I do a fair bit of public speaking and get a lot of enquiries through my web site here.
Last week I received an enquiry to speak in England. I knew something wasn’t right, but thought I’d respond to the scammer and see what was next.
Here’s my reply to them as negotiations move along:
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from: | Brendon Sinclair brendon@tailored.com.au | ||
to: | Alan Wickens | ||
date: | Wed, Feb 22, 2012 at 12:25 PM | ||
subject: | Re: BrendonSinclair.com.au contact form |
Dear Alan
What an excellent idea to invite speakers from outside the UK to speak. I have a neighbour, his name is Terry but everyone calls him Tel, and he’s from England. No-one can understand a word he says half the time and we just smile and nod.
He may actually be retarded, we wouldn’t know as we can’t make any sense of him. So I can understand why you’d prefer speakers that people can understand.
I love your ‘One people, One world’ campaign slogan – that sounds absolutely marvelous and I feel so very inspired by what you have said (if by ‘One people, One world’ you mean all people except people who ride skateboards. They are so annoying they should be separated from normal people.).
I’m so inspired that I will indeed drop my speaking fee from the usual $8,000 to just $7,950. This gives me much hope and awesomeness for the future.
I’m so pleased to have been fingered to speak on the recommendation of a sponsor and the Lord himself. He has excellent taste I must say – God, I mean, not the sponsor.
No-one has better taste than God himself.
Actually Charlie McCubbin might give God a run for his money.
You’ve probably heard that Charlie, the legendary owner and chef of the River Cafe in Glasbury has named a dessert after me – “The Sinclair”.
I thought that was my greatest ever honour (obviously disregarding the time I captained my Under 10 footy team to victory in the Grand Final in 1976), but when God singles you out, as he has me, well that just about takes the cake!
Or in this case, the dessert (specifically “The Sinclair” in case you’re missing my hilarious joke!).
That’s another thing about me, I’m really, really funny.
I reckon I could well be one of the funniest people around (just ask me). See, another joke!
I could go on for ages like this. Being all funny and stuff.
I’m well equipped to ‘sensitize’ your congregation. If there’s one person who can speak as if God, it’s me and I welcome the opportunity to have a 400 strong crowd with which to direct my efforts.
Is it possible to lock them all in the room – I find it distracting when people walk out during a speech? They’ll be ‘sensitized’ out of their brains by the time I’m finished with them!
I’ll send through my bio once we finish negotiations. I’ll also send through a photo – I am quite good looking (I’m being modest, I’m very, very good looking) and you can expect the number of female attendees to rise quite a bit once they see me.
Would it be indiscreet to enquire if I may bring my ‘niece’ along with me as a guest?
(By ‘niece’ I mean my mistress. She’s not really my niece. Even though I am a Tasmanian, I do frown upon having sex with relatives. Unless they’re really, really attractive.
But being from Tasmania means the relatives are always quite ugly. They sell a lot of beer in Tasmania for some reason.)
Fees:
Speaking fee: $7,950.
Flights: I’ll require flights from Australia for myself (and my ‘niece’ if possible)
Accommodation: I prefer to sleep in either hotels with a 24 hour bar or, if my ‘niece’ doesn’t come along, youth hostels where there are lots of drunk Swedish chicks
Hire car: Must be red
Thanks again for the invitation Rev Al. I look forward to your response.
Regards
Brendon Sinclair
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The scammers latest email I responded to (posting this up so it gets found by other speakers they’re trying to scam):
from: | Alan Wickens | ||
to: | Brendon Sinclair <brendon@tailored.com.au> | ||
date: | Wed, Feb 22, 2012 at 6:58 AM | ||
subject: | Re: BrendonSinclair.com.au contact form |
Thank you very much Brendon, We understand you live in Australia which is why we contacted you in the first place, We are looking at bringing someone from a very different part of the world to share their views with our congregation so as to give an insight into the outside world and since we are an advocate of ‘One people, One world’ campaign, We see this as an opportunity to practice what we preach by seizing the opportunity if this conference to bring a speaker from across the world.
I have a few more details to share with you so you can have more insight on the conference and what the church stands for as a whole.
Since inauguration of the reformed arm of the Church (The Church began its independent worship in the year 1780) we have been involved in new and inspiring developments, organizing this conference is one of them and it will go a long way in achieving our dreams to bring people together to learn and gain from other people’s experience which is one of the major reason why we are arranging this conference this year. Previously before the reformed Albion, Anglo-Saxon lectures were given and people in the community and environs always gained from this which teaches history and culture. The lecture will be published in this year’s following delivery and copies can be obtained at Albion or our other branches or from the lecture secretary).
With branches in two other locations (Charlestown & Hurst Nook) we have been able to draw people closer to the word and also try to teach them values with which they can survive the world. It is due to this age-long ritual that we have decided to organize a conference such as this since the doctrine of the Church lectures has evolved over the years we are proud to say we are keeping the hope alive! It is due to this that we are hosting the conference come 16th, 17th & 18th of next month, March 2012 with about 400 people in attendance,
You were been fingered to speak at this event on the recommendation of a staff of one of our sponsors and after checking your credentials and after reading blogs about you, we received the Lords direction to invite you to speak in this event and we also believe you are as well more than capable to deliver in this occasion, We have decided among the Event Organizing Committee to invite you to this program.
Since I was inaugurated as the Presiding Minister of this esteemed church, God has being helping us to keep hope and monuments alive and we have also being able to change the face of Christianity, and the church having a whole lot of history attached.
Apart from the conference coming up next month, The church is as well involved in a few other projects. For one, the church has dedicated the new school building to the Most reverend Benjamin Heagreaves,(The second-ever Minister of the esteemed church) in view of his many achievements, the website is under-construction.
http://www.benjamin.lancsngfl.
Sending out the invitation to you is by virtue of Gods bearing plus human recommendation, We need you to use your wealth of experience to sensitize the congregation, We organized this conference and workshop also in the hope of trying to re-organize the Church and further extend our impacts, So we can have people listen and be inspired by speakers like yourself
The conference theme has been carefully chosen by the Lords’ inspiration due to the backdrop of the present situation in the United Kingdom and this year’s conference has been tagged. ‘Big things: How to Start small’
You can email us the keynote you would like to speak on as we would want you to be convenient with the keynote topic so we decided it would be better you choose it yourself as long as its motivational and inspiring! We will as well need your bio to put up on our website and start to design posters as well as hand bills,
We are inviting you so you can inspire this people, teach them how to triumph over the deflating effects of set-backs & self-doubt, how to break free from whatever is keeping them “small”, and become empowered by their challenges, rather than victimized. And most importantly, how to start great things with small efforts and steadfastness. We are expecting your speech to last for about 60mins-70mins and a question % answer session thereafter.
We would like to know your standard speaking fee for this engagement as we do indeed have a sponsor, So we can negotiate this I believe, Our fees are based on budget and we are not biased with our speakers fee, We budget for every speaker according to what the Event Organizing committee deem fit, But we will also be glad to negotiate.
All travel arrangements such as Flight fare, Speaking fee deposit as well as Hotel accommodation will be taken care of by us as soon as you honor this invitation. The events committee will send you all binding documents including a Letter of Invitation and Contract Agreement as well.
Email us in ample time any questions you may have so we can move ahead.
You are blessed.
Reverend Alan Wickens
Cheers
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