Is this "reward" fraud?

here's the letter:





Subject: Award Claim Notification


This is to inform you of the release of the North American Prize Pool as sponsored by group of companies in North America. Your name attached to the sweepstakes number xxx-xxxx-xxx with a serial number of xxxx-xx drew the lucky number of xx-xx-xx-xx-xx-xx which consequently won a sweepstake in the 2nd category





You have therefore been appoved for the lump sum payment of US $200,000.00 USD in cash credited to file with the Claim#: KW xxxxx/PO9, this is from a total cash prize of US$8,000,000,000 shared among other International winners in this category. CONGRATULATIONS!!!!





All participants were selected through a computer ballot system drawn from a pool of 85,000.00 names from Europe, and North America. Your fund is now deposited with our institution and insured in your name. Due to the inablity to establish initial contact and subsequent system failures and delays, we ask that you keep your Claim numbers confidential until your claim has been properly processed and your fund have been remitted to you. This security protocol was essentially emplaced to ensure fraudulent claims are not processed and eliminted. In any event of 2 people calling on he same claim winning numbers we reserve the right to cancel such winning without any notice.





Upon confirmation of this letter, you are required to call our office and speak to our Director Mr. xxx xxxx @ tel. 1 416 732 xxxx to initiate the redemption of your claim. Your payment will be disbursed into one lump sum payment.





Canadian Non resident tax of $3,950.00 is required and we hereby enclosed a check of $4,955.00 to enable you pay for the Canadian Non resident tax because there will be no out of pocket expenses to be made. Upon receipt of this check, you should call our office to validate it and after that proceed to your bank and make a deposit. Immediately this check clears, you should contact our office immediately for information on how you should be paying for your Canadian Non-Resident Tax, After you have paid your Canadia Non Resident Tax within 24 to 48 hours we will process and send out your remaining balance of US $ 195,045.00 by FedEX Express over night delivery-and that is the funds you keep.





Note: Remember to keep your letter in a safe place for security reasons.





Note: At which time any unclaimed money will be deemed null and void. To avoid that you should contact our office immediately you recieve this notice, Once again Congratulations from all the members of our staffs and thank you for being part of this International promotions program.





For more information on this kindly contact Tel: 1-xxx xxx xxxx Attn Mr. xxxx xxxx





We look forward to hearing from you soon.


Sincerely yours,


XXXX


XXX Micheal


(promotion Manager)











There is actually an authentic check in this envelope. Is this a fraud or real? The title of the letter is Oceanic Payment Centre. I will provide more info if needed.|||This is a scam my friend .. the cheque is a fake .. as the say the want you to pay the non resident tax of $3,950.00 within 24 to 48 hours.. the thing is that it will take a week or so for your bank to find out this cheque is a fake, at which point you will have sent them allmost 4 grand. which your bank will hold you on the hook for. I would advise you to forward this to the Toronto Police ASAP. as they have provided a (416) area code. this IS A SCAM DO NOT CASH THE CHEQUE ..





TURN IT IN TO POLICE ASAP!





Please post the phone number that you are to contact|||Did you enter the "North American Prize Pool"?





Any country that taxes foreign payments requires that the tax be withheld at the source.|||How many times are you going to post this?





Did you enter a contest for this? Sounds like a fraud to me.|||This is fraud. The $3950 will go to the person behind the scam, not to taxes. The $4955 check either will bounce or is counterfeit. If you deposit it, your account will be debited for the same amount when the bank learns that it was not a good check. If you cash it, you will have to repay the bank or other place where you cashed it. You will not receive the $195,045.|||You realy didn't need to reprint the entire letter. It's a well known scam. For starters, Canada doesn't tax lottery winnings. And even if it did, they wouldn't have you pay joe schmoo by western union.





You stupidly deposit the check into your bank account. 3 days later, your bank gives you a courtesy credit of the amount, but reserves the right to take all of the money back if the check fails to clear.





Meanwhile, the crooks bug you to send them $3500 of "real money" for "tax" reasons.





They figure people are so greedy, they'll just deposit the check to see what will happen.|||Oceanic Payment Centre? Maybe the author of this fraud/scam is a fan of LOST! LOL





Sure, there is an authentic check in the envelope..because they hope you will cash that and then send them the fee or whatever associated with you winning this prize from a contest most likely, you never even entered.





If you want to have a huge $ mess on your hands, go ahead and cash that check and believe that this scam is *real*.