Trollng a Scammer

Today, someone tried to scam me out of $400 through texts. They posed as a person who is, basically, my boss at my real estate office. So, they probably got my cell number and information about our office from our website.

I consider myself pretty savvy to all the scams, but this experience taught me it's really easy to fall for one. I was falling for it for an embarrassingly long time. I think it's because the possibility of being scammed is just not in the fore of our mind. This scam actually started last night. I didn't notice the text until this morning, though, and was feeling kind of bad about it.

I guess one thing I should be thankful to this scammer for is making me revisit my notification settings to make it less likely to miss important texts.  

So, I got these texts when I was just leaving Walmart. I was in the parking lot about to pull out and go home. I got back out and headed back into the store. 

At this point, I was thinking my broker needed a gift card right away for some kind of "thank you" or door prize kind of thing. I was thinking I would have to run it by the office, and I was NOT dressed for that. I hadn't showered or really dressed, just wearing some grungy "work outside" clothes. I was just there to get some dog food for my poor hungry dogs. 

I remembered being told never to leave the house without being ready to meet clients. I was busy chastizing myself for not following that advice.

So, I am a little ashamed to admit... this is the point I finally realized this was a scam. I was very surprised at the 2 x $200 request. I was expecting like $25 or maybe $50. $200 is ridiculous. But, I was still mostly thinking about having to go into the office dressed like I was.

When I got to the counter, the cashier asked me how much the cards would be for. There was something about the way she asked that made me realize it was a question specifically to probe for scams. Then it all clicked.

I called the number that was texting me and got Google Voice, then the message about being "in a meeting." 

Okay... I put the cards back, feeling like an idiot. 

At least I didn't waste money on two cards. The scammer wouldn't have gotten away with it if I had -- I would have realized it was a scam when he told me to send him pictures of the cards -- but then I would have had two $200 gift cards I didn't need.

I debated what to do. My first impulse was to say something rather rude to him. But, then I decided to have some fun instead.

Those last three responses were from the menu of one-click responses suggested by my phone. I was thinking I'd just always answer with oue of those and see how long it took him to figure it out. But, after I got back home, fed the dogs, and got in the shower, I had some creative inspiration.

At this point, I was driving to Houma and had to stop for gas at a RaceTrac. I decided to kind of work that into my story.

I was heading to Houma and running out of ideas to lead this guy on, so I decided to wrap things up.

I used to watch videos of people messing with scammers and I've been waiting for the opportunity for YEARS! I wish I could have strung him along for longer. I will have to think of some more excuses not to send pics for next time.