Second restaurant was target of money laundering scam

Hannah Trickett and partner Michael Walsh were targeted by the same booking scam as Mark Greenaway.

A second Scottish restaurant has revealed that it was also the target of a fake booking which is believed to be a money laundering scam.

Hannah Trickett, owner of Faodail restaurant in Kincardine, contacted The Scotsman after Edinburgh restaurateur Mark Greenaway unveiled details of a fake reservation from a man who claimed he wanted to book a party of 30 in for his son's birthday. The customer then said he wanted to make an extra payment of Â£2,000 on his credit card to the restaurant for staff to hand on to a bus driver who would transport the group to the venue on the day of the event.

Ms Trickett, who runs the Fife restaurant with her partner, chef Michael Walsh, received a near-identical email from a different email address last week. Like Mr Greenaway, she also had an email exchange about the booking with the would-be diner until the point when he had asked the favour about the extra payment and became suspicious.

She said: "We have literally just dealt with this very same scam. It appears they are hitting a lot of restaurants, big and small. As soon as the email came to me - they used my booking email but didn't go via our booking system - I had a look and realised it wasn't a real email address.

The pair opened the restaurant last year.

"We knew right away that it was some sort of hoax but we had to be sure we still remained professional. We received a lot of emails from him with varying amounts of inconsistencies and then finally he asked us to accept money from him via a credit card and offered us Â£200 tip, then offered to pay Â£2000 instead of the Â£10 per head deposit we ask for."

Both Ms Trickett and Mr Greenaway have reported the matter to Police Scotland.

A Police Scotland spokesman said: "We can confirm that we were contacted in relation to a concern over a potential money-laundering scam."