Personal shopper/assistant - A scam?

Hi all,

I recently posted an add on Gumtree saying that I was available to provide cleaning services (I've been desperate for a job) and received the following reply :

Hi, Am looking for someone who can work for as a Personal help / assistant,pls include your CV and personal email address when replying.
From: Jack

After replying to this email I received this:

Thanks for your swift reply

I am currently in Portugal and will be arriving to United Kingdom by the End of September. My Name is Jack Authur, I have a 4 years old daughter Ann,I will be sending you a secure payment.

The Royal Mail will bring the package to your address, you can cash the Travel Cheque at any bank and the Cheque will be made payable to you in other to be able to pay you your money and buy needed item from a nearby store. All expenses and taxes will be covered by me and I will be paying you per errand.

I will email you the list and pictures of what to shop for when I am ready.No heavy packages is involved! You can do the shopping at Amazon, Asda, Tesco and other stores.You will be shopping for household items, Electronics and clothing.

I will provide you my Royal mail account number for Shipping.All you have to do is provide my account number to Royal Mail and shipping charges will be applied into the account.I will provide clear set of instructions for each task I need done as well the funds to cover them.

How much will you charge per Errand? I will pay(300pounds) for each Errand.That is not a bad offer is it? I need your service because I am constantly out of town because am a Sailor.Well, let me know if you are able to handle the position.


How should your Name appear on the cheque?
And your address Where to mail it to?
And what is your cell phone number?
Age?


Reply

Interestingly I've been corresponding with someone who turned out to be a scammer. This scammer offered to pay me £300 for a few hours work weekly as a home cleaner and even sent me a cheque for £1800 which had come from a stopped cheque book (I took it all to my bank and after a few calls, the worker there found it to be stopped).

This morning I received an email from this Jack guy asking if the cheque had arrived this morning. An attempted special delivery from Royal Mail had indeed happened although I'd missed it.

After some research I found that members of this form had received similarly worded emails, most notably the "That's not a bad offer is it?" bit.

Is this all a scam or real?

Thanks,

Pete

[poirot]

Of course it's a scam. Any offer of cashing checks or money orders, or receiving payments in any form and then forwarding the money or goods to a third individual is money laundering. The source will be illicit such as credit card fraud or some other crimes. There's an ongoing thread on this subject here: http://fraudwatchers.org/forums/show...=32361&page=32

also http://fakechecks.org/

Thanks, I thought it might be after almost getting scammed by another job offer.

I'm normally quite knowledgeable in scams as I used to partake in scambaiting 419ers but I'd never heard of these job frauds until recently.