SG Complains

Victim: I thought it was a good opportunity

According to AsiaOne News:

INVEST US$1,000 ($1,461) and get back US$250 every month.

It sounded like an attractive ‘investment‘, so music teacher G Joseph, 59, signed up.

He forked out US$2,000 last November and was hoping to enjoy the attractive returns from the Swiss Mutual Fund.

ALLEGED SCAM

Known also as SwissCash, it is an alleged scam in Malaysia.

But Mr Joseph didn’t realise this till it was too late. He has now lost US$1,000.

He said he found out about SwissCash last November when a man named Alfred called him and invited him to attend a seminar.

Mr Joseph believes the people behind the scheme could have got his number from newspaper advertisements for his music lessons.

The seminar, he said, was conducted last year in a building in Geylang by a man named Kenneth.

Mr Joseph said: ‘Kenneth joined the fund for a year and he said he got back his principal sum.’

He added that at the seminar, ‘there were people who talked about how they have been receiving money every month’.

‘I was even given a nice book to show how the scheme works. I was impressed.’

At a 25 per cent return rate, Mr Joseph invested US$2,000 and got back US$1,000 over two months deposited into his bank account.

After the first two months, Mr Joseph was told that there would not be any payouts for the next 10 months.

He said: ‘I was told that the next payout will be on October 2007. I would get back the outstanding interest payments then. October came and went but I received nothing at all.‘

He contacted Alfred and Kenneth but the men claimed that they do not know anything.

Mr Joseph, whose monthly income is about $2,500, realised he could have been cheated after he submitted a form online confirming he was an investor.

But he didn’t get any money even after that.

He said: ‘I didn’t know this would happen. I thought it was a good investment opportunity.’

Last year, two Malaysian datuks and six others aided Malaysian authorities in investigations into SwissCash.

They were placed in remand, reported The Business Times.

SwissCash claimed that investors’ funds were channelled to business activities ranging from oil exploration to shipping and agriculture in the Caribbean.

- Be wary of “investment” scams and also “telephone” scams. Anything dealing with transferring money to their bank account and paying money to earn money is very dangerous. Do not believe everything the scammer claims! Always double check their claims and do it throughly even if it’s considered small amounts! They can scam few hundreds to a few thousand basing on victim’s greed, fear, lust, vanity, pride and gluttony.

The scammer differentiate themselves from normal marketing technique when they don’t deliver whatever they promised whereas the legitimate businesses deliver.

If you ever hear something too good to be true, be very suspicious and wary! They might just be after your money!!!!