Winston: Now this is a video about Scams in China but it's not Just a video about Scams. You can think of It As a
W: Survival Guide Because I'm going to be going through all of These Scams That you would most
Probably encounter from the moment you step off the plane landing in china
All the Way Through Sort of Daily life and even if You live Here.
Well Hello guys and welcome to another video Today we're going to be talking about
Scammers and in fact Here we have a Whole bunch of Scammers behind me we're going to talk about them in a minute
Now the point of This video is really to prepare anyone who wants to travel to china
prepare them to have a Good time and we're going to start with Those Guys Behind me
Those are Black Taxi Scammers
When you Walk Out of The Airport or
Even Just Cross The Border into China The first People you're probably going to see are these black taxi Scammers They'll Be shouting out in
English They'll Be shouting taxi taxi taxi
Do not Go with Those Guys
They're a complete ripoff They're going to charge a Lot of Money and
Now Let'S move on to the next Thing by The Way
This guy You might recognize if You Watch anything about Bargaining Right How about an Introduction Hey i'm colin You call on a Broadcast
I do a Lot of Bargaining videos Here in the Fake Markets of China and Today We are here with Serpent's a Day
When People come on
Holiday to China One of The Things they want to do is get a deal right Because Everybody Knows you can buy cheap Either
KnockofF or you Know Just Basically Cheap Products clothing Handbags You name It you can buy it right
Right But There are a couple of Things People Need to know
so since you Hear the guy does all the sort of Bargaining videos Maybe You can Give People a Little Bit of Advice
When You come to china?
Bargaining is Pretty Much a Sport and
You're literally Expected to Bargain for the lowest price like if you don't Bargain for the lowest price Then They're not going to respect you
And i When a Lot of Foreigners come to China it Just Kind of Like?
Like me coming from the Wife's leg When i first came here i met
Alright Yeah That Seems Like a Good price Let's Just do it like Just to be polite you know but uh That's not how it
Is here in china in fact they Actually take Advantage of sort of Western Sensibilities we we don't want
To bargain Because we think It might Be Rude or you know like we think we're
Ending Them or something Up and so They'll offer You an Outrageous price like maybe you can give an Example of something you've
You Know price You've Been offered and how much you actually Got It for in the end okay yeah so i think the biggest price
difference That i've had is i was Bargaining for a Hoop low Watchos
4,500 un that Was their starting price right four Thousand How much is that in us dollars That's Almost Like a Thousand us dollars
Okay i Say Maybe Like eight Hundred us dollars no i see 675 sorry okay so 675 and
My counteroffer Was like 100 Um Which is like fifteen Dollars and it's like That's such a Huge difference but the thing is like
They don't Get offended by That Because That's like Expected so the
Ultimate price i still think i paid a little too much It Was like three Hundred dollars Which is like
300 rmb yeah excuse me three Hundred
Which is like Fifty Dollars so okay so we went down from 675 down to 50 right and you could Have definitely
Gone Lower and Probably Yeah i mean That's something you have to realize is that The People are not gonna sell something?
Unless They're Making a Profit Right They're Not gonna let It Go if They're not making a profit so you're not ripping them off
Right Exactly You Know They're gonna rip you off but Here's a little tip if you want the best Deals
come Early Because iF you're the first customer at Any of these Places They will actually sometimes drop even Lower
Because Being The first customer it's Kind of a Luck Thing it's a tradition Thing okay
Superstition more Like so they won't Turn Away Their first customer okay so sometimes you can Get the best Deals if you go early
Oh i learned something New today Cool Anyway we're gonna go check out the counterfeit Markets with Him if you want
To see that i'm gonna link His video because i'm gonna continue talking about Scams but yeah if you want
To go see that Let's move on to his and then we'll continue here perfect yep let's do this?
Another Thing to watch Out for a Fake months in fact there's One right Behind us and
What They'll do is They'll Approach You and try to give you like a Try to give you like a Good Luck Charm
and then What happens Is you'll Feel
Obliged Because They hand this Thing to you they don't ask if you want it or not They'll give you this like sort of
Chintzy Looking Gold And Good Luck Charm and Then They'll Kind of Ask for Money or a Donation and
They'll follow You they won't leave you alone so if you Just take that charm and you try to walk away
They'll follow You and They'll Start Pestering You for a back Until you give them Money so
Beware of all The Fake Monks You know real Monks don't wander the streets trying to extort Money Real Monks Stay in Monasteries
Now before i continue and tell You about more Scams Let's Talk about Why there are so many Scams and Why
Scamming Is so prevalent in China Because of Course you will find Scammers everywhere in the world i know if you go to
soho in london You'll Get you know the Dodgy sort of
Girlie Bar Scams I know that if you go to eastern Europe You'll get all the taxi Scams Usual Kind of Things
The difference is That
Scamming to some degree or the other is more or less Baked into chinese Society and
I'm not trying to sound mean or or Weird it's Just Part of the mentality here and that is
for instance if i walked into a small Shop over here or
If i go to a wet Market and i'm buying some vegetables They will always be this Kind of
give and Take
Try to make a Buck here and there Kind of Mentality if
Somebody can Make a Little Bit of Money They will make a Little Bit of Money off of you and
It's actually Got a name Here in China Which i've said before in some of my Other videos but
There's an idiom Which is non p&G opium Which Just means if you can Cheat then cheat there's also a
Mentality at The moment Very prevalent in China especially in Business
Where people are not concerned about the long term They're only concerned about The short term so if a Businessman can Make
20,000 rmb Today and Forego a Hundred Thousand Darby's Worth of Business in the future he will do it
There are Plenty of Examples But
That's not What this video is about Support scamming Let's get on to the next scam
Now the next scam Should Be easy to avoid if you have a Healthy dose of common sense but a Subscriber of mine?
Fell for This two Weeks Ago he met up with me and he told me his story
So i thought i'd relate it to you Just in case
He was in the electronics district here in Shenzhen in han Bay Looking at Gadgets and Phones and Things Like That and he was Approached
By Somebody on the street Who claimed to be from hong Kong
Now Bear with me because i've Been approached by these Guys before and they will always claimed to be from
Taiwan or singapore or something like That you know obviously not from China Because well That's part of Their Scam
So the guy Says you know i'm from hong kong i came Over the border and my Wallet Was stolen and
I can't get back home you
Know all i have with me is my cellphone
It Would You want to buy it from me so i can have some money to get back home and
you Know he's Got like a Brand new iPhone
7 and he shows It to my subscriber and he Says look here see it's it's real and Everything
So they Check the Phone out and yeah it's a real iPhone 7 take some photos You know make sure it's the real Deal
and so the Guy Hands over the Money You know a couple of Thousand rMb and
Then The Seller Used some sort of sleight of hand and When he gave him like the box
There Was Actually a Fake iPhone
Inside of It so he spent a couple of Thousand rMB for a Phone That's worth about a Hundred and Fifty RMb
Which is and i've Got a smile on my face Because it'S quite silly
but You know that that could be quite a Blow especially if you don't have a lot of Money so
This is Actually Fairly common if Anyone tries to sell you anything on the street you Should Probably Think twice Because
you Know if it's not a scam it's probably Stolen Anyway
So up till Now you're probably Thinking that in China Scams Only Affect foreigners but This is absolutely not the truth
Local People Get Scammed Just As Much iF not more Than Foreigners the only difference being That Because you're a Foreigner
People in China think that you're rich They think you've Got Money and of Course the language
Barrier Makes It so Much Easier for them to scam you
Especially Since You won't be Able to talk to the police because the police in china cannot Speak english it's Just a fact
It's incredibly rare to find a police Woman or policeman Who can Actually Speak english and even if They do
you Know the Criminal or the scammer because They're chinese they know the
Society Here they Know how things Work and they will always Be Able to Turn Things in their favor
So in other Words You Pretty Much, Have no chance up against a Scammer if You can't Speak chinese here in china?
AnyWay back to the point chinese People Get Scammed and a
Subscriber of mine a chinese Subscriber of Mine told me a story a Week ago that Happened to him and
This is something That can Affect you know both chinese and Foreigners alike and it's got to do with dating right Now
it's Been become Very Very Popular Lately to use dating apps i
Guess it'S something Similar to tinder you know those Kind of Things you get a Whole
Lot of Them Here in china you've got. Ton ton you've Got more more You've Got i
can't remember But There's a Whole Lot and it's not Only
Chinese People That are using them foreigners are using these apps too
Even a Lot of The foreigners i know who can't even speak chinese use them because you know you can Install It Fairly easily and
It's Just a couple of Clicks of a Button and you can Start swiping Through
People in your area and then you know you Say You like them and if
They See that You've Liked them and They like you back you can start a Conversation
You Know that Kind of Thing and People use it as a Hookup App to
To get a day to
One-Night stand or whatever you know the
The Usual Kind of Crap But Because of That There's a Lot of Scams a Lot of Scams Built-in with These Apps
Now What Happened with My chinese Subscriber Is
He met a Girl on one of These apps and
She invited him out well he invited her out for a Drink and she said sure?
Let'S Go out for a Drink i know a Great Place
Okay so he goes to this place That she Recommends and it's a Little bar a Little Dingy bar he had three Drinks
Like Three Just Weak little Drinks and the bill came to
Three Thousand RMb
okay and Then There Was nothing he could do because a
Bunch of Like Big Thugs came in When he didn't want to pay cuz he refused to pay and They extorted Him and Basically
Forced Him to pay the Money Yeah
Hello
How are you
okay
I'm Good thanks all right Got a couple of followers Here hello
okay mm-Hmm hi
This is
Lots of fun Anyway
so hmm
Thugs came in made Him pay he called the police the police came
They shut the Place down
That's Very Nice Yeah okay now police take a Hike if you don't Mind okay mm-Hmm
So Anyway the guy was extorted The thugs Wouldn't Let Him leave until he paid
So he ended up paying the three Thousand rMb and he went straight
To the police and then the police went with Him he took the police to the little bar and the police shut it down and
you Know assured Him that They Would investigate It and sort it all Out so yeah the bar Got shut down and then
He just Kept calling the police to find out What had Happened and they Kind of Just IGnored Him and
He went back a Few Days Later and the place is open again and
This is because Usually The Scammers are in Cahoots with the local police i mean how else can an
establishment Like a Teahouse or a bar or something
continue to run if They keep getting complaints
That They're scamming People right it's because
They know the local police Because They've Got What they call one xi or Connections
So he didn't Get his three Thousand back the bar opened up again and there Was nothing he could do about it
Now the next scan i'm going to talk about is probably the most well Known scam and if You've Watched my videos before you Should
Be Familiar With It Anyway It is called the tea house scam but of course it comes in many Variations
The Gist of This scam is that You'll be Approached
Usually By attractive Young Women if you're a Man look Women are not immune to this scam either Because
People are still Approached Women you know so young Women Will approach Young Women and try to befriend them Now these scams are
TyPically Found in Beijing and Shanghai
That's where you'll find them the most
anywhere on Nanjing Road you know nanjing lu in
shanghai which is this Very popular sort of Touristy shopping area You will be Approached in
Beijing You Will Be Approached anywhere Near Tiananmen square
you Know the Forbidden City
Excuse me i'm walking Over Puddles and you Know Anyway
You Know you'll be Approached in 1:14 any of The Tourist areas By usually not one but two
Young Women or
you Know it can Be meant to but it's usually Younger students Type okay and they could Speak english
And What They'll Try and do is They Will try to invite you, to go for tea go for coffee Go for a Drink
Go to see their art Gallery Doesn't Matter There's also some nonsense That They Will try and
Entice you with and then You Say sure why not you know you're a Tourist and They're like Hey
We're Tourists - and we'd like to go and try out this tea Ceremony we Know this place Where they sell you know
Traditional chinese Tea That Kind of nonsense and you're like okay well you know i'm a Tourist That's Exactly the Kind of Thing I'm looking
For Why not and if you follow them They'll take you to like Usually a Ratty little tea house Which
Belongs to their friend and
Then What You'll do Is You'll Sit down and Drink
Some tea and then You'll be presented with an Outrageous bill for Thousands of rMb and i've Heard People Get Bills of Up to like
30000 rMb Because They Try to like Sniff Out how rich You are through Their conversations and
then You Know They'll Try to Kind of Relay The information so you know you can get a bill presented That's
Like a Thousand rmb all The Way Up to like Thirty Thousand Armies Just Stupid stupid prices and you would Have only Drank like a
P'tee
and Maybe Had like a Plate of Fruits or something stupid and it's Just One of Those Things Where
you have to be careful if someone comes to you and it Doesn't matter
Who they are if they start asking You questions like how long have you Been here i
Mean That's Their Gauge Because if They See you've only Been Here for a Day or a couple of Days i know you're an Easy
Target
You Know That's the first Thing They Will ask you then They ask you where you're from and
You'll notice i did a Beijing Scams video and Everyone That Was trying to scam me with these scams
They Would Always Say That They were from Xian
Because of The terracotta warriors so they have something they can Talk about you know something that Foreigners Know about so basically
Anyone Approaches you and wants to take you somewhere
There's a Very easy Way to avoid a Scam
If you agree to have a Drink with them or have a meal with them or whatever you choose the destination You choose the place?
choose a Starbucks
choose a Restaurant Nearby That You've Already Been to you know
You're the one who has to choose the place because if you let them choose the place
You Could Be Guaranteed That They're going to lead you into a trap
All right Let's move on to the next scam
The Next scam we're going to talk about is something that You will probably only come across if you
Take Part in a Tour group so this also happens usually in Beijing
Shanghai Places like That for instance if you want to get like an all included
Package Tour and you get on a Bus and They take you from place to place you get a lot of These sort of them
Almost Forced shopping Things Where you know the tour guide will get Kickbacks from Shops
So They'll take You to see a site for a short While then They'll take you to a Shop and Kind of Force You to
Mill Around The Shop for a while and Hopefully buy something but
The Jade and Pearls Scam is quite
Well-Known and quite aggressive and What Will Happen is
Usually You'll Kind of Get Locked in a Place and They'll come up with some other Story as to why you should buy their Jade
They'll Bring Someone in and then The person Will be like Hey
This Is some really Expensive Special Jade and you know i really like you or i
I have a Good Feeling That if i give you a Good price on this and you Will be Good for my business in the
future or there's all Sorts of Stupid Excuses That They make Up in order to kind of make you think you're getting a Good deal
The Gist of This is that you're going to be paying a Lot of Money for
Worthless Jade and Worthless Pearls so iF you're ever in a situation Where it seems Like You've Been taken to some Kind of Posh?
Jade or Pearl reseller and They're Trying to give you this Unbelievably Good Deal you know it's a Scam
It'S well documented
Just Avoid it Now
Let me Just Talk about Theft for a minute here of course i've done videos about pickpocketing it's pretty rampant in china
China Is an Incredibly Safe Place
Violent Crime Is Very low and it's not Very common However
Petty Crimes Like Theft
It'S quite common Now
Of Course pickpocketing Just You Know use common sense but a Subscriber of mine Actually Left a comment on one of my videos
Telling How he was pickpocket in a bus and how it Happened Was
He was
Approached By a Young Pretty girl That Seems to be a recurring theme Year
AnyWay he was approached by a Young Pretty girl who was Just chatting with him asking Him Random Stuff Hey there you are yeah?
She's being recognized again so he was approached by a pretty a
Pretty Young Girl Who's Just Kind of chatting to him and Asking Him the weather and you Know where he's from and stuff?
While the Girl was talking to him a Little Child Was Kept bumping Up against his leg you know
but he didn't Really Take notice of it
AnyWay Then the
The Pretty Girl Got off the bus but then so did the little girl and he Kind of noticed That They were together
Many Checked his bag and
Of Course his wallet and His phone and various other Things had Been Taken?
so you know be careful of being distracted like That and
Actually Thefts on a on the bus here are quite common so if you do take a Bus be very Very Careful
I've seen People and this happens like of Course not Just a Foreign as It happens to the local People a lot Here
Thieves especially Like to steal Phones you know or while it's whatever they can Get Their Hands on because the bus is moving
It's very Easy for them to
Kind of leave The bus and grab it on the way out and then by The time you've noticed it's gone Missing
You can't chase them so be very Careful When you're traveling on Buses in China
Now the next scam i'm going to talk about our
Bus rides to the Great Wall and by that i mean bus rides to any
Big Tourist Destination in Fact not Only bus rides But train rides too
you See because of the language Barrier once again if you Turn up at a bus terminal or at a train Station in
China Most Places There Is no english believe it or not and if the english is there it's not Very Helpful it'll be
you Know convoluted and strange
so when You want to buy a Ticket It Seems Almost impossible Because everything's in chinese But You'll get a Friendly
Woman or Friendly old Man or Whatever Run Up to you in english and Say. Oh you're going to the great Wall
it'll cost you XYZ 800 rMb it will cost you
200 rMb Whatever the case of Course These Guys are Just Scammers all They Want
to do is rip you off because they know the tickets only cost 20 rmb or 10 rmb or something Stupid Because
Public Transport in China is Usually Incredibly Cheap and
You Know there are all these bus Routes that Constantly Go out
To all the Tourist attractions and They're Cheap They Really are cheap
so it's one of Those Things that You will get Taken Advantage of so never
Take It for face value if Somebody comes Up to you offering you a price for a Ticket to get somewhere
you Know Just Be Careful and Also Always Try to use
Sort of Authorized
Brands
Authorized taxis so official Ones Which have all The Branding on them so the proper Buses the proper tour Companies?
Because then you can Avoid these Scams if You take some Just Unmarked Unlabeled car
There is a Big Chance That They'll drive you Out. To the Middle of nowhere and demand more Money
or They'll drive you Out into the Middle of nowhere and Just Drop You off there or
Threaten You or Whatever It Does Happen so Just use common sense
Don't take some Random strange bus Always Try to get a local or at least another foreigner Who lives in the area
To help you out When it comes to you know going to these Places Now this video has dragged on for far too long
But there are far too many Scams in China so this isn't the end they Will be more in the future
However i would Just like to leave you with a couple of notes Here number one in
General Chinese People are
Very Friendly and hospitable But
There is an Underlying Current of Making Money That Runs Throughout the entire society Here and so People often see?
Making Money Is more important Than Morals more important Than anything Else
so That's why scamming is Kind of accepted here and you know even when People Get caught out scamming
for instance If you're in the wet Market and
Someone's Buying Vegetables and The seller tries to charge like Triple the amount and the person catches them out
They're not going to hate each Other They'll Laugh about it it's Just Part of the culture here right
But There's also Another Thing you have to take into consideration
Here is that As a Foreigner You will always be treated as a Foreigner and
If you're Dealing with Authority and you Know other chinese People They will always
side with the chinese person so if a Scammer has made a couple of Hundred rmb Out of you
Rather Than
People taking Your side and Saying
Screw That Scammer Is a Piece of Shit They're more Likely to take The Scammer aside and Say Well done for
Making Some money For our China from those Foreigners so Just bear in mind that that Is a Big Mentality Here
So be on your guard
Don't be
To them on Your guard i Mean You still have to have a Good time Right but if you can avoid These basic Scams
You'll have a Fantastic
Time in China all love China Just Like i have you know you'll be Able to travel Around and have an Amazing Time
Without That Bad taste in your mouth of having Been Scammed so That's it for This one Guys i hope you found it informative
Stay Away from The Scammers and until Next time you know the drill stay awesome
Okay so you think that i'm
coming to the end of This video But
Actually no Because Scams in China Let's Just put It this Way there are a Lot of Scams in China
What i'm gonna do is i'm going to talk about something Which i guess it's not technically a scam but It is
Theft so this has Happened to me a couple of Times?
One time i went to do a demo Class This Is a Long time Ago for an English training Center and
They Asked me to do a Demo Class and if I did a Good Job then They would offer me a Job Type Saying you
Know it's Kind of like an Interview
So i did It and after Afterwards They Asked me to take a Photo with all The Kids in the class together Which i did
Great no problem i didn't Get the Job
But Walking Past The training Center Like a Couple of Months Later i noticed a Massive Billboard
With me on the billboard with all the Children you know Because They use that Photo for their Advertising
Which is really Frustrating
Now this doesn't Really Bother me but i know it would Bother some People
So i'm at Work and i'm Just getting Ready to teach a Lesson about Mixed
Marriages Now you can imagine My surprise When i heard winston's Voice
In the classroom Beside me What had Happened is my student had Clicked on a video That Was in the curriculum?
folder Here on the computer and
The School Has Actually Stolen One of winston's videos about Mixed Marriages That he made Years ago and
made It a Part of the curriculum
So what They've done is they've downloaded my my YouTube videos and and made It as Part of Their Curriculum
So all of Their teachers are being Given This curriculum
and They're you know making Money off of My videos Which is annoying
but It Just Shows you again the
Kind of Double Standard When it comes to Intellectual Property Here
It's very difficult to enforce and in fact it's not Really Enforced
Piracy is Still a Massive Thing Here
Copyright Infringement Still a Massive Thing Here and if You live Here anyway like me it can i
Suppose Affect You it's not gonna Affect you in a Big Way though so i wouldn't really put It down as a as
A Very worrisome scam it's Just something
to be aware of that if you're getting Your photo Taken By a Company or
If you've Got being Filmed in any Way That
Your picture your video could end up being used by some Random Company to advertise their products or
to make Money from Kind of like That training Center
Shame on you by the way and that is the tea house scam Which is also
Yeah What'S he on about about yeah no good so you recognize me