[007]

Disclaimer :
I have written this one also on Quora ( link : https://qr.ae/pYKmft )


This one is very interesting.
Was tried on us at Jaipur, however did not fall for it.
Being a city famous for tourism Jaipur is always flooded with tourist. I traveled there with my wife and son to have a good family trip.
As usual the taxi driver we booked from hotel were extremely humble, friendly and talkative.
Here it comes.
D is for driver. M is for me.
Other characters will get added as we move ahead.
D : Where you will be visiting in Jaipur sir
M: Khatu Shyam Mandir and nothing else.
D: Sir that is absolutely right however, I strongly feel you set visit more places in Jaipur.
Now we were intrigued to see what comes next.
M: What you suggest?
D: Sir, Jaipur is very famous for Amer fort. You must visit there. It was our great king Man sing who built it, before him nothing was there.
M: We will think of it, currently our schedule is compact.
D: Sir, you have come all this way long, visit a it at least once and you will feel it is a way more worth.
M: Is it nearby?
D: Kind of nearby but if you go by public transport then they will leave you at the gate and then you have to take jeep sawari to visit the palace. Better you do advance booking with us, I will take you directly inside the fort and also explain the complete history.
M: Thanks but we are not sure in case we make it up or might will give you call tomorrow morning.
D: And one more thing sir…
Now this was the new iPhone launch moment for me…… one more thing

M: go on
D: Man sing choose that place to build fort, because he had a very good astrologer who told him the exact place where to build the fort. Before building the fort they had very good Mandirs made at all of the 8 directions and surrounding it and then on then they started building the main fort. This astrologer is based nearby the fort. Currently his 5th ( or something ) generation is doing same work.
M: Good to know, but there are no kings now.
D: They provide the astrological advice for free sir, most of the people who visit the fort seek their advice for free.
M: My friend, I am from IT industry and we know that if anything is free then you are the product!
D: I do not get what you are saying sir, but this is coming from there generation, you must visit it's nearby the village, off the fort.
M: how they will do it for free ?
D: Government is paying them pension sir…
M: This is something new and unheard. Let's see if we meet tomorrow, bye.
D: Bye sir, it will be my pleasure to show you Jaipur tomorrow and maybe get your fortune back when you visit the astrologer.
Day2;
We were clever enough not took the same taxi again, so we will opted for another taxi and service provider.
D2: Welcome sir, it's my pleasure to show you Jaipur and our famous Amer fort.
M: Wait I am not very sure, first we want to see the hawa Mahal, jantar mantar and if time permits then only we will try to go to the fort.
D2: No problem sir, I will take the best route so that you can cover all.
So Market shopping, hawa mahal etc was done.
D2: let's go to the fort now sir.
M: We are very much tired.
D2: No worries. We have to drive at least for an hour, you can see jal mahal and between and you will be relaxed and refreshed by the time we reach fort.
M: Okay chalo.
Jal mahal was done.

Amer fort also done.






He suggested his tourist guide friends but we politely declined and preferred to read the history on the stone carvings instead.
M: All done let's go.
D2: You must have got good likes on the photos and why not our great king Man sing had this famous astrologer who got him to build fort here which will bring him a lot of fortune. Their next generation is still doing this good work of telling people fortune. They don't take any money. You also don't want to loose the chance to see what's in your destiny.
He said it all in one breath (like script).
M: thanks we are here, let's cover that as well, chalo.
M: I still wonder… they are doing it for free.
We reach the place in less than 5 mins.
So we have this huge building where everyone wants to to welcome you.
A very cool breeze of air can be felt at the entrance confirming air conditioned building.
Taxi Driver has called beforehand so we have reservation. We meet pandit ji.
(P for Pandit ji)
P : so you are 3 people. Tell me date of birth and then show the hands.
we do it.
P : All your luck is because of your wife. So let me tell about her .
My wife smiling and looking at me with pride.
P : Madam is Laxmi, all things are good but ….
(here it comes ….. the climax part)
P : to ensure unlimited wealth flow we must do a pooja here and get her wear blessed stone ring. According to her sun sign you must get her Pushkaraj . There are many people selling these stone duplicates. So you must buy from a reliable source.
Also make sure you buy exact carat, weight etc. specifications I am writing on this paper.
Then he proceeded for me and my son, prescribed panna and diamond - again with his specs.
Soon he finished…. a gem expert is called and appears in his cabin within 2 seconds.
(G form Gem Expert)
G : Hi sir, I am gem expert, here are my certificates. Let me see what pandit ji has prescribed.
Reads the paper. Thinks………. There is a huge smile on his face.
G : Sir I have exact stones available. You are very lucky.
M : ok . very good.
G : Let me show you. This one with pure metal alloy ring should cost you about 52k INR.
M, W, S ( Me, Wife, Son) : 0 expressions on face. As we have pre decided, we will not be buying anything.
G : Sir, shall I go ahead with booking ?
M : No my friend !
G : Sir any problem ?
M : Yes no money.
G : Sir you can pay half now, and half when it’s delivered.
M : Still it would be difficult.
G : Then you can pay 10k INR now, rest later
M : ………………………
G : Pay 5k now and rest later
M : …………. …………….. ………………. !
G : Pay 1000 now and rest in EMIs.
M : My friend I said no money, not low money. So I am sorry, I am not interested in buying.
G : ……
M : Thanks Pandit ji for advise. Keep these papers in case we change our mind in future.
P : Puts them in dust bin. No sir, the astronomical position will be different and advise may change. I have to redo the kundali that time.
M :
So we move out of his cabin with blunt faces.
While moving out, other guys in same shop were trying to lure us to buy at least some clothes, T shirt at least.
we bought nothing…absolutely..!
During return trip…
D2 : How do you find it sir ? Amazing na ?
M : Aaj Raja banate banate rah gaya bhai..! (I was too close to become king today)

[paras211]

It was 2012 was on my honeymoon to bali, I make it a point to read the local scams on wikitravel , one of these was a too good to be true exchange rate.
1$ was about 9600, this store was offering 9999,it was also selling leather bags so on stroll post dinner we enter to change 100$ to satisfy our curiousity.
We handover a 100$ bill and the guy puts 5x100,000 notes on the counter and the another 5 over each . Once I swept it up , I counted them by keeping each on the table, unsurprisingly they were only 8. So he did a repeat performance , and so did I. Finally he got angry and flung the 100$ bill at me which I picked up and left.
Glad that I didn't get scammed.

[jimnylife]

2025 Jan - Lucknow Bada Imambara
The shoe deposit counter guy takes our shoes (2 pairs) , and gives us a slip folded in half. Asked for the charges, said it’s complimentary and we can give anything as per our wish. Gave a Rs 10 Note. Open the slip later to find out- the written rate is 2.5 Rs per pair. Small but smart trap!

2023 June - Paris
People tie bands on your hands and forcefully ask for donations.

Rome - Was filming a guy singing on the metro exit while coming down from the escalator. Immediately a guy swooped in to ask for money since he saw me filming. Said I don’t have cash and left the scene.

[kvsneela]

Don't know whether this is the appropriate place to write about another type of scam.
Scam in tourist place or in temples in our country is nothing new ( since I come from a temple state) as more number of people fall for in these places..But there was ( I am sure it is still going on)a different type of scam going on in Bombay ( now Mumbai).
I have Vitiligo( also called Leukoderma in which the skin starts losing the pigmentation creating white patches) for the last 30 year. I was in Bombay( Mumbai) for almost 12 years from 1995 to 2007. I am mentioning only period because it happened only in Bombay and nowhere else.
Whenever I stand in a que( like in ticket counter) or even on the road somebody ( can be male or female) would approach and say that his/her brother has similar white patches and after a special treatment it became ok. I did not care about this much as I already knew there is no cure for Vitiligo as it is not a disease rather a type of disorder. Even Allopathy have any clue about the cause and there is no permanent cure. Only thing they say it is might be due to Auto Immune system of the body.

Once I was out of the city and wife got some information like this through some office colleague and wanted to try as they told the expenses would be around 2000 /- or so . Since the amount was not much I gave green signal. Somebody came to our house and did some mixture based on coconut oil ( done under the supervision of her office colleagues as I was out of town). After the mixture was ready they dropped a bomb that in order to work effectively the mixture needed gold foils which will cost around 5000/- and they directed her where to buy them. But
only at the time of buying she found out the cost was 25000/- but then also she purchased and the mixture was completed with that gold. ( Did not know whether they are really gold or not). I came to know about this gold foil episode only after I returned back home by the time it was too late. As usual the mixture did not have any effect on vitiligo. I met similar people afterwards and understood many agents like that were moving around the city.
Even in Pondy I get various ideas for treatment on the road but never in level of a scam like in Bombay.

[Gaur]

Last week i visited Prayagraj (allahbad) and Varanasi on a short trip.

I have an observation regarding a activity at dashashwamedh ghat during ganga arti time and not sure if its a scam or not.

So since it gets dark early now, the ganga arti happens at 6:30pm nowadays, we just reached on time for it but the ghat was already jam packed and we could only see the arti happening from a distance.

Here i saw a person carrying a large aarti diya and moving in the crowd randomly without saying anything, the impression he tried to create was that this is the actual ganga arti diya being moved out in crowd so that people standing far can take its darshan, as usual people started taking aarti and offering "money" however i observed that Ganga arti on the ghat was still going on and this guy was just randomly moving in and out of the crowd.

my gut feeling says its a scam.

[warp_10]

Originally Posted by paras211

It was 2012 was on my honeymoon to bali, I make it a point to read the local scams on wikitravel , one of these was a too good to be true exchange rate.
1$ was about 9600, this store was offering 9999,it was also selling leather bags so on stroll post dinner we enter to change 100$ to satisfy our curiousity.
We handover a 100$ bill and the guy puts 5x100,000 notes on the counter and the another 5 over each . Once I swept it up , I counted them by keeping each on the table, unsurprisingly they were only 8. So he did a repeat performance , and so did I. Finally he got angry and flung the 100$ bill at me which I picked up and left.
Glad that I didn't get scammed.

Lol, we got into a very similar situation in Bali. The guy did a similar trick and when I found out, he got angry, and said a lower rate for me.

Another scam that happened recently was in Vietnam. The boat rides were usually being sold at 350000. But then a lady approached us and confirmed that it would be 150000 for 20 mins in the river. We fell for it and got in. He took the boat to the mid river stopped for 10-15 mins to take pics and got back. Technically he did not lie, but a scam indeed .

[the.dogfather]

2018: Phnom Pehn, Cambodia : Jewellery scam
We had planned a 6 day trip in Phnom Pehn, to visit Ankor wat and the other destinations there. Arrangements were done from a reputed travel agency in Trivandrum and was a hotel + taxi with guide arrangement.
The guide was very polite and helpful all through the trip. He had asked my mother a few times about her interest in purchasing jewellery, but she had not shown much interest. On the 4th or 5th day, post lunch, he took us to a jewellery store, and asked us to check it out and buy only if you like anything.

Most started looking and found that the gems were quite cheap( around half of indian prices) and within no time had decided to get some jewellery for every member of the family. The whole shop was quite empty and on asking, they said its usually more crowded in the evening and this is not peak time. I found that suspicious and started searching online for scams. I found a few links claiming that the gems are often fake even though they claim to give a certificate for it.

I quietly went and showed it to my brother. Mom was almost at billing, we told them that our exchange rates on the card is too high and we will go and withdraw cash and come. They offered to accept other currency or even come with us to withdraw cash. We politely said that we will withdraw cash and return. The whole staff was surrounding us now giving us further discounts and offers if we do the purchase immediately. This got my mom also suspicious and we left the place.

I asked the guide directly if he knew about such a scam and showed him the links. He fumbled, and suddenly was timid the rest of the trip. Fortunately it happened towards the end of the trip and we did not create a scene with the guide as he had been nice to us generally.

2022 : Bali,Indonesia : Currency changer scam

We were carrying some cash and were converting to IDR. We noticed a lot of shops which were offering better currency exchange rates. We had spoken to our cab driver who we had appointed for the full trip and he knew a guy who had given us a decent rate earlier. However, in some shops in Kuta we noticed that the rates were better.
The cab driver warned us about unauthorized money changers, but we thought we were smart and decided to try one of these shops. We were not converting a big amount but just wanted to try it out.
So we counted, handed over the cash we had, the guy on the counter counted our cash, and started handing over bundles of IDR. IDR being a very low valued currency was a big amount of cash. Both me and my bother split it and started counting the cash. When we were done, he picked up a brown envolope and put the cash inside it and handed it over.

We got back in the car and started checking and found a bundle missing. It might have been a difference of 1K INR. The cab driver asked us, in a very knowing tone if we are missing any cash. We said yes, and he told us that its a common scam and he had warned us about it. We sheepishly agreed, and consoled ourselves that it was the fee to pay for a good magic show.

[maddy42]

On our visit to Kanyakumari we were told about the temple in Nagercoil which had Bramha Vishnu and Maheshwar statue together so we did visit.

Temple is about 20 mins away from Kanyakumari and has great architecture and very well done up. Here is where the scam lies.

At the entrance there is a group of priests who will first sell you a garland to the 12 feet tall hanuman idol which is the only one with a tail over his head.
400 bucks

Next a priest will dot with you and explain the story of the temple expecting a tip.

Finally at the hanuman idol the priests will corner you forcing you to buy butter which is put on the idol and the rest is given to you for prasad. They ask how many kilos you want? 1 or 2 kilos?

FYI its vanaspathi and not ghee.

This temple is a good visit but beware of these touts pretending to help you out.

[saket77]

Well one very common one- If you have bought pearls/ moti and other gemstones from Puri beach/ during a boat ride from any island, then you can discard them in the dustbin. Everything is fake.

This is a common scam where during the Chilka boat ride, the boatman will lead you to an island where some people will be engaged in 'finding' pearls from the ocean. To prove their point and to make buyers believe in them, they will even break oysters in front of them and show the pearls coming out. To make it more realistic, they will break open a few oysters with no pearls in them and then one with pearl already planted inside. They also sell other jewel stones, of course haggling is also prevalent, but actually they are worthless.

[SteeringStar]

Originally Posted by maddy42

On our visit to Kanyakumari we were told about the temple in Nagercoil which had Bramha Vishnu and Maheshwar statue together so we did visit.

Temple is about 20 mins away from Kanyakumari and has great architecture and very well done up. Here is where the scam lies.

At the entrance there is a group of priests who will first sell you a garland to the 12 feet tall hanuman idol which is the only one with a tail over his head.
400 bucks

Next a priest will dot with you and explain the story of the temple expecting a tip.

Finally at the hanuman idol the priests will corner you forcing you to buy butter which is put on the idol and the rest is given to you for prasad. They ask how many kilos you want? 1 or 2 kilos?

FYI its vanaspathi and not ghee.

This temple is a good visit but beware of these touts pretending to help you out.

My experience was at Coimbatore, just in front of Annapoorna restaurant, Avinashi Road. After parking the car in front of restaurant, while i was getting out of the car, around 3 ladies barged in front of me crying. One of the ladies seems to be pregnant (not sure if the belly bulge was real or not), and she also had blood stains on her feet which seems to be coming from top. All 3 of them were crying and telling me that it is an emergency and they need money to take her to hospital. I was initially taken aback and was about to hand over some cash, however, i realised that the local people near by are not at all minding them nor those ladies are reaching out to any of the others standing by. Since our car registration is KL (Kerala), these ladies seems to have approached us only.

I then decided not to give any money, and i went inside restaurant for lunch. When i return, i see the same drama being enacted in front of another family.

I then realized that this was drama and need to be careful in similar situations in future.

[anjan_c2007]

Scamsters have invaded every possible arena and most of them are revelling and brimming with scammed wealth. This goes on till they are trapped. They get bails after finishing their jail term and reenter their old business this time with more caution and after emerging smarter.

As a scamster acquaintance once confided to me,
"jab tak bewakoof jinda hain, akalmand bhooke nahin marenge".
( means that till fools (conned ones) are alive the intelligent (conmen) won't go hungry).
He had branded himself as intelligent.

[shipnil]

Originally Posted by paras211

We handover a 100$ bill and the guy puts 5x100,000 notes on the counter and the another 5 over each . Once I swept it up , I counted them by keeping each on the table, unsurprisingly they were only 8.

Originally Posted by warp_10

The guy did a similar trick and when I found out, he got angry, and said a lower rate for me.

So how did he do it? If there are just 5+5 notes, it would be easy to count for anyone.

What is the trick?

[warp_10]

Originally Posted by shipnil

So how did he do it? If there are just 5+5 notes, it would be easy to count for anyone.

What is the trick?

He had counted a few notes and placed on a table to a number, but when handed it was a note lesser. Intent might have been that I walk out in a hurry with it.

[Janus]

Originally Posted by paras211

It was 2012 was on my honeymoon to bali, I make it a point to read the local scams on wikitravel , one of these was a too good to be true exchange rate.
1$ was about 9600, this store was offering 9999,it was also selling leather bags so on stroll post dinner we enter to change 100$ to satisfy our curiousity.
We handover a 100$ bill and the guy puts 5x100,000 notes on the counter and the another 5 over each . Once I swept it up , I counted them by keeping each on the table, unsurprisingly they were only 8. So he did a repeat performance , and so did I. Finally he got angry and flung the 100$ bill at me which I picked up and left.
Glad that I didn't get scammed.

Originally Posted by the.dogfather

2022 : Bali,Indonesia : Currency changer scam

We were carrying some cash and were converting to IDR. We noticed a lot of shops which were offering better currency exchange rates. We had spoken to our cab driver who we had appointed for the full trip and he knew a guy who had given us a decent rate earlier. However, in some shops in Kuta we noticed that the rates were better.
The cab driver warned us about unauthorized money changers, but we thought we were smart and decided to try one of these shops. We were not converting a big amount but just wanted to try it out.
So we counted, handed over the cash we had, the guy on the counter counted our cash, and started handing over bundles of IDR. IDR being a very low valued currency was a big amount of cash. Both me and my bother split it and started counting the cash. When we were done, he picked up a brown envolope and put the cash inside it and handed it over.

Isn't it easier to use local bank ATM's (The one's in front of local Indonesian banks) to withdraw cash, most of the US & UK banks offer no foreign currency fee debit cards with transparent MasterCard exchange rates shown in the app (which is same as the real exchange rate when you google).

Indian banks usually do add Foreign currency markups + GST, but don't the newer forex vendors provide free ATM cash withdrawal ?

[paras211]

Originally Posted by Janus

Isn't it easier to use local bank ATM's (The one's in front of local Indonesian banks) to withdraw cash, most of the US & UK banks offer no foreign currency fee debit cards with transparent MasterCard exchange rates shown in the app (which is same as the real exchange rate when you google).

Indian banks usually do add Foreign currency markups + GST, but don't the newer forex vendors provide free ATM cash withdrawal ?

It was more curiousity , also I always carry cash in USD along with a card when travelling abroad. Just to be safe