Text of email received today follows - appalling grammar is a dead give-away, but otherwise it's a great workable scam!
mols
Dear Holiday Home Owner,
We are contacting you as we came across your wonderful holiday home on the internet and are very interested in talking to you as we would like to add your property to our expanding property portfolio.
We are a small family travel company who have spent the past 8 years providing simple to exclusive holidays in Tuscany & Umbria in Italy. After a large success we are now broadening our horizons and have created a new holiday company which will provide simple to exclusive holiday homes across Europe.
We currently have an extensive customer database of previous clients who not only want to travel to Italy but all across Europe. After much research we have selected your property as one of the many that we would like to add to our collection. As we are a small company we have a very flexible fresh business approach and offer a very personal service to our client?s which has given us our trusting and efficient reputation.
Please feel free to browse our existing website Tusacny-umbria.com and also to view our new European website at european-Holidays-lettings.com. We have proven to be a large success across the world and our main target audiences are in the U.S.A, UK, Australia as well as New Zealand.
We would greatly appreciate it if you could contact us if you require any more information and we would be delighted to discuss any queries that you have. If our service is something that is not of interest to you then we would like to thank you for your time and offer our apologies for disturbing you.
If you are interested about finding out more, then please feel free to contact us at info@european-holiday-lettings.com and we would be delighted to answer any questions that you have. We currently offer the lowest introductory commission rate in the industry at 10% and offer our holiday home owners the freedom to advertise anywhere else they choose. Unlike many agents we do not deduct the commission from your chosen rental price and we also transfer your deposit and final instalment payments as soon as we receive them which are automatically done via our online booking system. We charge our clients a 50% deposit and the remainder of the balance is due 60 days prior to departure. If you prefer an alternative method then we are happy to discuss this with you.
We take full responsibility for all of the client contact and will liaise with them directly as well as providing a full booking confirmation pack inclusive of maps. As from September which is our schedule launch date we will be operating a UK call centre where our experienced staff will be on hand to answer all of our client?s queries. We also have a tried and tested advertising campaign which includes weekly advertising in the Sunday Times amongst others as well as in some of the major travel magazines and websites.
We would like to thank you for your time and look forward to hearing from you soon.
Please feel free to contact me for any further information.
With kind regards and best wishes,
Omar Qureshi.
Director
European Holiday Lettings LTD
European Holiday Lettings LTD, 12 Edward Street, Ashton-under-Lyne, Lancashire,
OL6 6RF. England.
Registered in England and Wales Company Number 6131603
Tel: +44 (0)161 339 2810
Fax: +44 (0) 161 344 5952
Doea anyone know this little beauty?
- Mountain Goat
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Scam or spam?
I rather like this from their Tuscany site; someone's been around the block before.
I rather like this from their Tuscany site; someone's been around the block before.
8. MISCELLANEOUS
The vacation houses and apartments in Umbria or Tuscany we have to offer are usually renovated farmhouses. The houses are privately owned and furnished according to the tastes of the individual owners. Furnishings, kitchen utensils, and the quality of beds in some cases may not measure up to the expectation of quality in your home country. Even an equal price does not necessarily guarantee equal furnishings and quality. The distances given are approximate. Some driveways are in poor condition.
When one lives among nature, it is possible to be visited from time to time by small animals that belong to an intact environment. Often grass on a natural piece of property is not mowed and may be quite high. Houses surrounded by fields can count on agricultural work being carried out at certain times of year. It is not possible for us to give absolute guarantees about the quality of the waters and sunbathing beaches, as the condition may change may often change, also according to the season. It is possible that water and electricity service may be interrupted, especially in the summer.
As these and similar situations are typical in southern countries, we are not liable for them and will not give refunds requested with this as their basis.
- Giddy Goat
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He has made typos in both links to his websites. That's a giveaway for a start! When one corrects them, the Tuscany-Umbria one on a Who-is check is owned by a Martin Reinbold in Germany and the second is indeed Omar's from Lancashire, but under construction....
Why would you go to all that trouble to spam people with a well-thought out (and overly effusive) email, but make such fundamental mistakes - and who in the world would be interested in signing up without even being able to see the website? Well, the one his name seems to fit!
Why would you go to all that trouble to spam people with a well-thought out (and overly effusive) email, but make such fundamental mistakes - and who in the world would be interested in signing up without even being able to see the website? Well, the one his name seems to fit!
Nostalgia isn't what it used to be