Car body repair scam for paintless dent removal. Scammer finds you in a parking lot, offering to remove minor dents from your car, claims they do this on the side for extra money besides their normal job doing it for a company during the day, will do for you for 1/4 the shop price. They end up doing a lousy job and making your car worse with their inadequate tools and skills. There was no written contract or paperwork.
They start out saying you pay nothing if you are not satisfied. Then when done, you express your dissatisfaction and they try to claim YOU were the one scamming them by not wanting to pay the full amount they proposed IF you were satisfied. They make you feel guilty for not paying and try to intimidate you. They threaten to call a tow truck to seize your car and put a mechanic’s lien on it. When you get your car home later and wipe off the paste, you see they caused more damage and didn?t fix the problem.
The Hispanic male about 25 doing the work said his name was ?Tony? with close cut hair. He called me on his Cricket cellphone “832-388-8419” while he was there and said I could call him later if he needed it fixed more. However, it was all a ruse, because he knew his work was terrible and had no intention of ever doing more. That?s why he uses the white paste to hide the damage he caused and says it must be left on overnight. By the time you remove it later, you discover the scam and he is long gone. His wife was about 25 also and the 50 year old fat mother of one of them had her boobs almost spilling out of her top. The women both had dirty blonde or light brown hair.
They were driving a fancy expensive-looking black 2-door sports car in the Fry?s Electronics parking lot Monday night 5-3-10 about 830PM at 11565 S.W. Hwy 59 South Houston, TX with store phone 832-200-3300.
Is This A “Franchise” And Are There Any Stll Available ?
I didn’t know that there were people who would fall for this type of thing. It must be the same people who buy air filters or spark plugs to double their fuel economy.
Trying to list all of the scams out there would be nearly impossible. Probably the best advice would be not to buy car parts or services in a PARKING LOT !
Always know who you are dealing with, even if the person is an alluring ". . .50 year old fat mother of one of them had her boobs almost spilling out of her top. "
CSA
Thanks for the warning, but I am of the opinion that most of the regulars on this site would be too wary of an itinerant parking lot body repairman to be taken in by him.
I can recall–many years ago–that some shady characters would haunt the parking lot of a local discount store in Jersey City, hawking allegedly “hot” luxury watches for…something on the order of $25. The stated brand was Omega. I did not have enough money at the time for their alleged luxury goods, and was altogether too cautious about suspicious-looking folks to have been taken in by them.
But, one of my friends–the type who comes up with a new “get rich quick” plan every few months–did fall for these scam artists. He called me up on the phone, and urged me to come right over to see his new Omega wristwatch. I drove over, instantly noticed something “not right” about the watch, and proceeded to move the hands. When the hands were moved away from the area where the brand name appeared on the watch face, it was revealed that the brand was Cimega.
All it took to make this sale was artful placement of the hands and a very gullible customer who wanted to believe that what was too good to be true really was true.
This is NOTHING new…Seen and heard about for over 30+ years now…First time was when I got back from Nam and stationed at Ft Campbell Ky. Some LOCAL boys setup a shop outside base and prayed on the service men…They milked 20-30 servicemen out of a few hundred dollars and by the time the authorities found out…they were LONG GONE.
And lets not forget about the guy selling Stereo equipment or furniture out of van…this is still around…
Or the guys who just happen to be sealing one of your neighbors driveway and will give you a GREAT deal if you do it NOW…
Ever hear of “The Travelers”???
Happens every Spring when they start heading north again . Every year the priests in our local parishes would warn against them but some poor old lady would get taken badly . Driveway coatings , roof repair , dent removal , cancer cures - they do it all .
Only if you are a gullible chump…
They tried this on my mother, but she was smart enough not to go for it.
Of course they do a lousy job. What kind of quality body work do you expect from a stranger in the parking lot of an electronics store? It doesn’t matter what kind of service or goods we are talking about. Legitimate businesspeople don’t do business this way…ever.
Sorry, but if you agreed to this while standing in or walking through a parking lot you deserve to be ripped off.
If you wanted dents repaired you would have gone to a dent repair place and asked to have your car fixed. You didn’t do that, so I have to assume you weren’t worried about the dents until “Tony” brought them to your attention, claiming he could fix them for a bargain price.
You expected something that was too good to be true, and that’s what you got.
Next time, just say, “No, thanks.”
This scam is not new and defintely illegal and immoral. And I doubt of his real name was Tony.
Thanks for the heads-up. A reminder never hurts, and if one person who had not heard of this scam reads your post and is saved from being a victim you’ll have done a good thing.
I’d let the local police know so they can watch for him. A letter to the newspaper might be a good idea too.