SCAM ALERT - This Recording Studio Scam Is Going On Right Now!

jr mastering

New member
Ok, I've seen this scam done many ways. There's a dude doing it specifically with recording studios. And "I know" he will get some young sound engineers with this. He's very good!

Here's how the scam goes. This dude (Stephen Mark 714-510-2692) contacted me 10/05/2018.

1. He emails your website saying he has this huge mixing job he needs done. 15 songs / 30 stems a song.

2. He asks for your cellphone, confirms your name, are you the owner? He wants to talk to the owner, etc.

3. He then starts going over the project, the songs, number of stems, etc. He'll even give you more time to complete the project.

This guy is really working it. He's good!

4. He tells you he has a Christmas album for a church. (Because working with a church = honest good people)

5. He says he will pay you in full, but he needs a small favor.

6. He then tells you how great your website is. (Buttering you up, and it starts up small talk)

7. Now the scam - He's going to pay you the full price for your mixing/master, PLUS $2,500. You keep $500 (for your troubles) and pay the $2,000 to a caterer.

This is silly. Why doesn't he just pay the caterer and save $500 he's giving you? Here's why.

The $5,000 plus he gives you, it's from a stolen credit card. The $2,000 you send the caterer (its really him), that's your REAL MONEY. He gets your $2,000 and you won't get it back.

In 30 days or sooner, the real credit card owner will notice someone stole $5,000 from their account and will charge it back. Soon the $5,000 the guy gave you will be charged back from your account. So, you now owe the bank $5,000 and the $2,000 you sent is lost....

This has been done with checks for the last 30 years. And in other fields. I'm just letting everyone know there's a guy working hard with recording studios. Be safe!

FYI - the guy sent me like 20 texts. As soon as I pointed out the scam, I haven't heard from him since... Get a real job, bro!
 
As soon as the conversation got to the "caterer" part...I would say to him. "Huh...WTF? I don't have anything to do with catering, so you pay him direct."
Of course, the "hook" in the scam is that someone people will want that extra $500 on top of the "mixing/mastering"...so they get caught in that scam.

Also...I would do everything through PayPal...I wouldn't deal directly with credit cards or checks.

TBH...it's kind of a dumb scam, because introducing the caterer payment into a mixing/mastering deal...is a major red flag for most anyone, IMO.
 
The only thing more dangerous that being susceptible to this sort of shit is thinking you're not.
Thanks for posting, jr.
 
4. He tells you he has a Christmas album for a church. (Because working with a church = honest good people)

This never cuts it with me, its like the ad for a second hand PA system, taken out of a church, well what does that mean? it works fine or was taken out because it's now worn out? Or because it was a church it will be in top condition.

Alan.
 
In Brazil this things are called "golpe", there are some: credit card, false kidnapping (someone calls you saying it´s your daughter and was kidnapped), calls from the penitenciary asking for money or someone will shoot you, and so on...
 
I had an email from a guy who had "6 exciting new artists" he wanted to pay me in advance to start recording ASAP. After I checked out the name and discovered it belonged to someone about 8 states away, and the emails repeated the request to set this up to have them start in my "studio" (which I clarified, on my very first response and repeated on the second, that I don't have) stuff, I told the "manager" to stuff it. Maybe missed my chance to catch the next Beyonce, but I kind of doubt it :). (We never got to the [fake] credit card with a bonus part, but I knew it was coming.)
 
My son was selling his trumpet on eBay and a scammer started messaging him. He agreed to buy the trumpet outside of eBay if my son pulled the ad down. He did. He gave the scammer our address so the scammer could send a check. They did. The check came in a fedex envelope from Seattle. It was from a construction company in Idaho and the phone used for texting was from Maryland. Red flags.

The amount was double the agreed price. My son is so innocent. He came to me, "Dad, what do I do? They overpaid me. I have to give them back their money." This was when I first found out my son was selling his trumpet on eBay, let alone agreeing to sell it privately. But here's the kicker; in one of the texts, the scammer said he was sending one of his agents to my house to pick up the trumpet. I couldn't believe my kid did that. I was pretty upset with him giving our address out to strangers like that. I told him he should have come to me before posting anything on eBay.

So I took his phone and texted back to the scammer that I knew it was a scam and that we live in Texas and if he sent anyone to my house, they would be shot. Never heard from him again. :D
 
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