Dear Fellow Equestrians,

What you see below is a $11,500 fake check that we received in an attempt to buy a horse from us. How could that happen? Keep reading to make sure that it does not happen to you.

Several weeks ago we noticed suspicious activity on the website — a prospective "buyer" sent about 50 horse inquiries to our website members. If you are a HorseClicks member, you are aware that we do not tolerate any scammers and ban them for life. In fact, we have even made a decision to cut off website access to entire countries, like Nigeria. But unlike many scams, this message was not coming from overseas — it originated from the wilds of the state of New Jersey. Here is the original email copy:

Hello, My name is Baraja Zapata and I was given a contract by Country Polo Club to supply them twenty horses/stallions. I was just browsing through the site and I noticed that you have horses available for sale. So I decided to email you to let you know that I'm interested in buying your horses if they are still available. Please let me know their price per each. I also would like to know your preferred mode of payment. I'll be glad to hear back from you soonest...

We easily recognized that this "buyer" was harmful and quickly blocked their IP address so that they could not access the website. But we also decided to "follow up" with them and pretended to be the seller saying that the horse was still available. The response was immediate — the scammer emailed us back asking only for the final price and our address. We emailed back our address information and told them that our horse was priced at $11,000. To our surprise, after three days we received a reply with a link to the UPS website to track the check that they sent us without even one question about the horse at all. Very strange for an $11,000 purchase, isn't it?

We haven't seen scammers use UPS before, and this check was sent from Saddle Brook, NJ even via UPS second day air delivery. One would think that would be very expensive, and even traceable, so it made us a little bit confused. After putting two and two together, we realized that they probably used the fastest option to ship because they had used another fake check or stolen credit card to pay for the shipping itself. If UPS found out in time that their payment was not legit, they could put a lien on the package and not deliver it to the recipient. That's just our guess, however.

Now take a look in detail at what a piece of artwork we received: click here to enlarge the check picture in a new window. There are quite a few things here that make check look fishy:

1. The tagline under the US Bank logo says "Five Star Service Guarenteed." Wouldn't somebody working for US Bank notice by now that they've been spelling the word "guaranteed" wrong all this time?
2. The big, bold statement "Official Check" is supposed to add some trust on a subconscious level, but ask yourself — have you ever seen a "Non-official Check"?
3. Other misspellings — "Lacation" instead of "Location" and "Authorised" instead of "Authorized."
4. "Issued By: MoneyGram" in fine print is meant to add credibility in case horse owners accept cash only transfers issued by MoneyGram or Western Union.
5. Finally, and this is the most important thing, it was made out for $11,500, not the original $11,000 asking price. The "buyer" explained in email that it was his finance department's mistake and he asked us to send the $500 difference back ASAP. Please take note, scammers ALWAYS have an excuse for making the check more than it needs to be and want the difference back "ASAP." That's to ensure that your money is sent to them before the bank, and you, find out that their check is fraudulent. In some cases, it takes banks in rural areas a few weeks to find out that the check is counterfeit, and that's exactly what the scammers hope for.

We at HorseClicks hope that after reading all the details, you never get scammed like this. Sadly, there are many honest people who still fall victim to fraud. Some horse owners are new to the online selling process and others are simply blinded by the desire to sell. Just put it bluntly — if this scam did not work, scammers wouldn't be doing it. That's why we ask for your help in passing this page along to everyone you know — email it to your equestrian friends, post it in horse forums, and share it in newsgroups. It doesn't cost anything to spread awareness, and this illustrated example will hopefully prevent somebody from losing their money, their horse, or both.

Thank you
Kathryn Lynn Stewart,
HorseClicks.com

PS: If you have any questions, feel free to contact me directly — horseclicks at horseclicks.com