Just when TCA think they have seen it all, another scam slides across our desks. This one is particularly inventive and gave us a wry smile whilst investigating. This scam arrives by email, unlike the normal pattern of scams. So without further ado, let’s investigate.
TCA Investigation
It’s the well worn fake court case where money has been awarded, except it hasn’t! The contact letter sent to the victim is without doubt a cut and paste exercise, although the potential victims name and address is quoted at the top of the letter, instead of being addressed personally, it begins Dear Sir and Madam:
“Dear Sir and Madam
We write with reference to your account in which funds are being held in trust under your name as the beneficiary. There are legislative acts governing cross border trading and dual taxation treaties which need to be adhered to, prior to the account being released to the beneficiary. The details of the beneficiary, the beneficiaries account and the beneficiary’s obligations are detailed herewith:”
The first bone of contention is that the letter states that funds are being held in trust. Trusts, as a right of property or assets held by one party for the use of another, are not recognized under Portuguese law. Next, the actual letter makes no mention where and why there are supposedly monies held in a “trust”, in fact it doesn’t even state the amount of monies to be paid out of the “trust”.
Needless to say, the letter does go on to say that there are problems to overcome before the funds can be released:
“In order to complete the transaction and release the account to the beneficiary, the beneficiary is aware that the following obligations to the Republic of Portugal must be adhered to:
• A completed 20255 tax declaration stating that no taxes are owed in respect of the award to Governo de Portugal and submitted by the nominated representative to the DirecçãoGeral dos Impostos.
• A Cross Border Litigation Permit duly certified by Ordem dos Notarios accompanying the original judgement. European directives 91/308/EEC & 2011/97/EC & Portuguese Decreto-Lei no129/2007 de 27 de Abril”
Now it doesn’t take a brain surgeon to work out where this is leading, you guessed it! The letter goes on to state a fee for this service with a sum required of €969.62.
Before we move on, there is no such document as a cross border litigation permit and the EU Directive mentioned is in relation to criminal money laundering, not settlements from supposed court cases.
Now here comes the really interesting part. The letter is supposedly coming from Ordem Dos Notarios which is the trade body and register of notaries in Portugal. Translated it means “the Order of Notaries”
Two points come to mind, firstly, notaries would not get involved in this sort of service and secondly, the supposed notary handling this case, José Carlos Pereira Carvalho, does not appear on the register of Portuguese notaries.
Next, we come to the address quoted on the fake letter:
Ordem dos Notarios
Avenida, Visc de Valamor A,
1000-290, Lisboa
Tlf: 920 597 204
All looks good so far, but wait….let’s check that with the address quoted on the official website:
Avenida Visconde de Valmor 19A
1000-290 Lisbon, Portugal
Tlf: (+351) 275 241 693
Those with keen eyesight will notice that the fake address fails to quote the street number; obvious really, the scammers don’t want you turning up unannounced. Next we see the phone numbers are entirely different.
Moving on we look at the quoted email addresses. On the real site we see:
On the scammers communication we see:
The real domain was registered in July 2000; the scam domain was registered in May 2023.
Now here it becomes even more interesting. Accompanying the fake letter there is also a document with the following information:
First name : José Carlos
Middle name: Pereira
Family name: Carvalho
DOB: 24/08/1965
Email: carvalhojosecarlospereira@gmail.com
Address: Rua Barbosa Du Bocage 8, Sintra, Lisbon, 2710-517
Tel: +351 930 051 605
Social security number: 672-68-7337
First point would be why the contact email is shown as @gmail.com when it should be@notaries.pt. Next off we checked the address, turns out that this address belongs to a rather splendid hotel, the Valverde Sintra Palácio De Seteais. According to the hotel website, The Valverde Sintra Palácio de Seteais is located in the heart of Sintra, a resort town and UNESCO World Heritage Site, only 30 kilometres from Lisbon airport and 1.5 kilometres from Sintra train station. So apart from being a hotel, it’s not even in Lisbon and hardly likely to be a branch office of Ordem dos Notarios.
TCA comment
As we stated earlier, very inventive and likely to fool the unwary, nevertheless it’s still a scam. Doesn’t matter whether its Portugal, Spain or outer Mongolia, if you receive communication stating that there are funds from a court case you have had no prior knowledge of, then its fraud!
Scammers are getting smarter by the minute so it’s up to you to be one step ahead of the game. None of the investigation team at TCA went to the Metropolitan Police detective training school or any other institution. All the information contained in this article is available from Mr Google. We would be the first to admit that we know where to look, and if you don’t, let us know if you suspect a scam and we will do the research for you.
On this occasion the potential victim spotted the scam and simply ran it by us for confirmation, others won’t be so lucky. Whilst €969 doesn’t seem to be worth getting out of bed for, when you consider in 2024 the average wage in Portugal is €1,269 per month, scam two people a month and you’re well ahead of the game.
For those interested, a redacted copy of the fake letter may be downloaded here
For more information regarding this article or assistance in any other timeshare related issues please contact the TCA on 01908 881058 or email: info@TimeshareConsumerAssociation.org.uk