Many years ago, my Dad had someone come into his Burnsall Street studio about a new yacht. After a slightly strange meeting, the guy made to leave, patted his jacket and, with great embarrassment said he must have mislaid his wallet and was there any chance we could help him get to Heathrow. My father gave him a crisp £ 50 note ( those were the days...), the man offered profuse apologies and thanks, and we never saw or heard from him again.
His spiritual successor is alive and well and appears to be putting shipyards and brokers through their paces around Europe. If you get a call from someone who has been looking for a 50 - 90m new build and claims to be closely related to a European industrial dynasty, treat it with suitable derision. Actually, there was a strong smell of rat when he first surfaced a couple of weeks ago, but it sounds like he may have convinced several yards to prepare for a bumper order.
Here is the Dickie Bannenberg faker detection guide ( not necessarily a complete list and I am sure others may have helpful contributions ) :
- Clients don't generally tend to go from 50m to over 90m in their requirements over the space of a couple of weeks
- Even the most loaded yacht owners are interested in sticking to a budget.
- Even the sharpest yacht owners don't tend to contact more than twenty yards in their preliminary discussions.
- A yahoo e mail address is unusual for a billionaire ( I might be wrong ).
- Talk of arriving by helicopter with two nannies and eight security men is a quick way to confirm you have no more than three pence to your name.
- If the only reference to the "client" on the Internet are endless identical pages involving the purchase a large diamond at Harry Winston, this is unlikely to help the cause.
- The Geneva Royal Family does not exist ( as far as I am aware ).
- One no-show at a meeting is confirmation enough. Two is gold-plated proof.
- Requiring a confidentiality agreement before you will reveal your name is, of course, bollocks.
- Getting Tim Heywood to do your exterior is mad. ( OK, I made that last one up )
In my patent system, any one of these triggers suggest trouble. When eight are triggered simultaneously it is time to bolt the door, get in supplies of drinking water and cut the phone lines.
