Dear Deceived,
This is Jenna, the English speaking lawyer. I have read through the thread. But to be frankly, your explanation is not clear enough for me to really understand the whole picture of this affair and to make a correct judgment regarding the nature of this legal matter whether or not it should be defined as a fraud. Before I study all evidence that you have and before a proper communication with you, I would not be able to provide the legal advice to you. Therefore, my suggestion would be, if you are still in Kunming and still have the willing to deal with this legal matter, then you may have a meeting with me and we may have a discussion about what had happened to you. If it's really a fraud, I then might be able to provide advice and might assist you to file a complaint or a case-report to certain governmental authorities, including the police authority. The reason for me to help you is probably because it is upset to know that the environment of the business security in Yunnan is not as good as I know of, and as a lawyer based in Yunnan who can provide help, I would like to contribute some effort to improve the local legal environment and would be happy to provide certain professional assistance to you. So if you want, you can make an appointment with me for a meeting. Don't worry; it's free of charge for meeting you and having a discussion with you. Hopefully, you could take less regret when you leave China.

Best

Jenna

To tigertiger:

yes, I'm afraid you're right.

To be honest, it's not that much about the money, but being cheated and designing something in China would have been absolutely amazing; we already worked out some ideas etc., sad that it'll never get anywhere.

To Long-Dragon:

Thank you for your replies! It's exactly what I wanted to know.

I haven't revealed much details as their written English was pretty good, so I thought they might be users in this portal and will figure out that we know what they are doing before we get more information from them.
Their spending were minimum: dinner (after signing the contract), gift to us (tea) and bit of sightseeing what I mentioned earlier. No receipts.
We're from France. Open a bank account isn't easy in here, France, you would need ID, permanent address etc. so by that you can easily track person down or at least know his name. So seems that it's different in China.

You need an ID to open a bank account in China too, but unless the court makes an order the bank won't release the details of the account owner.

To Silvio DaVinci:

Thank you for your reply!
Of course we did a research, and what we found? Company name, address, phone numbers, faxes, legal address, website etc.

That's why we think it's identity theft, it's quite unlikely they created everything from scratch, but it's also not proven otherwise.

1) to pursue them legally would be the best way forward, but in my case, wouldn't make that much sense as lost amount isn't that big and I assume legal fees would be much higher than that. But I didn't want to sit and do nothing, forget about whole thing as well. I think it needs to be heard, maybe it'll help somebody or maybe it'll make frauds life more difficult as people are more aware that the same scam from 2010-2012 is back.

3) Have I really rambled on that much? I've only written 2 posts..

I haven't revealed much details about the 'project' as scammers written English was pretty good, so I thought they might be users in this portal and will figure out that we know, what they are doing, before we get more information from them.

Scam goes by the same rules which are described when you open the link which I provided at the beginning of the thread, first posting, if you didn't read it.

to Yuantongsi:

Thanks for explaining!

At least we have a name and addrress what they gave us (address can be false of course), that should mean something.

It's not actually fraud, as they're not representing YOU - it's actually more IP theft, as they've copied your website...if I understand the strings correctly.

On your issues with this Chinese organization. Lets try to be a bit positive. Based on the small possibility they actually have work. We are guessing here. You have invested time and money on this and you would like this checked out in Chinese without any lawyers we could do this. You send all the documents and a few pictures to us. We review them to see if anything is real and make some phone calls. If they check out reasonably Ok we go see them for you. We are not going to play policeman here as at most we will probably scare them off if they are the crooks we think they are. Based on what I know lets talk further if you would like this done. If you are interested we will qualify ourselves further and you should too.

to laotou:

I guess latest replies haven't read my first post, which included this link:
www.architectsjournal.co.uk/[...]

So yes of course it's fraud and some of the so called companied have been prosecuted in China for the same thing (like i read from another article)

Our story is exactly the same like article scam describes:

How the scams work

- A plausible but poorly specified request for a quote is received, often by fax using convincing letterheads
(they composed us contract instead of asking a quote)

- The value is usually above £500,000. Terms are often favourable with up to a 30 or 50 per cent proposed down-payment with minimal negotiation
(for such a large scale project like they offered, amount was about the same, consisted different parts)

- The supplier is invited to China to sign the contract. Large sums may be required to 'smooth procedures'
Once in China there may be negotiations involving demands for commission and/or cash payments or gifts.

(they asked to buy and pay for the gifts)

- Meetings may take place in genuine-looking offices. Contracts may be signed
(exactly the same and contract was signed)

- Back in the UK, the initial payment is not received. Communication ceases and any cash parted will be lost.
(exactly the same, no promised first payment, instead asking us to transfer remittance free upfront from whole amount to private account)

Hope i made my story a bit more clear. I just didn't want to add whole information right away, as we already been scammed..

I somehow can't see whole article anymore, so here it is:
(copied)

Architects across Europe, including Lubetkin Prize-winning Gianni Botsford Architects and Cambridge-based Mole, have been targeted by an alleged Chinese scam

The studios, who together are designing a 71,000 square metre resort in Hsinchu, Taiwan, were separately told they had won a luxury 130-unit villa development in Kunming, southwest China and invited to the country to sign a contract.

Believing it could be 'too good to be true', the companies contacted the China-Britain Business Council, which said it was 'certain it was a scam' and advised against the meeting.

Botsford said: 'The scam, we are told, is usually to get you to China, to wine and dine you, to get you to pay for everything (they say it shows respect), to go to a special shop to buy gifts, and the following day, on signing the contract, to pay a lawyer's fee of between $5,000 and $10,000.

'On returning from what seemed a successful trip, you find they have all disappeared, do not answer calls and emails, and you do not, in fact, have a contract.'

The AJ understand architects in Italy have also been targeted.

In 2010, a group of architects in New York fell victim to a similar swindle involving an office tower and housing scheme in China's Henan province. Botsford said he felt 'very foolish' because searching the internet proved such scams were common.

A UK Trade and Investment (UKTI) spokesperson advised 'due diligence when trading in China'. The UKTI's trade services partner for mainland China, the China-Britain Business Council also offers company checks to verify the legal status of Chinese outfits.

How the scams work:

A plausible but poorly specified request for a quote is received, often by fax using convincing letterheads
The value is usually above £500,000. Terms are often favourable with up to a 30 or 50 per cent proposed down-payment with minimal negotiation
The supplier is invited to China to sign the contract. Large sums may be required to 'smooth procedures'
Once in China there may be negotiations involving demands for commission and/or cash payments or gifts. Meetings may take place in genuine-looking offices. Contracts may be signed
Back in the UK, the initial payment is not received.Communication ceases and any cash parted will be lost

Source: CBBC