It has been brought to Hotel Suppliers’ attention, via a handful of our own clients whom have been affected, that there is a vicious group of scammers targeting the Hospitality sector and the companies within it.
One example of this is a gentleman who has posed to be from an established hotel group as one of their leading employees, contacting a company within our network to place an order for a large amount of products.
Fortunately, after doing some extensive research into the enquiry and the person behind it, the company was able to extract themselves from the deal before shipping the goods. We would like to take this opportunity to advise everyone across the sector to stay alert and be thorough when doing background checks on any suspicious enquiries/leads that come through.
At a time where online fraud soars, this well-planned and executed scam is designed to make companies believe they are being approached by leading members of reputable hotel groups. The scammer presents themselves as a member of staff from the hotel group, ensuring the real employee has a LinkedIn profile to back up the story that they present to the company receiving the order.
If you do have, or have had any suspicious enquiries or orders come through, or an enquiry that seems a little too good to be true, we strongly advise you research the lead thoroughly in order to be certain that it is legitimate.
Ways in which you can do some research into the lead includes examining the domain of the email address, if the web server can’t be found, or has only very recently been registered, then it is likely to mean it could be a scam. Typically, you would be able to contact the person through a general hotel group number, if this is not possible, or indeed the person doesn’t know anything about the order, then it is more than likely a scam and be particularly cautious if they ask for credit.
Finally, we’d like to just remind everyone once more to be fully prepared for this kind of scam as it appears to be occurring across the sector.
