Beware of scammers in fellow shops when traveling and shopping

Pretend to be a fellow tourist, and use the family card to sell low-quality and high-priced goods to tourists. Mr. Liu and his wife from the provincial capital traveled to Yunnan not long ago and were deceived by a "fellow shop". An industry insider in the tourism industry revealed to reporters the inside story of how "Laoxiang Store" deceives people.

According to Mr. Liu, he and his wife not long ago took a group tour from Jinan to Yunnan. In Dali, the tour guide took tourists into a shop selling jade. "We have long heard that we cannot buy things from tourist shopping stores, so everyone is very wary." Mr. Liu said that at that time, his wife saw a very beautiful jade bracelet and casually asked the price. As soon as he heard this, he said: "You are from Shandong, right? What a coincidence, our manager is from the same hometown." Then he called the manager. The manager claimed to be from Jinan, greeted everyone warmly, and wanted to treat the "fellows" to drink the best tea. The manager talked to everyone about Jinan's customs and customs, which convinced everyone that their original defensiveness was gone. Finally, the manager quoted a 40% discount price to the "fellows" in Jinan, and many people were tempted to buy it, and they bought a lot. After returning to Jinan, Mr. Liu found someone knowledgeable to look at and was told that these things were only worth a few dozen yuan. Only then did Mr. Liu realize that he had been fooled.

A travel agency staff member told reporters that in fact, these so-called "hometown stores" specialize in products that are difficult for ordinary people to identify as genuine and fake. The cost is only a dozen yuan, but the price is usually more than a thousand yuan. , even if the discount price is as low as 20% off or even 10% off, there is still a huge profit. She said that when tourists sign up for a tour group, they give some personal information to the travel agency, and they also use their ID cards to register when they stay, so that more personal information goes to the travel agency. Then, the travel agency will give the tourists' information to the "fellow shop" one to two days in advance. The "Laoxiang Store" is familiar with the situation of tourists and will "prescribe the right medicine" when seeing tourists. If tourists enter the store to shop, the tour guide will also receive a commission.

According to reports, one way to identify a "laoxiang store" is to see if the store has a tourist product sales license certificate issued by the local tourism bureau, because most "laoxiang stores" are illegal stores and do not have such a certificate. At the same time, tourists are reminded to stay alert when traveling and shopping, and not to be fooled by "fellow shops".