It looked like a scam, but wasn't!

Looks like the vast majority of material here is confirmatory of an approach's being a scam. 99% of the time, if a person thinks enough of the details to post them here, it's pretty clear it is indeed a scam. But what about false positives? I have a few stories about experiences in recent years that stank very strongly of "swindle"...but weren't! Some of them turned out to be legitimate business operators who were just eccentric or clumsy. Some were misunderstandings. One was a result of dementia! I don't have time in one post to tell them all, although I'll try to soon, starting with this one that I'm not absolutely sure wasn't a scam, but at least probably wasn't.

In recent years I've been doing badly enough employment-wise to consider offers that previously I'd've rejected as too dodgy looking or otherwise unattractive. A few years ago I saw a help wanted ad on Craig's List for someplace very close to me, so I applied via e-mail for one of the positions, an administrative ass't. However, their Web site was very sketchy to the point that I couldn't figure out what business they were in! Some pages or at least details were missing, and there were certain incongruities. I wish I'd kept notes to explain this in more detail, but I hope you get the idea.

I was given an appointment for an interview at the office. When I got there I noted that the name on the awning did not match the name on the window glass, and that neither one matched the names on the Web site. I walked in to a large anteroom where I was given a paper application on a clipboard and told to sit with the other applicants who filled the room. The application gave me pause as to certain details it asked of me which didn't seem relevant to my qualifications. One was my Social Security number. Couldn't I give them that if and when I was hired? However, since that time I've found that a great many employers are asking for such info up front. But what really took the cake was asking for my driver's license number. I could understand asking about a car license plate number as regarding parking in their lot -- but they didn't have a parking lot there -- but why a driver's license number? Friends since then have told me that questions like these are becoming more common on employment applications. It seemed to me like a phishing expedition, but I put down the info anyway.

I started thinking, could this be a big house grift? Some sort of con game big enough to justify hiring space, multiple accomplices and locations, etc.?

They made me wait until an hour after my scheduled app't, and then called me and another applicant into the back for the interview. The halls and rooms were still mostly empty. The editor window here is making it hard to compose and see what I'm doing, so I'll continue in another post if you don't mind. In the future I'll write these offline and poste into the editor.

The interview was like some kind of joke. I'd never experienced interviewing of two applicants at a time like this, although I'm told it's becoming more common. The other interviewee wasn't even applying for the same kind of position -- he was applying for warehouse work as a forklift operator! The interviewer asked us a few goofy seeming questions about our hobbies, etc. that seemed to have nothing to do with hiring. Then he asked if we had any questions, and I asked what business they were in. He said, "Didn't you know? We sell toys." And he gestured around the room as if there were invisible shelves full of goods; the walls were actually bare. The Web site hadn't mentioned toys.

The other interviewee sensed "scam" so strongly he asked if he could be paid in advance!

The interviewer explained that he was just in from Calif. (we were in New York) and so not familiar with a lot of the local details. Someone else explained that the discrepancy between the names outside was that they'd lost their original awning in a storm some weeks previously -- which doesn't explain why it was replaced with one with another name instead of a blank! Anyway, the whole thing was disconcerting.

I didn't get a phone call with a job offer, but I went by there periodically and at least a year later they were still apparently in business. I can't prove it isn't a big house grift, but it looks like too expensive and elaborate a way just to try to phish identifying information. I think it was just a business trying to expand rapidly and the left hand not knowing what the right hand was doing.

The other stories I have are even more bizarre.

Robert, I am not sure of your intent with posting this story. I don't see that it helps people who have been scammed, nor does it help people to not be scammed. I am requesting that you re-read this sticky regarding the purpose of this site prior to posting any more stories like this.

This thread and this thread.

Robert, I am not sure of your intent with posting this story. I don't see that it helps people who have been scammed, nor does it help people to not be scammed.

Neither this nor the other stories that I could write (as decribed above) would be of any help to people who have been scammed. What I'm hoping to do is provide more experience to help people distinguish scams from non-scams. For instance, from one experience I learned that just because someone is evasive and uses aliases and copies boilerplate inappropriately in a Craig's List listing (Yes, all that, no kidding!)doesn't guarantee he's trying to scam you. From another, I learned that someone who e-mails you by a title you don't have and uses bad grammar isn't necessarily scamming or even spamming. In each case I looked out for certain things that would've put me at risk but never came up. You have a lot of examples posted here of fishy things that are scams, but not many of their complement, i.e. fishy things that are not scams. Do you think there's a better place for me to enter stories about experiences I had that looked a lot like scams but turned out not to be?

Neither this nor the other stories that I could write (as decribed above) would be of any help to people who have been scammed.

Robert for me this says it all. I am locking this thread for the time being because it doesn't fit the stated purposes of this site as you acknowledge.

PM me if you need further clarification.