2017 Tourist Scams In The United States Of America USA

Oh hey, You're there. You didn't hear? Today's class is cancelled. Instead of teaching today I'm going to tell you about some common scams in the United States. I know there's a lot of videos out there telling you about scams, things that are common all over the world, but today I'm going to tell you about some scams that I have seen over the course of my lifetime. Some of the most innovative and some of the most creative scam, I'm showing you this to keep you safe when you come visit our country the United States. So come on with me we're going on a little field trip today. Let's go. Let's say you just arrived to the airport. You've got your luggage and you come out here on the curb. There's a man standing there who says "Taxi!" "DO you need a taxi do need transportation?" You say yes, I do and he takes you over here to what is not a taxi but it is a limousine service. Now there's technically nothing wrong with going with the limousine service, but you need to be careful how you do it. Here's how the scam works. You get in the vehicle and he drives you to a hotel let's say the Ritz Carlton Hotel downtown. He knows you're spending some money. So, if you took a taxi let's say it's 10 miles. It might be 35 bucks. He takes you down there and he tells you it's 150 bucks. Well that's gouging. That's ridiculous, but at this point there's really not much you can do. You accepted his service. It's your fault that you did not ask in advance. So how I do this is I prefer to go with the limousines. A lot of the taxis in the United States are terrible. Some cities have great taxis. It all depends on where you're visiting. What I do is.... The guy says "hey do you need a taxi?" "Do you need a ride?" Well yes I do. You need to ask them upfront what is the cost. does it include taxes? Does it include your gratuity because in the United States you need to tip. Anyone in the service industry expects a tip. So just ask them, "hey I'm going downtown to the Ritz Carlton Hotel much is this going to cost?" He says "well I charge $72." You can come back and say, "Hey buddy can you do it for 45?" Sure I can! Get in! Well, you just got a lot nicer service for about the same price as a taxi. Be careful because next time you could be a victim. Possibly one of my favorite scams of all times is the taximeter scam. So you get into a cab that looks like this. He has a meter. You think nothing of it. So, he turns on the meter. It's a normal rate. It seems normal. Everything's fine but what happens is he switches his rate. Now it started at five dollars and it's going to charge you five dollars a mile. So your 10 mile ride is now going to be about 60 bucks because they're going to get you sitting in traffic - and how are they able to do this? Well they just switch the rate. Do you see over there? The little number one? Now he's on rate number two. Now he's on rate number three. Now he is on on rate number four. This thing will add up really fast and it pretty much gets people every time. After all, he did run the meter. When you get there to your destination what are you going to do refuse to pay him? Your luggage is in the trunk. There's not much that you can do at this point except pay the driver and know that you got scammed. This next scam is probably one of the most ingenious ones I've ever seen. The first time I saw this happen it absolutely blew my mind. So this is how it works. Most of the time you're going to find this at a Greyhound bus station or maybe an Amtrak. Any transit or maybe in front of a hotel. Anything within an urban City where it's very easy to disappear. I've seen it at an airport but it's very hard for people to get away from the airport because they're often in isolated locations. What happens is you come off your grey hound bus or maybe you're sitting around waiting on a transfer. Regardless you're outside you're smoking a cigarette. You got your luggage there, your protecting it, and you're playing on your iPhone. People have 600$ - $700 phones now. Whatever expensive phone you have. Without an expensive phone you might not be a target for the first one. For the second way this works they don't care they'll take anything. These people are professionals. They do this every night. so you're out there and a lady or a man, I'll play that role. They come up and they make friends with you. "Hey how you doing? Oh great." They'll set down their luggage right next to you. They seem legit. They have luggage so they'll ask you, hey my phone's dead is there any way I can use your phone to call for my ride? I don't think they know how to get here. They're coming from a hundred miles away. It's my boyfriend, my husband, or whatever. So you being the good person that you are, you offer to let them use your phone. So they call, "hey, hey, how you doing? Oh nice to hear your voice. Well yeah my phone was dead. Oh I'm down here at the Greyhounds between 22nd Street and East ninth Street. Okay, well I don't know the address here. Well do you know the address? Do you know the address? I don't I think it's on the side of the building." While you are not thinking anything of it, they go walking around the side of the building to look for the address or whatever. It is the excuse that they came up with. so you're sitting there you don't think anything because the ladies or man's luggage is sitting right next to you . After about 15 seconds or 20 seconds you start to get a feeling in your stomach like hey hey where did these people go? Where's my phone, where's my phone? Well she has to come back her luggage is right there. She's not coming back! So after about two three minutes you decide to look through her luggage see what she has she's not coming back you go open up her luggage what's in here trash nothing you got a big nothing her $10 Walmart bag she just traded that for your $700 iPhone the second way this one works they used the exact same line hey can I use your phone I got a call from my ride she might have her luggage she might not even have luggage what they do is you hand her the phone she might just take off running well what are you going to do you have all your luggage right there you go chasing this lady down as soon as you run off her accomplice comes running right in and takes your luggage boom they're gone so now you're sitting there with no phone no luggage nothing just whatever is in your pocket and the clothes on your back and it happens that fast so next time you come to America be careful be careful of this scam don't be naive another common scam happens with car accidents a lot of times you get to the airport you go to the rental car you're being watched or you're driving down the road rental cars are going to have out-of-state license plates and there's going to Google a bar code in the corner so these know how to spot this and what happens is is they'll sit let's say across the street from the rental car they see you come pulling out great in a rental car it's a busy night Sunday night one day all day at the airport they see maybe like the Asian maybe you just look like you don't belong here or they've watched you inside the terminal well what happens is they're going to wait for you to come pulling out they're going to follow you they're going to hope you get into an area that's not so the traffic's not so heavy a lot of times these rental car areas are in the middle of nowhere so it might have been pulling just right out of the rental car what they're going to do is they're going to get behind you and they're going to smash into your car sometimes often pretty hard obviously you are going to get out and go look at the damage you're going to need you know all their information well it doesn't work that way as soon as you get out of the car with all your luggage in the car there's a gun to your head and what happens there's nothing you can do man you give them the car they don't really want the car that's not what they want they're going to drive off with the car the other guys going to drive off they might not even have license plates on their car or they might be hidden he'll drive the other way the guy in the rental car is going to drive it five ten blocks from there and steal all your stuff in the robbery they took all your money they know you're coming into an airport you just walked into a rental car it has no gun sign in America many people are armed so it doesn't work this well with just a normal car so they're looking for tourists and tourists also have they carry a lot of money they're here for a while credit cards whatever they want anything they can get so watch out for that rental car scam how do you combat it well just keep driving call the police try to get their license plate number but don't stop and get out of the car that's what they tell you to do don't do it call 9-1-1 especially if you just came into a city and someone rear-ended you that's just not right things like that they the chances of that happening are slim and none so call the police just keep driving try to keep them behind you if you get into a high traffic situation maybe you can slide in behind them and start following them but be careful because if you're behind them they can block your freedom a moment so you see what I mean but be careful this scam has made it's an old-school scam but in the last couple months I just hear about it it's on the news every day they're doing it everywhere they're following women home from late night shifts at the hospitals because they know they're all alone and they know they're leaving a hospital and they've got the uniform on they're probably a doctor or a nurse and they have they have money so be careful about this one another common scam involving cars and your rental car is the fake valet scam and this happens a lot in suburban shopping areas in upper-class areas where you wouldn't think that there'd be thieves out there but they are so what happens is you were shopping all day at the mall they might be watching you because these have all day to do this this is what they do for a living you were shopping whatnot and then let's say you're going to go to a restaurant over there well they kind of follow you and then they're standing out in front of the restaurant or their buddy is with a jacket on that says valet so you come pulling up and there well how much is the valet well it's free first thing you need to be suspicious of nothing in America's free there's very few places that still offer free valet service I can't think of any of them so what happens is you get out of the car you go into the restaurant you think everything's fine well you come back out where's the valet guy you go back in and ask them they say well we don't have a valet well what just happened they stole all that stuff that you spent all your money on while you were shopping in there plus they got all your valuables and there's nothing you can do you don't have a ride home now you have to call a taxi the police aren't going to find your car for probably a week or so they'll find it two miles away the rental car company isn't going to be happy with you they made a lot of problems my solution for this problem just park your car yourself I know in some downtown areas you have to use the valet but they will be clearly marked the street signs will have valet zones they will also have valet jackets on but there'll be more than just one of them and if you don't trust them walk into the restaurant and ask them is that your valet so let's say you want to go to a sporting event baseball football basketball very popular in America so the guys are outside selling tickets in many cities it's legal for them to sell tickets most people are very legitimate about this but I hear people getting ripped off just for even petty amounts like a twelve dollar ticket and it's not real so how do you how do you combat this what you need to do is I I buy tickets off of scalpers all the time but I buy them close to the door and if it's an expensive ticket like a fifty sixty dollar ticket I tell them yeah I'll buy it for you I'll buy it right at that gate you come up to the gate with me and I will pay you through the gate sometimes they might not like it okay great so I'll pay you here in front of everyone and you stand right here and you watch them as you're going through if the tickets good say thank you that's one thing you could always do because sometimes you buy them five blocks away from the event and what are you going to do the guy's not going to be there when you come back and this still happens it happens more often than you'd like to think and it just kind of ruined your night ruined your day so watch that one the fake ticket scam I hope I didn't frighten you guys away from visiting America it's a beautiful country a great place to visit I'm sure you'll have a lot of fun just use this arm yourself make sure you have knowledge knowledge is the key once you have knowledge about things that can happen you'll be able to prevent this thank you for watching make sure you subscribe to my channel leave your comments below hit like and I'll see you guys next time

Channel: Native Ease

Views: 39,511

Rating: 4.5490909 out of 5

Keywords: scams, scams in usa, tourist scams in the united states, learn english, how not to get ripped off, getting robbed in usa, scams to avoid, avoid robbery, con artists, pick pocket scams, learn esl, american english lessons, taxi scam, rental car scam, car jacking, stay safe in new york, safety in america, speak fluent english, stolen luggage, airport scam, fake taxis, illegal taxis, robbed as a tourist, crime in america, top scams, scammer, scammer caught, robbery prank

Id: vgZCuKP6EU0

Length: 14min 9sec (849 seconds)

Published: Tue Mar 07 2017