Scammers using snail mail.

E-mail is the way they arrive.

Offers to make me a squillionaire. They always come by e-mail.

I get plenty of them. I bet you do too.

Millions of dollars are sitting in a bank account and in return for helping liberate them you get to keep a large amount.

Today I had a very different and interesting approach.

By snail mail. Personalised.

A stamped envelope containing a typed letter on headed notepaper (remember them?) arrived in my mail box.

It's from a firm of lawyers in Madrid with an address, telephone number, fax number and two e-mail addresses.

The stamp says it's from Portugal (is that where Madrid is now?) and it cost 80 euro cents.

The writer identifies himself as a barrister, personal attorney to a deceased gentleman with the same surname as me.

The bank of the late gentleman has issued a notice to the barrister to contact next of kin, otherwise the the account will be declared unserviceable and the money diverted to the bank treasury.

That would be a shame because the sum involved is "Seven Million Five Hundred Thousand Euros Only".

Barrister Santino tells me that "so far all my efforts to get hold of someone related to my client has proved abortive."

His suggestion is that he presents me as the next of kin,'"...since you have the same last name...", so that the proceeds can be paid to my account. He will of course provide the bank with "all the legal documents to back up your claim as my client's Next of Kin..."

The deal?

A nice touch - 10% of the money is to be shared"amongst the charity Organisations". The remaining 90% is divided equally between myself and barrister Santino.

Another nice touch - ïf this business proposal offends your moral ethics, do accept my sincere apology."

It's a new one on me. A correctly addressed snail mail letter, personalised by surname, the cost of a stamp, the cost of the paper and envelope...