Friday 28 March 2014

MUST READ: Internet scam victim narrates how she was scammed by fake online store www.smartnaija.com

So yesterday i was battling with a bad headache and watching my favourite series of the moment 'being maryjane' when my friend of many years(secondary school) pinged me and needed to talk. 
i gladly put the series on hold and was eager to know why she buzzed so late in the night. 

To my greatest surprise she had an internet scam story she wanted to share with people to avoid them from falling victim like she did. 

What won't we hear in Nigeria, twice now my Facebook account has been hacked and the innocent hearts of my friends and well wishes ripped into giving out money in pretence of me being stranded, it got so bad that the person went ahead to hack my mail as well, it took a miracle to get myself back together that day. 


Fast forward to today, see how she narrates the story when you continue. 

As i am writing this i am still wondering why anyone would be so heartless and keep doing wicked things to their fellow human being. The economy is bad yes we know, there are no jobs yes we know, the government is not helping the youths yes we know but still its no excuse for anyone to steal from anybody else. I am a Lagos girl and i can honestly sad i am embarrassed writing this because i should be smarter but o'well shit happens (pardon my french). This is my story.

I was sitting down jejeli in my office where i do my IT (industrial training) joblessly surfing the net when i decided to open my e-mail (something i rarely do in fact) and i saw a mail. The guy whose name is GODSWILL UZOR sent a message to me introducing his website to and what he does. The website iswww.smartnaija.com. He said he needs distributors in different states and he has only 14 slots open and he would like me to be one of them who would help him get his goods to his customers faster. out of curiosity i opened the website. There were different phones and laptops for ridiculously low prices. at first i was uncomfortable with the prices i just closed it and went on to do other things but he kept sending me mails and i started considering it not because  i needed a change of phone but because i thought it would be a form of making money for me buy them cheap and then sell. I told my boyfriend about it and he checked the site out. He said that the goods look legit but the prices are scary. i decided to call the guy with the number he put up in the mails and on the site to. Of course he sounded legit and assured me it wasn't a scam. My bf suggested we buy the cheapest thing there first in case it failed so we decided to go for a Toshiba laptop which cost #20,000. My dear people as an IT student i collect #15,000 where i work and my bf  is a corper and we all know how much they collect. Anyways we both decided to drop 10k each so that one person wnt bear the risk alone. My bf held on to the money for another 2weeks because he was just not convinced. he was supposed to go check out the office address which d guy put up but one thing or the other always stopped him from going (thinking about it now i think the jazz that guy is using is very strong) the address is 25 URJI STREET OFF NNAMDI AZIKIWE AVENUE, AWKA. my bf serves at Owerri so it is close by. Long story short on a Tuesday my bf sent the money finally without going and after talking to the guy severally. he followed the instructions on the site and ordered for the laptop.
On calling the guy he said there was a problem with the address and that my bf should refill which he did later he stopped picking calls. I foolishly decided to Google the guy after money had been sent (why this didn't come to my mind earlier i don't know) and what i found just broke my heart. A number of people had complained about him on different platforms saying they paid for stuffs they didn't get, a guy put up his phone number saying anyone with information on how to get him should call. i called him and he said the same thing. he paid for the same product i did and never got it. apparently this Godswill guy had changed the account  number he put up on the site three times. First it was First bank with account number 3079618011, then Fidelity bank 6233446216 then Uba2068987994 with the name KENECHI OKECHUKWU GODSWILL. The guy said they traced where the first bank account was opened and it was traced to computer village not Awka.  I was so sad because i felt  responsible for putting my bf into such situation of loosing more than half his NYSC allowance for a month. We kept calling him to no avail. I reported to UBA and the person i talked to said it is a long process to catch someone like that that i have to write a formal letter which would first be sent to the head office and we all know the litany of letters that would be sitting there unread. I just closed that end knowing it would be a lost cause.

I know that money has gone but this can help one or two people out there who is reading this not to fall a victim of this Godswill guy. I hope there are people who can catch him but i know he will definitely be caught one day. He can't keep ripping people off of their hard earned money and keep going scot free, God doesn't work like that.
This is just a form of warning to everyone out there. Do not buy things online except you are 100% sure the site is legit!



Sighs how people think so much evil as to rip hardworking people off. Notice how the comments has a similar sequence? 
Dear God save your good people. You can also visit the site for outrageous price overs. This is one person's experience and I have shared it as she sent it. Be careful guys


5 comments:

  1. may God make him see the end of d road

    ReplyDelete
  2. One idiot like dat sends me dis kind of mail.God punish him!

    ReplyDelete
  3. If its too good to be true. ...then it probably is. ....word of advice. ...stick to payment on delivery ONLY

    ReplyDelete
  4. I almost fell victim my spirit said I should pray A̶̲̥̅̊₪d̶̲̥̅̊ I was on fasting that day. I asked should I pay into the UBA account he said no that he would send an ECO bank account. I told God to show me a sign if this guy I̶̲̥̅̊
    s̶̲̥̅̊
    true or false when he sent the acct. The joy I had died instantly I wasn't happy I changed my mind A̶̲̥̅̊₪d̶̲̥̅̊ decided to google.A̶̲̥̅̊₪d̶̲̥̅̊ saw all the complains. S̶̲̥̅Ơ̴̴̴̴̴̴͡ people in all u do put GOD first A̶̲̥̅̊₪d̶̲̥̅̊ he will surely deliver U̶̲̥̅̊
    .

    ReplyDelete