I wanted to alert all of you to a possible scam that could have made a victim of one of our authors.

A man who claimed to be in Japan contacted the author directly, saying he wanted to purchase 100 copies of her book. He was using a free email account and didn’t provide a company name. She pointed him to the wholesale order form on the BookLocker.com website.

The first weird part of his response was that he called her “Mate.” Perhaps he was trying to win her over with an endearing term? Then, he said he needed the books in “the shortest possible time.” This is a common ploy used by scammers – saying they need something urgently, thus not giving the victim time to assess the questionable deal. (He also continued the urgency tone by signing his email “Waiting to hear from you”.)

He then claimed he needed them for a book fair in Japan to be held on December 21st. He sent the email on December 9th. Everyone knows the chances of books getting from the U.S. to Japan in 12 days via regular shipping are nil. He added he “couldn’t stand the stress of ordering through the bookshops” and that’s why he contacted her directly. More red flags!

Here’s the most disturbing part. He said, “My shipper will come and pick them up from your location.”

Obviously, if someone is ordering something directly from an author, they would assume they’d be picking up the books from the author’s home. The author was justified in seeing all these red flags and contacting me. Reading this part made me sick. I suspected the author may have been the target of something possibly more sinister than a simple book-buying scam.

Please don’t ever, ever, EVER invite someone you don’t know to your home, even if they are promising to buy 100 copies of your book! To see why, just look at the news headlines!

And, please don’t send numerous copies of your book to anyone until payment has been received and the check has cleared. If they’re paying by credit card, you should be particularly wary of overseas transactions. It will take weeks for your merchant service to discover the charge was fraudulent. Your books will be long gone and you will have lost a lot of money.

This type of risk is one reason authors choose to let their publisher process these types of orders. Publishers often have automatic fraud detection in place to protect themselves and their authors from these all-too-common questionable transactions.

Watch out for the bad people, my friends! They’re everywhere!!

Got questions about Print On Demand and Self-publishing? Ask Angela Hoy.

About The Author

Angela Hoy is the publisher of WritersWeekly.com, the author of 19 books, and the co-owner of BookLocker.com (one of the original POD publishers that still gets books to market in less than a month), PubPreppers.com (print and ebook design for authors who truly want to self-publish), and Abuzz Press (the publishing co-op that charges no setup fees).

Angela has lived and traveled across the U.S. with her kids in an RV, settled in a river-side home in Bradenton, FL, and lived on a 52 ft Irwin sailboat. Angela now resides on a mountaintop in Northwest Georgia, where she plans to spend the rest of her days bird watching, gardening, hiking, and taking in all of the amazing sunrises.

WritersWeekly.com - the free marketing ezine for writers, which features new paying markets and freelance job listings every Wednesday.

BookLocker.com - According to attorney Mark Levine, author of The Fine Print, BookLocker is: "As close to perfection as you're going to find in the world of ebook and POD publishing. The ebook royalties are the highest I've ever seen, and the print royalties are better than average. BookLocker understands what new authors experience, and have put together a package that is the best in the business. You can't go wrong here. Plus, they're selective and won't publish any manuscript just because it's accompanied by a check. Also, the web site is well trafficked. If you can find a POD or epublisher with as much integrity and dedication to selling authors' books, but with lower POD publishing fees, please let me know."

Abuzz Press offers FAST and FREE book publication, but only accepts a small percentage of submissions, and only works with U.S. authors.

PubPreppers.com - "We Prep, You Publish!" Print and ebook design for authors who truly want to self-publish. Offers formatting and design services only, and then provides simple instructions for authors on where to sign up to have the print and ebook editions printed/listed/sold. Cut out the middle man. Keep 100% of what bookstores pay for your book!

Angela's POD Secrets Revealed Series can be found HERE.

Have a POD Book with another publisher? See if BookLocker can give you a better deal. (BookLocker offers "disgruntled author discounts" to those who want to move from other POD services.)

See BookLocker's publishing packages HERE.

ANGELA ON TWITTER https://twitter.com/AngelaHoy

BOOKLOCKER ON FACEBOOK - Provides links to free excerpts!
https://www.facebook.com/booklockerbooks

ANGELA ON FACEBOOK
https://www.facebook.com/angela.hoy.750

ANGELA ON LINKEDIN
https://www.linkedin.com/in/angelahoy/

Angela is the creator of the Original 24-Hour Short Story Contest!
https://24hourshortstorycontest.com/

Read More Of Angela's Articles HERE