Here's scammers personal bank account, where they have requested to transfer more money:
BANK: BANK OF CHINA YUNNAN BRANCH KUNMING CITY GAOXIN SUB-BRANCH YUNNAN CHINA
SWIFT: BKCHCNBJ640
BANK CODE: 1047 3100 9013
ADDRESS: WEST RENMIN ROAD NO.350 KUNMING CITY YUNNAN PROVINCE CHINA
ACCOUNT NO: 621 7852 70000 7850 280
ACCEPT NAME: Chen Yuanping
Well, how about telling us how you met this person/people?
Did they contact you or did you contact them?
How was contact made - in person or internet?
What services did say they COULD offer/provide?
How many times did you meet with them?
What restaurants did you go to with them?
Did they come to your house or did you go to their house?
I can think of many more but just a basic idea
I've already written how the scam works, but here it is again:
www.architectsjournal.co.uk/[...]
I found it from the internet, but this article describes pretty accurately our situation.
______________________
Well, how about telling us how you met this person/people?
Did they contact you or did you contact them?
How was contact made - in person or internet?
A: They are contacting designers/architecture companies by e-mail, i copied their first email to me a couple seconds ago.
What services did say they COULD offer/provide?
A: Scammers 'are searching' design company who will provide European/US design for 56 villas that they will 'start to build' in Kunming
I copied their first email to me a couple seconds ago.
How many times did you meet with them?
A: 1x in Kunming
What restaurants did you go to with them?
A: no idea of the name or location
I can think of many more but just a basic idea
A: please read all of threads in the posting, all should be here now.
Thanks!
@Long Dragon: i can't get e-mail address for Department of Commerce of Yunnan Province, their site is mostly down? Does anyone know their e-mail? I can't read Chinese..
I've just read through the entire thread, and here's my two cents:
@deceived: You can and should file a formal complaint if you can find a channel for it. But don't expect to get any money back, for the simple fact that all of the money you spent (minus your own travel expenses) was part of willing engagement in corruption.
I'm not sure how the law works in France, but if you were a US company, you would already be exposing yourself to prosecution under the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act.
This is actually the heart of the scam. They want their targets to be wary of talking to the police and commerce officials, because the complaint is basically "I tried to bribe your government and they ran away with the money."
I think that the most you can hope for at this point is to spread awareness so others won't fall for this scam.
Sorry to hear about what happened to you.
@Xiefei:
Scammers can't say that we tried to bribe Chinese government and then ran away with the money, cause after returning to France, they wanted to 'proceed' with the contract and make first payment, BUT as according to our contract, we agreed to pay remittance fees, they asked us to pay it first (from whole project amount) and THEN they will make payment asap.
We were quite convinced that everything is real until that moment.
But yes, you're right, i'm pretty sure we'll never get our money back, it's just when somebody who has similar issue is googling Kunming fraud, my posting will come up and they will get more information what happened to us and can be happen to them.
I managed to file a complaint to
through this site as it could be Copyright infringement (company identity theft)
jbts.ipr.gov.cn/tousu/eIprLawcaseInfo.html?sp=S5300
I also found this site (www.bofcom.gov.cn/bofcom/434323585645936640/) which is mostly down, so couldn't get e-mail address from there.
Actually, you said you were under the impression that you were "giving gifts to officials" to "smooth over the process." You were attempting to engage in corruption, and despite all appearances to the contrary, that's illegal in China.
I'm not passing moral judgment on you, just saying that this scam is specifically tailored to make the victims reluctant to report on them. And while the authorities may be interested in investigating these guys (not necessarily, because of the small amounts of money involved), they're not going to be very concerned about getting your bribe money back for you.
@Xiefei: well, that's what they said, that we need to give gift, it's Chinese tradition, which shows respect etc. When we were still in France I read about it in the internet and all seemed good, it is a tradition, so i assumed pen or something symbolic (we also took some sweets to give them from France) but in Kunming, scammers told us that as the project is bigger, gift needs to be bigger and as it's not for one but several people.
We asked what we should give, scammers told us that they have a specific cigarette mark which government people like and took us to the store where we foolishly bought it.
Scammers claimed that it's not a bribe, but tradition, we also have it written in one email.
quote from their email:
''I need to introduce the traditional business culture in China to you, when we sign the contract, there will be some governors from three government departments attend our meeting, they are：State Administration of Foreign Exchange, Bank of China and Fire Protection department. They are as eyewitness for our meeting and support our work. So, it needs you to give some gifts to them(the governors). I suggest you take some money when you come. We have no choice because this is a kind of business culture in China. It is very important because we can get the approval for foreign exchange quickly through the tradition. As to the advice, I hope you can respect the Chinese culture.''
Well, if you're planning on doing business in China in the future, you need to be careful about such things. Tradition or not, it is definitely illegal, and China is in the midst of a large anti-corruption campaign. The courts won't care what your partners told you. It's your responsibility to know and follow the law.
It can be difficult to get things done here without "gifts" and kickbacks, but it can be done.
