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The invitation came while Sue Britton was on vacation in Europe, making her heart leap when she saw it in her inbox. Would she like to apply to sell her ceramics at one of the most exclusive holiday markets Victoria?
“I didn’t think I’d ever get into it, so immediately I got really excited,” said Britton, who started making pottery in her studio overlooking the ocean three years ago, around the time she retired.
At the time, she had no idea this message was a sophisticated scam — one that has targeted holiday markets and vendors across British Columbia, costing some victims more than $1,000 in losses.
Britton applied, and was quickly accepted in an email that complemented her use of colours in the pottery and asked her for a payment to secure her spot in the Out of Hand Modern Market. The process appeared similar to other markets she’d participated in, so she e-transferred the money. When her bank flagged the payment for fraud, she convinced them it was legitimate.
Then, she received two more emails — each telling her there was an additional fee that she needed to send. Her bank flagged these transactions, but Britton pushed them all through, amounting to over $700.
She grew suspicious when she heard from a friend who hadn’t been accepted to the market, and checked Out Of Hand’s website, where she discovered an alert warning vendors about scammers impersonating the market.
“$700 is six months of supplies for my pottery business, like it’s a lot of money,” she said.
One of the emails sent by a scammer pretending to be Out Of Hand Modern Market. (Submitted)
Jocelyn Pransky, a resin artist, says she was initially taken by the same email due to the level of professionalism and information it contained, including a schedule, table sizes and costs, and a detailed description of the event.
When the payment process looked different from past years, she grew suspicious and reached out to the organizer, who confirmed it was a scam. Every two weeks since this first experience in August, Pransky says she’s seen other similar scams pretending to be other local markets.
Calli Duncan, owner of Far and Wide home goods and gift store in Kamloops, B.C., lost over $1,100. She was among the victims of a scammer posing as the 10-day Kamloops Christmas Market.
When the community heard, a local florist led a fundraiser to sell bouquets to help Far and Wide and other impacted businesses make back some of their losses.
“It was really lovely,” said Duncan. “That Friday morning we opened, there was a lineup to buy donation bouquets.”
In light of this scam, she hopes markets will switch from using money transfers to processes that are more difficult to imitate, like accepting cheques in person, or through an official payment portal system.
The Out Of Hand Modern Market takes place annually in Victoria’s Crystal Gardens event space. (Facebook)
Bethany Wilson, producer of Out Of Hand Modern Market in Victoria, says the scam is “sophisticated,” scrubbing websites for market details and local artists, including those who have not participated in a market before.
“I think everybody needs to know that it’s a countrywide problem,” she said.
“There is an overwhelming sort of inundation of fraudulent claims that are asking people to participate, not just in our market, in everybody’s markets.”
She warns that the best way people can detect the scam is by verifying the email address is the same one used by the market, as most do not use Gmail accounts.
CBC News reached out to RCMP for more information, but they did not confirm whether any cases have been reported to police across B.C.
Britton says she got one final email from the scammers this week, telling her she needed to give them $100 more to be part of an artist catalogue, to which she sent a furious reply.
However, she’s felt a bit better since she found out her real application to the Out of Hand Market had been accepted just a few days ago.
“I feel like I can try and make it up,” she said.