BritCits

Beware

Sadly, it seems that there are scammers out there who are attempting to take advantage of people's desperation.

I received the following via email. Obviously this person has done the right thing by notifying the appropriate authorities who are in a position to investigate. At his request, I'm sharing the story.

Be careful and read on :

'I wanted to write to you to tell you about something that is happening on Facebook and I hope that you can spread the word and warn your readers on your website.

When I found out about the new rules on immigration in the UK I not only bookmarked your webpage but also joined a few groups or liked them on Facebook so that I could meet other people who were going through the same visa issues as myself . Well shortly after doing that I had a friend request from a woman who said she wanted to add me because she had seen me on a friend of hers page and thought she could give me advise on the visa issue because she worked for the British embassy in Ireland . On her profile page it says that she works in Dublin and that her fiancé is a UK border agency worker. I thought it was all a bit fishy to start with but carried on with small talk . Over the past few weeks she mentioned where she apparently worked and told me that I could get a visa for my wife by just moving to the UK and then applying for permanent residence when we got there..

Yesterday she started speaking to me and asked how we were getting on with getting the visa , I told her that we haven't done anything yet and were waiting to see what was the best option for us and then she said that she would get us a visa if we paid her $5000 , I knew then that this was a scam but played along hoping that I could get some info on this person where something could be done about her. I pretended to be interested and she told me how she would need a copy of Hayley's passport and a copy of my bank account details to show that I had the money to be able to pay for the visa she would supply and then she went into detail about how she would get the visa for us . She then gave me a fake email apparently from her work at the Dublin embassy .

I straight away called the Met police and told them about this but they said that no crime had been committed and that there was nothing they could do for me . I then called Crimestoppers and explained it all again and they were much more helpful and gave me some phone numbers for the UK Border aAgency where you can fill out a crime report and also a number to a company that investigates fraud. I phone that company http://www.actionfraud.police.uk/contact-us they took details from me and said that they would look into the matter .

When I looked further into this person's Facebook page you can tell that something isn't right , she is adding friends who are from all around the world and is probably finding them on pages liked the one I had liked . Her so called Fiance has friends who also say they work for immigration in the UK but when you look at their pages it is clear that they can't speak very good English and so I am worried that there is a gang of people out there who are trying to exploit people and asking for large sums of money with a promise of a UK visa.

If you can please warn your readers about this scam and hopefully none of them will get caught up in this scam and lose their money to these people.'