Lay My Hat

This arrived yesterday
"hi is your apt available for date shown as flights booked. Couple aged 61. Is there a golf discount too? Thanks."
No number of people specified, no phone number, e-mail a hotmail.co uk address & IP lookup says it came from Dallas. I replied before I realised maybe this was a scam.
Has anyone else had it? And do you think I should be worried?

The spelling of apartment is incorrect so must be a scam

BTW You can't really track a Hotmail address as it will always show as coming from a Hotmail server, most of which seem to be in the USA, regardless of where the user is. It is a web based email service.

To teba18, there is no reason to be worried. In replying to the enquiry all you have done is to confirm that their enquiry has hit a 'live' email address, As long as you haven't provided any personal information or clicked on any links or attachments no harm has been done.
If I had received this mail I would have responded as well. It would appear to me to be from who was sending out a number of enquiries to determine who has availability.

And I am sooo stupid! I just had a feeling about it (not sure why!) so checked source of email - then got more suspicious because although the e-mail came from 'hotmail.co.uk' the source was in the US. which made no sense ..............................................
....unless of course you factor in the fact that it had been forwarded to me by OD!!
How stupid am I!!!!!

teba18 wrote:And I am sooo stupid! I just had a feeling about it (not sure why!) so checked source of email - then got more suspicious because although the e-mail came from 'hotmail.co.uk' the source was in the US. which made no sense ..............................................
....unless of course you factor in the fact that it had been forwarded to me by OD!!
How stupid am I!!!!!

I dont think you were stupid at all - I would have replied to this although my scam alarm would have been on full alert. Not everyone in the world is computer savvy and some of these types of enquiry are genuine - so maybe best not to always to throw the baby out with the bathwater! It may well be and could of course be a scam but as Kev said, with Hotmail addresses you never can tell exactly where the email has actually come from as they almost always seem to come from the states. I prefer to answer with caution on such cases and if I get the obvious scam later then oh well - however if I get a booking then great!

kevsboredagain wrote: You can't really track a Hotmail address as it will always show as coming from a Hotmail server, most of which seem to be in the USA, regardless of where the user is. It is a web based email service.

That's useful to know. Just to be clear, does that mean that in teba 18's example, although the address is hotmail.co.uk, there's nothing unlikely about it arriving from a US IP address? That's how I'm understanding it anyway.
Ta.

I would reply courteously but briefly to an enquiry like that and wait and see. My experience is that either you hear absolutely nothing or get the 'great news!' spam-o-gram, but some people just don't know how to phrase an enquiry so unless it is glaringly obviously spam I'd play the waiting game.

I did reply but it was a brief 'holding' message (we were away for the day and I just couldn't reply then with all the booking details) I thanked him for his enquiry, explained that I couldn't reply fully but said we did have availability and I would send booking details when we got back. Then I got a bit worried and decided to send a message to ask if there was a number I could possibly ring him on and a convenient time to call - and I've had nothing at all back. So I'm guessing either it was genuine but he booked somewhere else, he didn't like the idea of me ringing him or it wasn't genuine - could be any of the above!