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Info on Wyoming Corporation (possible scam)

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  1. #1

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    Info on Wyoming Corporation (possible scam)

    I am posting for a friend back home who sent quite a bit of money to the USA to pre-order a new IT product under development. Delivery date has repeatedly been postponed and he is clearly worried (he is one of many customers and no product was shipped ever). He still wants his product though.

    Here are a couple of facts about the company. Does anybody know if there are ways to get more info on them?

    • Company located in Kansas City, registered August 2011
    • Domain registered by Domains by Proxy
    • Address on web site, in private loft in KC
    • Phone, Fax and Skype on web site
    • On email correspondence only first name and first letter of last name ("First L")
    • Registered in Wyoming, Wyoming "C" corporation (says for tax reasons)
    • The incorporator showing in the filing is a person employed by the Registered Agent
    • Registered Agent denied by email that the company is related to them when informed that there may be a scam going on
    • Registered Agent finally resigned a few days ago according to the filing
    • Bank account same address as loft, in company name
    • PayPal verified registered since September

  2. #2

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    Quote Originally Posted by 100LL:
    I am posting for a friend back home who sent quite a bit of money to the USA to pre-order a new IT product under development. Delivery date has repeatedly been postponed and he is clearly worried (he is one of many customers and no product was shipped ever). He still wants his product though.

    Here are a couple of facts about the company. Does anybody know if there are ways to get more info on them?

    • Company located in Kansas City, registered August 2011
    • Domain registered by Domains by Proxy
    • Address on web site, in private loft in KC
    • Phone, Fax and Skype on web site
    • On email correspondence only first name and first letter of last name ("First L")
    • Registered in Wyoming, Wyoming "C" corporation (says for tax reasons)
    • The incorporator showing in the filing is a person employed by the Registered Agent
    • Registered Agent denied by email that the company is related to them when informed that there may be a scam going on
    • Registered Agent finally resigned a few days ago according to the filing
    • Bank account same address as loft, in company name
    • PayPal verified registered since September
    Wyoming is a very odd choice for a place to incorporate in the US for tax reasons or otherwise and the other info you have provided points to either a complete scam or a guy who didn't really know what he was doing who can't deliver what he promised. Either way, contact the consumer protection division of the Missouri AGs office (I'm assuming Kansas City, Missouri is where the business is registered, but there are other Kansas Citys) to start.

    Consumer Protection
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  3. #3

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    If the merchandise was paid via Pay Pal, your friend may file a dispute with Pay Pal. Consequently, Pay Pal will contact the company to see what the problem is. If no response from the company, Pay Pal will escalate the dispute to a claim. Within 2 weeks thereafter if the company still doesn't respond, your friend will very likely get his money refunded.

    Usually companies and corporations in the USA, registered with the State of Delaware. Like HelloThere said, Wyoming was a strange place for a business to register in.

    Last edited by Renotommy; 08-02-2012 at 02:58 PM.
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  4. #4

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    Quote Originally Posted by hello_there:
    Wyoming is a very odd choice for a place to incorporate in the US for tax reasons or otherwise and the other info you have provided points to either a complete scam or a guy who didn't really know what he was doing who can't deliver what he promised. Either way, contact the consumer protection division of the Missouri AGs office (I'm assuming Kansas City, Missouri is where the business is registered, but there are other Kansas Citys) to start.

    Consumer Protection
    It's Kansas City, Missouri. But the only registration they have is the one in Wyoming. Incorporating there for 'tax reasons' while it is actually an odd choice is one more thing that points towards scam I guess.

    The thing is that they have supplied pre-order customers with photographs of the product in development stage and they seem to be working on 'something'.

    The phone and fax number is the same and seems to be a cell phone. How can a cell phone be the fax number at the same time? Any idea if there is a reliable service to do a reverse phone number lookup? I used to do it with 192 for the UK and can't find anything via Google that seems to work.

    Usually companies and corporations in the USA, registered with the State of Delaware. Like HelloThere said, Wyoming was a strange place for a business to register in.
    According to "them", it's either Delaware or Wyoming, and all the Fortune 500 companies are in one of the two.

    As for PayPal disputes, it seems the company is offering refunds to people that ask for it. But since the product is very promising, people are so far still willing to hold on (it's been numerous times that they pushed the delivery date by a few weeks, 4 months in total) and more and more people actually place new orders. They accept payment via PayPal or via bank transfer.

    The price of one unit is in the price range of an iPhone, and they limit it to maximum 10 pre-orders per customer and customers seem to order multiple units indeed. If this is a scam they have done a great job collecting a reasonable amount of money so far.
    Last edited by 100LL; 08-02-2012 at 03:15 PM.

  5. #5

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    So what is it?
    Why not post the website/name so we can look for other signs of scammish behaviour.


  6. #6

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    I promised my friend to do some research discretely, and unless you are into cryptography devices the web site in question wouldn't mean anything to you.

    There are plenty of potential customers (who know a fair bit about their trade, but nothing about Wyoming corporate laws) who have already looked for suspicious signs for the past few months and the summary is basically posted above. Putting their company name here wouldn't help at all I am afraid.


  7. #7

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    Quote Originally Posted by 100LL:
    I promised my friend to do some research discretely, and unless you are into cryptography devices the web site in question wouldn't mean anything to you.
    I've been in IT and security for a couple of decades now, I'm sure it will mean something to me. But no matter, you've made a promise and I'm not looking to buy anything anyway, just idle curiosity.

    There are plenty of potential customers (who know a fair bit about their trade, but nothing about Wyoming corporate laws) who have already looked for suspicious signs for the past few months and the summary is basically posted above. Putting their company name here wouldn't help at all I am afraid.
    I dont think looking at corporate laws, company filings nor looking at registrations will be able to give your friend nor any others peace of mind....

  8. #8

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    I don't know who "them" is but there are no Fortune 500 incorporations in Wyoming - and for a reason. They don't have the infrastructure, court system, well established precedent/ case law on corporate law matters, well-developed laws on management and shareholder matters, etc. to deal with public company issues. You would incorporate in Wyoming for a totally different set of reasons - low or no personal/ corporate taxes, privacy (few reporting requirements and very little disclosure of info required), very little bureaucracy,etc.

    Didn't say this is necessarily a scam - but it does, at least, sound like someone who can't, for whatever reason, deliver what he promised. I would personally report it to the authorities or get comfortable with taking the hit when the product doesn't show up and the money isn't returned.

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  9. #9

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    ps. that list of "facts" about the company raises a huge number of red flags - the most glaring being that the registered agent (a highly regulated and therefore likely legitimate business entity) bailed. Things like personal (residential) rather than business addresses, cell phone numbers only for contact, etc. are also not things that are good to see.


  10. #10

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    Quote Originally Posted by 100LL:

    There are plenty of potential customers (who know a fair bit about their trade, but nothing about Wyoming corporate laws) who have already looked for suspicious signs for the past few months and the summary is basically posted above.
    Wyoming law isn't what necessarily matters here (unless you care about the corporate governance of the business or shareholders' rights, etc., which doesn't make any sense for a customer to give a hoot about). If the company is a Wyoming corporation, but carrying on business in another State, the laws of the State where the business is actually being conducted are more relevant.

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