[baking]

I got you. I said "implied threat" meaning that someone who was having second thoughts before wiring the money is thinking about what could go wrong if they didn't wire the money, and not what could go wrong if they did. As others have mentioned there is also the whole sunk cost fallacy. This whole story is a great example of social engineering and it's the first time I've heard of it. Good for you to take the effort to post it. It's just long and could use a quick summary of the actual scam upfront for people with short attention spans.

[ghaff]

Absent all the red flags, the basic form of the scam is pretty sophisticated. Here's a check to get yourself setup from our preferred supplier and expense it when you start probably should set off alarms to the degree that other things seemed off. But it's not by itself something a legit company would likely never do.