Beware of Checks if you accept them.....

Beware of Checks if you accept them.....

A story to make all of you merchants aware of the danger in accepting checks...

I am sharing with all of you today a story that is incredible to believe even for someone who is going through it as we speak.. A couple of weeks ago I started to receive checks for work orders coming in to my online webstore, www.aghomegoods.com... I received a total of 7 work orders totaling 12,781.00 into the store..

 

I was happy as hell that many WO's and to a single customer it was going to be a good month after all.. Well that was then .. Fast forward two weeks later and the story changes.. All WO came in under PPN Holdings Limited, no problem there but under the scenes my assistant was talking to someone claiming to be Joelle Salgado, an old friend of mine using all his information and that he had started a new company by the name of PPN Holdings, Limited - Still no real red flag there but to me it would have been - You see Joelle Salgado was deported to Mexico back in March.. Yrea he could have come back but still a case worth a red flag.. Well to make a long story short about a week ago I received a call from someone claiming to be from PPN Holdings wanting to know what this was.. By this I mean AG Home Goods and that they had placed no orders through this store and that they were in no way responsible for the payments already made, cleared, and used to purchase furniture already delivered to someone or Joel Salgado himself.. Who this mystery person is I have no idea! Is it the real Joel Salgado? I have no idea? Does he have furniture that is worth over 7,000 that is now a loss to this company? Yes he does.. and who looses out in the end myself of course for trusting that checks received, cleared and deposited by bank were legal and legitimate..

As the bank of PPN Holdings, Limited reversed all charges going through their bank so I was left with a bank account that was negative 7,200, reversed checks for fraud, and the attention focusing on me and my store.. All because my assistant innocently took these WO's over the phone, received the funds, I deposited them,. they cleared the account, and we purchased and delivered the goods, most of which we had in stock.

Although today we filed a police report, got some relief from the people at the station, we are still out the 7,200 dollars in furniture we have already purchased and shipped to this person who we have no idea who it is... and thank GOD the last two checks did not go through the account and the orders cancelled because that would have made it over 12,000 in purchases... we would now be looking at losses.. Its amazing.. when you look at it a check can be duplicated by anyone..

They sell the check paper at office depot, office max, and just about anywhere stationary is sold.. All people really need is your check, routing number, account number and a simple check copy has all the information they need to do anything they wish with your account.. I mean print as many as you want and simply use them to buy things.. By the time the other party reacts, God only knows how many things you have purchased.. and all those stores simply loose that money as the originating bank always gets their money back, as they report the fraudulent activity.. I wonder what happens to thew people who do this on purpose.. 

Anyone can order checks online to any account and there is no verification... 

or print your own checks at home..

What is to stop a legitimate business from ordering a bunch of stuff using pay by check, having it delivered to a location other then their address, and then calling the bank and saying it was not them.. and to please reverse all charges.. HUH, one has to wonder.. 

I am writing about this to see if something similar has happened to anyone out there and if it has please send me the info as I would love to compare notes and maybe find who did this because now instead of having a good month I am having a horrible month.. I have losses totaling almost 8,000 and I don't even know how I am going to make that up.. Needless to say, Avant-Garde (AG Home Goods) is no longer accepting checks for orders unless you want us to hold the money for a period of three months and then send you your order. And actually we don't even want to do that,.. I do apologize for all of you who have paid by check and have sent in legitimate business checks to our checking account

AG Home Goods