Modeling scams, skincare scams, lottery scams, Japan travel scams...

Learn & avoid from the costly scam stories of others. Variety of scams reported in last week after Japan travel scam truly mind-boggling.

SCAMS &  MODELING

Scammed pretties take action: No model jobs, just promises

15 duped by beauty firm, lost 10 million baht
25/04/2017
Wassayos Ngamkham

In the last week or so, a continual stream of scams have been publicly exposed.

Everyday there has been a new revelation by scam victims of how they were cheated.

Scams have ranged from lottery ticket scams to modeling scams to skincare product investment scams.

The stream of revelations seems to have been set off a little more than a week ago by the thousands of people stranded at Suvarnabhumi airport waiting for promised flights to Japan that never materialised.

Initially, a young woman named "Shogun" seemed to be at the center of a vitamin-food supplement-travel to Japan scam, but as in most scams, figuring it out soon got tricky and complicated.

Scams have duped Thais out of hundreds of millions of baht and reveal a pattern of low trust environments for investment where investor scepticism (don't believe everything you see) or "buyer beware" (caveat emptor) should be deemed of key importance.  

MODELING SCAMS: AFTER PAYMENT, JOBS ALWAYS CANCELED

On the same day, a group of young women also lodged a complaint with the CSD against a modelling agency which swindled them out of hundreds of thousands of baht.

Kritsira Phupattarasiri, a complainant, said she and others were asked to pay deposits of 1,000 baht per job to ensure they would not break the promise.

However, they never got any money either.

She said there were about 30 people who were allegedly duped by the agency.

Purida Charatchatsasothon, another complainant, said she was recently offered a one-day job in Singapore for 10,000 baht and asked to pay a deposit of 1,000 baht.

However, the job was cancelled.

She said that after a series of job cancellations, she suspected it was a scam.

CSD commander Pol Maj Gen Suthin Sappuang said Monday that police will have to question witnesses and gather evidence first after accepting those complaints.

WANTED MONEY TO EXPAND BUSINESS, PROMISED 30% DIVIDEND

A group of 15 people lodged a petition Monday with the Crime Suppression Division (CSD) of the police accusing the owner of a skincare firm of committing public fraud.

Led by 49-year-old Ratsami Duangprachan, the complainants accused Nonnarat Mulijan, who runs Palitta Pure Intercosmetic, of cheating them out of millions of baht.

One complainant, who identified himself as Mr A, said he was lured by Ms Nonnarat into investing in the skincare product business with the promise of a 30% dividend.

The owner Ms Nonnarat said she wanted money to expand the business.

DISAPPEARED WITH MONEY

Mr A said he was unaware Ms Nonnarat was also asking other people to invest in her business up until early February, when the owner Ms Nonnarat fled from her house.

He estimated the damage caused to the hapless group of investors was estimated to be 10 million baht.

PROMISE TO GET MONEY BACK, IF THEY DIDN'T GO TO POLICE

"We don't want any dividend, just the money that we invested," he said.

He said that before the group lost contact with her this month, they were told they would get their money back as long as they didn't go to the authorities.

NO PROMISED RETURNS ON INVESTMENT, JUST REQUESTS FOR MORE INVESTMENT

Ms Ratsami, who lives in the US, said she learned about the products from her relatives and agreed to be a distributor for the company in the US.

She said she sold 50 beauty product sets a month at US$100 (3,435 baht) apiece.

She said Ms Nonnarat later told her about plans to expand the business in China.

Then asked her to invest in the business with the promise she would get a return on her investment and 30% of all profits within two months.

However, Ms Nonnarat did not make any payments and even asked her to raise her stake, said Ms Ratsami.

CHULALONGKORN SAVINGS COOPERATIVE LOTTERY TICKET SCAM

One of the recent high-profile scams involves Sawat Saengbangpla, 79, ex- chairman of Chulalongkorn University Savings Cooperative.

He is accused of luring people into investing in a bogus lottery investment scheme (read more here).

The Klong Chan Credit Union (KCCU) was also a savings cooperative.

The KCCU collapsed after money was extorted out of it for donations to the Dhammakaya Temple, in a very high-profile recent case,

Meanwhile, the Cooperative Promotion Department has assured the cooperatives are not affected by the scam, saying it had no involvement in the scam and its financial standing is sound.

MANY PUBLIC FRAUD CASES EXPOSED RECENTLY

He said police are doing their best in investigating alleged public fraud cases which have been exposed recently.

Pol Maj Gen Suthin said police are investigating if others are involved in the lottery scam.


http://www.bangkokpost.com/news/general/1237870/hapless-investors-take-action-after-skin-scam

http://www.posttoday.com/crime/491597

http://www.bangkokpost.com/news/general/1237242/csd-hunts-for-former-boss-of-savings-co-op

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multi-level_marketing

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