Amanda Roberts

    aroberts42@live.com

    DOZENS of expats in Shenzhen have been swindled out of tens of thousands of yuan in a United Airlines fraud case allegedly perpetuated by a well-known Shenzhen international student, an investigation by the Shenzhen Daily has discovered.

    “My mother was stranded in Rome,” said one victim named Rose. “We had to pay thousands of dollars to get her back home to the United States.”

    People interviewed for this article asked not to be identified by their full names.

    The person accused of the scam, identified by her surname Uzcan, is attending a university in Shenzhen and allegedly used a stolen credit card to purchase flights while selling the flights to Shenzhen expats at discounted rates.

    (Continued on P5)

    Victims deposited cash into a bank account under the name of Uzcan’s boyfriend.

    Some of the people Uzcan approached were cautious initially, but after booking the flights through Uzcan, United Airlines emailed the victims directly to confirm the flights.

    Some were even able to apply the flights to their United Airlines Mileage accounts.

    After several people successfully completed flights booked through Uzcan, the number of expats purchasing discounted flights through her grew quickly.

    But on September 2 people noticed that their flights were being canceled by United.

    Some who were halfway through their trips were told by United that they had to pay for the full cost of their flight - often double or triple the amount of money they paid Uzcan - in order to return home.

    Some travelers arrived at the airport before finding out their flight had already been canceled.

    “I was told I would have to pay over US$3,000 to take my flight,” Seth said. “I only paid US$500 for it in the first place.”

    At least two dozen people contacted Uzcan through WeChat and email to find out what happened. At first, she said that United’s system had been hacked and she returned some of the money, according to the victims.

    By the end of September, she began blocking the WeChat accounts of people who had booked flights through her.

    United has since started contacting people who completed flights or attached their United Airline Mileage accounts to flights that weren’t taken. According to letters from United, the people who booked flights through Uzcan violated the airlines terms of service because Uzcan was using a stolen credit card to book the flights.

    United said the victims are liable for flights they took because United was never paid for the flights by the credit card company.

    United has also nullified all the mileage accounts connected with the scam.

    “I lost over 100,000 miles I had saved,” another victim named Ariyana said. “United is saying that I owe them thousands of dollars. The stress has been unimaginable. I had to hire a lawyer. I don’t know when I’ll be able to recover financially. I won’t be able to go home for Christmas this year.”

    “United has been terrible to all of us,” Rose continued. “They are treating us like criminals.”

    “United allowed this apparently fraudulent card to be used for months but are now blaming us for their lack of oversight and responsibility,” said a victim named Jayton.

    Several of the fraud victims have reached out to law enforcement officers in China, the U.S. and Canada. While all three countries are investigating the case, they claim there is little they can do.

    “Most of the transactions were conducted through WeChat,” a Canadian police officer said. “Anyone could have been behind the screen.”

    Investigations are ongoing.