rmadisonwi

I'm sorry, but I'm going to have to disagree with your logic here.

If it's #2 , then you absolutely want UA security involved.

If it's #1 , then, either:
a) The employee is doing it unauthorized. If that's the case, that should raise all sorts of red flags on what else this employee may be doing representing UA but not following their rules.
b) The employee is authorized to do this, but the way they are doing it raises suspicion flags. In that case, UA should change its practices to enable communication like this to happen with more clarity as to the legitimacy of the process. For example, changing the message to say something like "please call United reservations at [publicly available UA number], or view your reservation online to provide payment" rather than "e-mail me directly or call my office in Mexico and give me your credit card number."

So, yes, you should contact them, if for no other reason than to encourage companies to make their official communication policies not sound similar to phishing scammers.

ajGoes

In case OP is still persuaded this email was legitimate, s/he can look here to see that someone called "Lamplighter" with no contact information holds the registration for unlted.com.

OP, this is a transparent scam. Do not follow up except to report it to authorities.

p_man

That's a reasonable explanation. Agent in Mexico scans reservations (I'm assuming this is possible) and finds a few that they can do at a better price. Talk with flyer, cancel original booking and re-book under new ticket. Instant revenue for Mexican rep.

pseudoswede

On this website, it lists a person in Santa Fe, NM. He also has registered LamplighterInn on Twitter. He only has two domains that are still active.

JetAway

I don't understand why the OP is so resistant to calling UA.

COSPILOT

Never, not once, has someone from UA called me to save me money. Not once from other companies as well. OP lives a privileged life if he/she thinks this might be legit. If OP wants to PM me more info I'll have my wife (Govt. Investigator) see if she can find anything. But I really don't need to, as this is 100% scam. I actually enjoy screwing with people like this, with my personal favorite the IRS calls demanding payment via credit card asap to avoid the cops coming to my house this afternoon. I keep calling back, but the number is disconnected. Well its day 7 of the same call, when are the cops showing up? I'll even make coffee for them if said caller could give me a time.

pushmyredbutton

I see no reason why this wouldn't be legit if:

1. The OP held the reservation to be later ticketed at UA ticket office
2. The reservation had travel to/from MEX, likely causing the PNR to show up at the local office as 'not ticketed'
3. The OP emailed [email protected] back (not a spoofed reply-to) and received a response.
4. It's totally possible the fare dropped during the time of holding the ticket and contact being made. Maybe the office wanted to help out, I don't see why that is so far-fetched.

I would have no problems contacting the office after a quick search of the phone number in this case. Plus, my cc will cover me for fraud if anything were to happen.

Bonehead

Is this correct? If so, that might explain it.

cjermain

First off, I'll say that in the end I decided that $150 was not worth the hassle of having to get a new CC, and so I ticketed through the UA 1K number this morning.

After reading all of the advice here, I think that my biggest worry is actually that someone within UA is doing something shady. If might just be that someone is trying to pad their sales numbers, but it could be worse than that. For that reason, I will probably heed the advice of a couple of posters and let UA know about the email. If I do, I'll update this thread if I get more info.

I still think it is highly unlikely that this is an outside-of-UA scam. It's just too much effort to be able to respond to emails sent to united.com. It can certainly be done, but I'm not worth the effort. What's the going rate for a working, stolen CC number on the black market? $10? $50? That's more than $50 worth of effort.

Just to be very, very clear: this person responded to an email sent to a united.com address, not un ted.com. I am absolutely sure. I hand-typed the email address (as I was wary of scams just like this). Again, this makes me think that if it's a scam---and it my very well be one---it's a within-UA scam.

MSPeconomist

mozilla

I'm sure if the email was from a US-based office, far fewer people would call it a scam, albeit the chances of scam would be the same, if not higher because a higher total number of employed people means a higher probability of a rogue employee.

But it happens to be MX, and although UA has a big operation there, and that is where the OP is actually traveling to, which perfectly explains why the agent can access the reservation, this has to be a scam.

This is stereotyping which encourages prejudice, and it definitely calls for some introspection.

smc333

I think it has a bit more to do with the fact that OP random received an unsolicited e-mail from a person he had no prior relationship with who promised him something for nothing and asked for a credit card number. I don't think that's stereotyping, prejudiced, etc. etc. at all. No matter what country that happens in, something like that is almost always a scam. Random unsolicited request for a credit card or bank account number = scam. Offer of something for nothing = scam.

pushmyredbutton

While that may sometimes (most?) be true, it's definitely not always the case. I've had some incredibly kind people along the way offer to help me out in ways that would certainly equal a scam based on this equation, including a few similar to what the OP describes. I'd also like to point out this wasn't a 'random' request, although unsolicited. The OP had business with UA, and was traveling through MEX, so hardly random.

My advice is to just set up a privacy.com account, create burner cards when unsure (with the appropriate limit!), and lower the walls a tad.

mozilla

If we assume good faith, then this person acts as a representative of the company which the OP has a relationship with. Neither did the person offer something "for nothing", he offered a slight discount which may very well be related to a fare drop, a POS differential, or a private fare that only UA sales reps have access to.

If you show interest in buying a product, leave contact details, and you get an unsolicited call or email from a sales rep, it can definitely be qualified as annoying, but I wouldn't say it is a scam.

As indicated above, it's not an offer for nothing, it's an offer which requires OP to pay. And I wouldn't call it an obvious "too good to be true"-offer either.

While I agree it may look strange to us for a rep to ask details that way, it may be an acceptable way in the culture of MX, and in itself is insufficient to qualify as scam (this seems to be prejudice at work). As a general guideline, however, credit card data should be guarded, and OP should be able to find an acceptable way of reconciling this with the offer of the company he received, with a slightly discounted ticket and a rep recording a sale as a result, and no one scammed out of any money.

cruiser9999

This is a SCAM period (and if you believe the email then I have a bridge in Brooklyn for sale - ). I have yet to hear of an international corporation sending me an email and asking me to call them in Mexico with a credit card number so that I can save $50/ticket. If it really was legitimately United then they would have asked you to call their Customer Service number where are all ticketing issues are handled and not some number in Mexico. On a related issue, if you have many United miles or other United credits I would monitor them carefully as they obviously have access to your information and could quickly empty your Mileage Plus account.

I just did a quick lookup and the minimum wage in Mexico is $4.71/day. Thousands and thousands of such emails can be sent out and even if the response is less than 1% the scammers can make $$$ however it is more likely that it is the CC number that they are after.