With authorization from the author, I'm putting this email here because I think it can make some people understand better why scams, hoax, phishing, etc. work so well...

Yes. It is sad that some people profit on others without offering a service at all, just pumping money. On the other hand, it is at times hard to define the product. For instance, if you pay to see a movie and have to go to the toilet... you won't get your money back and you won't have the right to watch the next show either. Just $5 or $7 lost? Yeah... but if you don't see your movie, that's like paying for nothing.

What's weird to me is the fact that all this mail is being caried by the Post Office and they say they cannot do anything about it. This is not true, they could work with the police and the FBI and just not forward mail which is balently scam. They could refuse pre-paid stamps to scam only companies. (you know these pre-paid envelops... these crooks get them and the post office says: So?!) Ha! Money! Look at it their way: the scams probably represents 1 to 2% of their income. Why would they even consider stopping it? And it is so high because there are all the crooks sending their mail, but also all your letters coming back. That feeds the Post Office more than the crooks!

I guess there is hope. We've been able to pressure large companies before in doing one thing or another, but the problem is that we have to do that over and over again. That's what is not logical. Every generation, even person has to fight these white colars wrong doing. That's a pain.

Okay 8-) I'll stop here since I now wrote more than the email itself...

Have you found any way to stop the offers from coming in? My Mother-in-law 
gets an average of 20 a day from all over the world and of course asking for 
processing charges from $9.99 to $40 each. She even gets 2-3 from the same 
company for the same prize and same voucher # but different account numbers so 
she will pay several times yet get only one prize however we all know she will 
never win. She lives in a condo, is 83 yrs old with a touch of Dementia and 
she writes checks to all of them--fortunately we catch many and don't mail 
them off. Last year she did get over $800 in checks cashed by these different 
companies. I also was able to stop over $1,200 in checks by getting her mail 
before it went out. She just does not understand that she will not win  
anything, and just from reading these things, calls me daily that she just
won $567,000 or $1 million, etc.
Hers all come first class mail, and the post office could not help me on 
stopping them. HELP!!
 
Anonymous