of waking up, believed another gold trading scammer can help recover their losses... Talked about lighting striking twice!
That's why fake gurus like to milk their students over and over again.
If bei kambings can pay thousands for kindergarten materials, they surely would pay even more for advanced advanced, and ultimate ultimate master of the universe classes!
I believe all of us have things that we want very badly. That's normal and can also be good to motivate us to progress. Problem comes when we don't have realistic expectations to achieve these things. Want short-cuts, lazy way out.
ReplyDeleteEnd up don't even need skillful snake-oil to push the vulnerable buttons. Ownself push ownself buttons.
Once we are near King Snake oil; it may be harder than we thought we are self-aware and not fall into their gifted tongue showing wonders that we can achieve through their help. Read? Bei lambing and Snake Oil
ReplyDelete