chain letter aimed at kids

jockettuk

my daughter got a letter from one of her friends basically its a chain letter stating that kids all around the world have been doing this since 1996 and when it finishes winter 2006 it will go into the guiness book of records etc .. it asks that you copy the letter stating abt the guiness record attempt and add your name to the bottom of the names omitting the top name on the back of the envelope and in a months time you will get a thank you letter from the post office... call me cynical but i cant stand chain letters or chain spam mail.. i throw them in the bin or delete them .. i dont believe im going to get cursed or lose the love of my life or etc etc.. but how do you explain it to a 11 yr old who thinks they will upset there friend if they dont carry it on??

This is a new one ive not heard before anyone heard of it?

skylight

My daughter and her friends got this too.

It took ages to tell them its a load of rubbish and they will get nothing. I don't envy you having to tell them - it wasn't easy. They think I am an interfering Mum and that it must be real, cos why would anyone start this if it was rubbish.

And I am still not convinced that they are not going to do anything with it.

Astaroth

Whilst it is rubbish it doesnt really cost them anything other than the cost of a stamp and all it claims they will get is a thanks letter so no monitary benefit.

Most of these are by email rather than snail mail and therefore dont "cost" anything to send - normal precautions of antivirus/ spyware etc protects against anything truely malicious that may be attached to it.

I would explain to them that it is a scam but wouldnt stop them from sending it on if thats what they want to spend their pocket money on.

jockettuk

the thing with these chain letters is although this one isnt that bad.. is that some say some real nasty things if you dont send them on, dont want her to start getting worried that she or i are going to die or have something horrible done to us if its not passed on in the future. i would rather she recognised that these things are a scam and that although this one might be ok to send she wont actually receive anything from the post office. she needs to know she doesnt have to believe everything thats is written or said.. unless its by me of course

Turning_into_scrooge

My niece used to get allot of these sent to her email add by her friends. Some of them actually said that if she didn't mail it to at least 1 person within a certain time frame she would die:mad: . It scared her so much that she had to send them :mad: , when i found out i told her to send it to me and i would delete it for her which she did, i never forwarded any of these mails on and guess what? I'm still alive:T . These mails and letters are nasty and manipulative and threatening on a good day, they are also illegal. Bad enough an adult receiving these but its well out of order a child getting them. My niece is now 18 and has the sense to bin them but a 12 it was a different story.

Crispy_Ambulance

My daughter got one of these (age 6) from a school friend across the road. I thought it was probably a scam - it tells you the post office will pay the postage so I googled it and put it in the bin. I told the parents it was a scam - can't believe they thought it was real!

Bossyboots

Astaroth wrote:

Whilst it is rubbish it doesnt really cost them anything other than the cost of a stamp and all it claims they will get is a thanks letter so no monitary benefit.

Most of these are by email rather than snail mail and therefore dont "cost" anything to send - normal precautions of antivirus/ spyware etc protects against anything truely malicious that may be attached to it.

I would explain to them that it is a scam but wouldnt stop them from sending it on if thats what they want to spend their pocket money on.

My niece got one of these and it terrified her. She was frightened that she would be bullied if anyone found out she had broken the chain. It took her parents, me, my daughter, my husband and her grandad to finally convince her the children sending them in the first place was wrong to do so and that her mum would tell the school these were going round (the schools round here have banned them).

It is not usually just one they have send back either. It can be between 6 and 10.

While the one described in the OP sounds harmless enough, it is the peer pressure behind it that can cause problems. Sadly, as has been described, many of these warn of dire consequences if you break the chain.

Aside from that, you are also supplying your name and address to people all over the place as if you send to six people, they will send your name on to six people, who send it on again to six people etc. so who knows who will get the details.

Murtle

I remember these from when I was a child (I'm 30), they were very common at primary school and secondary school. There were girls in my class/year who were always scared of not passing them on, so I always said they could pass them to me, whereby they felt they had completed their side of it (yes sometimes I got all 6 or however many they needed to send on), I then chucked them away. I guess with email now, they are less common in the hand written form. I never knew how they managed to get around, but you'd notice the same ones coming through year on year.

Explain to your daughter that nothing bad will happen because of the letter and show her some of the scam sites that explain the background to the letters.

If she really wants to send them on, tell her to write them out and that you'll post them on (and then forget to). Will keep her mind at rest and your purse full of money!

Good luck

KizzyK_2

I got the post office snail mail one a few (about 8) years ago, took it round to the post office to check it out (the days before google ), he didn't have a clue so I just binned it

gibby

some con artist I new had this done to him but slightly different

he was a horrible guy - ran a biz and ripped off ppl all the time and just insulted customers who complained

someone set up a web page about a poor little ill child who was collecting postcards for the guiness book before he died.
they used this guys address on the net and one monday morning he couldnt open the door due to all the mail - which continued for weeks, keeping he staff busy until he glued the letterbox shut.

then it got worse as they changed the web page telling people not to use a stamp as the post office were doing a free delivery

he was charged over £1 a time as a post office charge and closed his business a week later.

I never got my money he owed my but to hear he went out of business was music to my ears & I had a good laugh too.


G