MONEY MORAL DILEMMA. Would you give a stranger £3?

antilles

This happened to a friend of mine a few years back, smart guy in a suit approached him at a petrol station and asked him for 7 quid to buy a fan belt for his car as it had just snapped.

My friend gave him the money then as he drove away, he saw the guy approaching someone else. He passed the garage on his way back from lunch 20 mins later and the guy in the suit was still asking people for money.

What a great con!

munkiemunkie81

Where I live - most definitely yes as most train stations are quite urban and pasengers are few and far between so hardly a money making scheme.

In london however - i am scared of the amount of people! and if i think of me being a smartly dressed woman if i lost my train money i'd ask for help from the train people/police and not from joe public! I cant even bring myself to ask someone for a returnable £1 coin at the local supermarket for a trolley!

judosteffer

This was a well known scam in Swindon. So no!

thelawnet

mmillie wrote: »

There is a similar scam going on at my local station. Someone stands in the ticket machine queue and puts £15 in the machine for a £16 ticket. They make a great show of hunting for the last pound, holding the queue up. When they can't find it, they ask the person behind them for a pound, who in frustration at the delay pretty much always gives it to them. When they get it, they hit the refund button and walk off with all the money.

That's quite risky. If you ask for £2 then there's little risk for being rumbled, but if you walk off in plain view with the money, it's just theft, and you're risking a punch in the mouth.

dipsy

maybe I am a sucker, but I would probably help out if I could......

dninja

This scam was being pulled in Sheffield by a girl last year. She was out on bail at the time for a similar scam. I know this because my partner, mate and I got approached by her. I refused but they clubbed together and gave her 16 quid. I said at the time it was a scam then months later she was on the front of the local paper.

charis18uk

About ten years ago I was stopped by a woman accompanied by her small child in a pushchair asking me if I could spare her a pound for her bus fare as she had lost her purse. I gave her the pound and I was one my way. A week later she was in the local paper as her con had been discovered and she had been collecting god knows how much money for her 'bus' home.

Would I give the £3? No, but I would help by perhaps purchasing the ticket she needs. I'd rather give the money (by purchasing the ticket) in good faith than actually risk her being genuine and doing nothing at all.

I remember standing waiting for a bus in a strange town and had only a note on me for the bus journey. It was one of those services where you can buy a ticket and it covers you for upto five passengers. The tickets were exact change only so I couldn't get on the bus. A family of three behind me let me board on their ticket and I couldn't thank them enough especially as I had my son with me.

BigMikeyG

I would offer to buy them a ticket but whether they accepted or not would be another matter.... I live in London and seen this happen to other ppl.

blondecaz

I have done this and I would again... we've all been there at one time or another and why not help someone out if they look honest?

glitterjunkie

I had this happen to me at the bus stop last week actually, a man asked me for £1 for his bus fare. He was smartly dressed too, which surprised me. I didn’t trust him on instinct though, so I told him I didn’t have any cash on me. I’m not sure whether it being a woman would make any difference, as a fellow female….possibly if she seemed genuine, but probably not though. I’ve heard of scams where someone asks you for money, but their mate is lurking nearby ready to snatch people’s purses/wallets as soon as they get them out.

I’m afraid there are just too many scams around these days…it’s a real shame that it puts people off helping those who may be genuine, but I’m not risking getting my bag snatched/purse nicked for anyone! Anyway, I have to work for half an hour to earn £3, and I hate my job so there you go

I got scammed by some woman in Manchester city centre selling ‘lucky heather’ a few years ago (lucky heather my backside …but I was only 18, had just moved to the city and was very naïve!) I told her I would buy some as I thought she’d put a curse on me or something (told you I was naïve!)…I only had a fiver though, but she said she had change. The cheeky cow shortchanged me by £2 though, and then acted dumb when I asked her for the rest of it (pretending she couldn’t understand me) and then ran off. I also got scammed in Tenerife by a man selling tickets to a foam party that night - he seemed genuine, so me and my friend coughed up about 30 euros. It was only when we mentioned it to our holiday rep that he told us we’d just fallen for a well known scam on the island…of course there was no party, and we never saw our 30 euros again! I don’t trust ANYONE these days! (sorry I know that’s really off-topic…but maybe I’d have answered this dilemma differently if I hadn’t have experienced these scammers before!)