I met a lovely Ukrainian woman online, had 3 visits, but I suspect she may be scamming me

by Alex
(London)

I met her online with AFA, visited her in Kiev, she visited me in London, and I visited her again in Kiev. And yes, we were very intimate together during the last two meetings. She has an arrangement to see me again in 2 weeks time in London, but I have discovered that she is actively talking to other men and offering to meet them too.

I have used two fake profiles to test her on two different websites (AFA and Unona) and both times she replied with non-generic e-mails and very new information that only she could know. I also noticed that she has been getting comments from a guy on her Instagram so I looked him up and invited him to chat.

He told me she had offered to meet him in June and had told him she was single and he sent me her private e-mail address to prove it. She also says she doesn't have much money and yet I see from her Instagram and Google+ profiles that since dating me she has visited both New York and Rome in between seeing me!

When I quizzed her about this she categorically insists she is only dating me, that these were trips with her female friend and she knows nothing about the letters to other guys.

I have seen a case of this before where the website translators write without the girl's knowledge, so who do I believe? Having read your blog, she doesn't fit the usual scammer's profile and yet she is very materialistic and she did question why I was holding back on buying her an expensive bag during her trip to London.

Like you said, maybe she is used to having more disposable income than us here in the West and the streets are paved with gold, etc! I'm usually very good at weeding out the scammers but with Svetlana I have no idea! What do you think? Many thanks for a great website and very sensible advice and if you can shed any light on my dilemma, I would appreciate it very much. Kind regards...


Bob's Answer:

TECHNICALLY she's not a "scammer" by my strict definition, but the difference between "scammer" and what she is doing is probably only academic. You have good reason to question her motives.

It sounds like you've done some solid research and analysis here, and you reasonably conclude that something isn't right.

Given what you've described, I think you can safely rule out the possibility that an agency is writing on her behalf (either to you, your fake profiles, or that other man).

The New York and Rome trips (I would much more believe that these trips were to visit men then just with her girlfriend), her offer to travel to meet the other man in June, her penchant for expensive gifts, etc., all lead me to believe she probably dates for the "goodies" (trips, expensive gifts, nice dinners, etc. -- things she surely couldn't afford on her own).

I don't think I mention this phenomenon elsewhere, but probably should... there are Russian/Ukrainian women who are "real", and aren't actually taking cash from the deal, and maybe really would marry the right man if they found him, but mostly their game is simply the world travel and accumulation of goodies on someone else's dime.

I'll have to come up with a name for that :-)

So what now?

Well, I think if I were in your shoes I'd probably just cancel her upcoming visit and just find someone else. But if you aren't ready to do that, maybe you could just quiz her again, but with a little more detail... "So you're only dating me? Are you not even writing to anyone else?" If she says she isn't, you know for sure she's lying. Then you could even push a little further and ask "So do you know a man named Steve?" (substituting your name in the fake profile for "Steve").

She might blow up and accuse you of spying on her (which you were, but you had good reason), but you could just say "No, Steve is a friend of mine and he mentioned to me that he met a girl online, and when he told me about her she sounded like you, so I asked further..." That might get you off the charge of espionage AND get her to come clean (but probably not, but by then you could just milk it for a little entertainment value).

I hope that helps! Good luck!