Episode 6 The Real Hustle

This is The Real Hustle: New Recruits!

The hustlers are back! This time, they've brought in

two new faces to help them with their scams.

New recruits Polly and Jazz...

..join original hustlers Paul, Jess and Alex.

Working together as a team, they'll carry out scams

that are more cunning and devious than ever before.

-On tonight's show, Jess knocks...

-Hello. Hi there.

-..Polly sucks...

-On the go, start sucking.

-..and actress Jennifer Metcalfe blubs.

-Don't start crying again!

The hustlers have invited

celebrity friends to help them with their scams.

They'll be thrown in at the deep end. No training and no practice.

Just straight in.

Today's celebrity guest hustler is an actress best-known

for her starring role in Hollyoaks - Jennifer Metcalfe.

I'm a little bit nervous, because I don't know

if I'm capable of getting money or anything off someone.

I hope I don't burst out laughing halfway through.

I haven't got a clue what I'm doing, so...

I'm just going to go with the flow

and just try and put my butter-wouldn't-melt eyes on.

Jennifer hasn't been told any details of today's scam.

She's just been sent to a restaurant, where a table has been booked in her name.

-Hi.

-Hi.

-I have a reservation.

OK, this way.

It's not long before she's joined by a hustler.

-Hiya.

-Hello.

-I'm Paul.

-Paul, Jen.

-Nice to meet you.

-You too.

-How are you feeling?

-Good, good. A little tired.

-Nervous?

-Yeah.

-Feel lucky?

-Not really, no.

-That's funny, because it has been the luckiest day of your life.

-OK.

You've won a massive amount of money.

-OK.

-Unfortunately, you need someone to help you collect it.

-OK.

This is a version of one of the oldest scams in the book.

Usually played today with e-mails, maybe with scam mail

that comes through the door, but we're going to do it old school style, person-to-person.

-What do you think?

-I'm up for it.

-We're going to find out.

Jennifer will need all that enthusiasm and more,

as she goes undercover in... The Syndicate!

A smart city hotel is the scene of crime today.

These young ladies enter the foyer, minding their own business.

One of them has just become the mark.

There's a business conference happening in the hotel,

and here come a couple of delegates.

It's Jess and Jennifer

moving in for the hit.

The first stage of the scam is going to draw a bit of attention,

because these smartly dressed business ladies

are about to have a right old barney.

You've cost us not hundreds, but thousands, you know that, don't you?

-I thought I was doing the right thing.

-Shut up!

-Stop crying, for goodness sake!

-I thought I was...

-Ssh!

It sounds like Jennifer has done something very stupid, which has

-cost Jess a lot of money.

-Do you know what really

-BLEEP?

People in there are not giving you a hard time, because they know you'll not stop crying.

I don't care if you cry, because you need to be told what you've done is wrong!

They understand it's a simple mistake.

It's not a simple mistake. Stop crying.

The mark hasn't recognised Jennifer. So far, so good.

But she's certainly noticed the noisy squabbling.

It wasn't actually your ticket, so why would you put your name on it?

They gave it to me and I saw, "Write your name," so I wrote it.

The scene is also drawing attention from the hotel staff.

-Hi there, ladies, everything OK?

-Yeah, we're fine.

In fact, it's new hustler Polly.

-Hi, you OK?

-She's here to strike up a conversation with the mark.

I'm the customer relations manager here, so if you've got any problems,

want any help with anything, don't hesitate to call me.

-OK.

-Sorry, what was your name?

-Gemma.

-Gemma...?

-Kramer.

-Kramer.

I'll just get my card for you, OK?

The fake customer service manager heads off,

with the argument still raging behind her.

It's like butter wouldn't melt, and I'm the only one who knows what you're like!

-I asked why it was given to you in the first place!

-Time for Alex to join the girls.

He's also playing a convention-goer.

-Don't even come and speak to me for the rest of the day.

-Hey!

I'm so sorry. Listen, she'll be fine.

Just calm down. It's all a bit exciting.

I know.

She's just being stupid, because you were trying to help.

As Alex tries to console Jennifer, Polly returns.

-Hi there, is everything OK here?

-Yes, thank you.

Ms Kramer? Here's your card.

-You want anything and I'll sort it.

-Thank you.

-OK, enjoy your day.

-That lady's name...

-Enjoy your day.

-Thank you.

That lady's name is Kramer. Excuse me?

Did I hear right? Is your name Kramer?

-What's your first name?

-Gemma.

Alex has overheard the mark's name and, suddenly,

has a light-bulb moment.

Look, if her name is Kramer... You're Gabi Kramer.

So, if you've got somebody with the same initial

-and somebody with the same name.

-That would be amazing.

Sorry, excuse me. I know this sounds a bit outlandish,

but we need somebody who's got the same name and initial as her.

G Kramer. Do you spell your name that way as well?

Yeah?

I just wanted to ask you. Basically, what has happened is they do, um...

We all work in the restaurant trade, but their restaurant

have got a little lottery syndicate al together.

And they buy a ticket every week and she looks after it.

And she wrote her name on it, because the lottery say you should

write your note on the back of it, cos, if it's winning,

then nobody else can take it off you.

They were going to cash it,

but realised Gabi was out of the country when the ticket was bought,

so she's not allowed to cash it.

-I didn't know that. I just found out...

-So here's the story.

They're in a work lottery syndicate and have won a lot of money,

but Gabi Kramer here

has only gone and written her name on the back of the ticket,

but she was abroad at the time and you have to be in the country

when the purchase takes place, so now, she can't claim the winnings.

The ticket's won quite a lot of money.

That's why the girl was giving her...

Basically, they find out that the other five people

have won tens of thousands and they can't cash it.

By a miraculous coincidence,

the mark has exactly the same family name and initial.

Of course, this is no coincidence at all.

Hi there, are you OK?

Customer service manager Polly only introduced herself to the mark in order to find out her name.

-Sorry, what was your name?

-Gemma.

-Gemma?

-Kramer.

-Kramer, lovely to meet you.

Behind the scenes,

she then printed out a badge with the same name and initial.

When she returned to the foyer, she slipped the badge to Jennifer.

-Is everything OK here?

-Yes, thank you, yes.

Whilst Polly handed over her business card,

the badge came out, turning Jennifer into Gabi Kramer.

Alex wants to persuade the mark to collect the winnings,

using her name G Kramer.

What I was going to ask you is, apparently, all you need to do is

go to a newsagents, give the ticket and they give you a certificate

that you've won and

then send you the cheque. If you could basically get the ticket,

go to the newsagent and get the certificate, that's all we'd need.

It's thousands of pounds.

Her boss owns a restaurant in Mayfair

and he's part of the syndicate. I'm sure he will take care of you.

They'll pay you 500 quid or something.

You see, without someone like you, they'd get nothing.

-Would you be able to do that?

-I'd be so, so happy!

500 quid for doing almost nothing? Who could resist?

I'll tell you what. I'll give you. Have you got a pen and paper?

I'll give you this address and come to the restaurant.

The mark agrees to meet Alex and the rest of the syndicate

at their restaurant later this afternoon.

We'll be there, so see you later. I'll call if anything changes.

But she's going to find out that Lady Luck isn't on her side today.

It's not that I don't trust you,

-I just don't know you.

-BLEEP!

-I'm sorry, I really am.

When hustlers go out, they don't bring money, they bring prop bets.

The proposition bet only has one rule -

and that's that the hustler always wins.

New recruit Polly is out on the town with some friends.

But Polly knows hustlers never buy the drinks.

Right, Ben, I'll ask you a question.

-Do you think, in my glass, I've more drink than you've got in yours?

-Yes.

-Yeah? OK. I've got a little challenge for you.

-Yeah?

-OK.

Right, this is the bet, OK? I bet that

-I can drink all of this...

-Yeah.

-..before you could finish yours.

OK? If I do finish mine before yours, you have to buy me a drink.

If you drink yours before I finish mine, then I'll buy you a drink.

-What's the..?

-Right, this is the condition, OK, right.

The condition is, you have to drink both of these drinks

-at the same time using both straws...

-OK.

..and keep sucking until all the liquid is gone.

-Right.

-Yeah?

-OK.

-So you up for this challenge?

-OK.

Give me a little shake? Yeah, OK?

So, to win the prop bet,

this guy needs to finish his drink before Polly does.

And he has an edge.

Not only does he have less liquid to start with, he has two glasses

and two straws to drink from at the same time, for double the suction.

One of you say, one, two, three, go.

-Right, OK.

-On the go, start sucking, yeah?

-Yeah.

-OK, Ready?

One, two, three, go.

-HE LAUGHS

-He's almost finished.

-Oh...

-POLLY GASPS

I won!

Polly finished first and that's because her friend's glasses

had an uneven amount of liquid in them.

-Go!

-Once he'd emptied one glass, he was just

sucking up air through that straw,

meaning he had no suction on the liquid left in the other glass,

so he'd never be able to complete the challenge. What a sucker!

SHE GASPS I won!

Told you. Burp! Oh, my...

LAUGHTER

SHE LAUGHS LOUDLY

I burped really loudly!

LAUGHTER CONTINUES

It just came out!

LAUGHTER CONTINUES

LAUGHTER CONTINUES

Off to the bar. Yeah!

Don't forget a day with Polly, will you, eh?

MORE LAUGHTER

Jess, Alex and Paul are taking a trip in the Hustle van

and, judging by the temporary branding on the sides,

they're out on business in... The Upgrade.

The hustlers are doing some cold-calling

in a residential neighbourhood.

And they're specifically targeting people with a visible satellite dish.

Hello.

My name's Susie, I work for TRH Installations. We're doing a scheme on your street today.

-That's my colleague next door...

-Jess points to Paul a couple of doors down.

-..just over there.

Two people in matching jerseys? On the same street? They must be legit.

-Do you have, er, satellite?

-Yeah.

-Today, we're doing a scheme.

We're going to offer, for a whole year, access to every single channel.

All the sports, all the films. Also, you know the box office channels you usually have to pay for?

We're doing all those, so you'll have access to every film.

We swap your card over, give you a new card, activate it in 90 minutes.

It's £50 for the entire year and all we want to do is, at the very end,

if you fill out a quick survey telling us how you found it.

So Jess and Paul work for a local satellite company

and are signing people up for an access-all-areas promotional deal.

For a one-off top-up fee, existing satellite subscribers

will get all premium channels for a year, and it only costs £50.

For the entire year. As long as you do the survey, yes.

It takes about two seconds. Is it something you'd be interested in?

Like I said, £50 for the entire year.

Shall I go and get one of the technicians for you?

He's already done a few houses right now. I'll go and get him for you, OK?

Give me the card you've got and I'll get you a new one.

Looks like the hustlers have a customer.

-Do you want to replace that?

-Aye.

-Right, it'll be £50.

-Do you want the card just now?

-Aye.

-Great, I'll do that for you. I'll be right back.

In order to upgrade their package,

Paul needs to swap the viewing card for a new one.

Alex must have a stash of new viewing cards in the van...

..because after some paperwork,

Paul returns bearing a welcome package, complete with a VIP viewing card.

Paul puts it in the receiver.

Right, and you've still got everything here.

It must really be a legitimate viewing card,

otherwise it simply wouldn't work in the receiver.

-That'll be £50.

-There's just the small matter of the one-off fee.

I'll be right back with your receipt.

Actually, no-one will be getting a receipt because as soon as they've got the cash

the hustlers jump in the van and are gone.

So what's really going on?

OK, I'll do that for you. I'll be right back.

The secret is in that brand-new viewing card the hustlers are getting from Alex.

Here's what the marks didn't see.

Alex took their existing viewing card, gave it a bit of a clean,

added a sticker to make it look new,

and handed it back to Paul attached to a bogus welcome letter.

-All the mark's old channels reappeared.

-Perfect.

Of course they did, it was their own viewing card after all.

That'll be £50.

They all paid £50 for a little green sticker and an official-looking letter.

Digital media made easy.

Unfortunately, those premium channels will never appear. No matter how long they wait.

50 quid for all the channels, that was that.

The guy was pretty convincing, seemed to know what he was talking about.

People looked genuine enough to me.

The guy came in, the card related to the headline on the paper.

His van was all logo-ed up.

She told me she was going to come back with the receipt, but she hasn't come back yet.

Unlimited satellite for £50 seems too good to be true,

but it's the small details that make this scam convincing.

Companies do occasionally run trial schemes for new services,

and with the badges, uniforms, and official-looking van, this offer seems completely legit.

You should never part with cash to somebody who cold calls you on the doorstep

under any circumstances, no matter how good the deal looks.

Always ask for their ID, phone the company and check it out.

Earlier today, Jennifer Metcalfe helped the hustlers rope in this mark, in an upmarket hotel foyer.

She thinks they're part of a work syndicate who've won a lot of money on the lottery.

But silly Jennifer has written her name on the back of the ticket

when she was ineligible to claim the winnings.

You've cost us not hundreds, but thousands. You know that, don't you?

The mark thinks that Jennifer shares the same surname and initial as her.

You give the ticket and they give you a certificate that you've won.

She's agreed to claim the money for the syndicate

for a handsome fee of £500 and their eternal gratitude in...

The Syndicate Part Two.

The mark and her friend are on their way to the restaurant

where Alex, Jennifer and the rest of the syndicate work.

They go inside to find some familiar faces.

And a new one. It belongs to Paul, the restaurant owner, and final member of the lottery syndicate.

So Ian's told me a little bit about this. He met you guys... yesterday, or...?

-Earlier on.

-This morning?

-It was actually this afternoon, wasn't it?

-Really?

-Yeah.

So he just met you guys. And your name is?

-It's amazing, did he explain to you what's happened?

-There you go, Gemma.

-Kind of, yeah.

Thank you. I'd like to know a little bit more.

I need to know a little bit more as well, to be honest.

Paul seems more cautious than the rest of the syndicate,

but he's willing to show the mark what they've all come here to talk about.

-That's our ticket.

-The draw date is at the top, and you should check the numbers.

-It's the winning ticket.

Alex lets her check the numbers on the National Lottery website.

-It does.

-So...

-It does, doesn't it?

I was terrified you're going to look at this and say no,

you know what? You've got this wrong, you've won a tenner.

Sure enough, those are the winning numbers.

Five numbers and the bonus equals a whopping great amount of money.

-It's £131,000.

-BLEEP.

-That's a lot of money.

What Ian suggested to me is that I give you some money to go and claim it,

a couple of hundred pounds and you go and claim it.

My problem is, they're not going to make the cheque to out G Kramer.

They're going to make it out to your name and we're depending on you giving us that cheque

in return for 500 quid or something, you know. I'm concerned about that, to be honest.

It's not that I don't trust you, it really isn't. It's just that I don't know you.

I'm sorry, I really am.

Paul's concerned about letting a complete stranger claim their winnings,

and then having to trust her to hand the money over.

They would have no legal comeback if she just decided to keep it.

You know, that 132 grand will go into your account,

then it's going to be up to you to pay everybody else.

So I can kind of understand where Rob's coming from.

There's no other way of doing this because you can't claim it

because they'll initially check if you were in the country or not.

It's the only way out, really.

But if they can't trust a mark to hand over the winnings,

they could all end up leaving here empty-handed. Paul has an idea.

Here's what I'm suggesting.

We've got a syndicate form, which we've all signed.

We make up another one with your name on it, dated for last week.

Would you be willing to claim it and be part of the five-part syndicate

and we'll let you take a fifth of it?

-So we were splitting it four ways, we're now splitting it five?

-Absolutely.

-Would you be happy to do that?

-A silly mistake.

-Well done, you.

So Paul wants to make the mark an official member of the group.

They'd all sign a new syndicate agreement that would mean they split all winnings equally between them.

There's just one tiny catch.

To make me feel better and also to give us a little bit of security,

if I give you that ticket, I do want you to put something up for it.

-What are you expecting me to put up for it?

-2,000?

The mark must first buy into the syndicate for £2,000.

She'll then be able to claim the winnings from the ticket and keep one fifth for herself.

It's 26,500 each, if we split five ways.

But will the mark stump up £2,000?

In fact, does she even have access to that much money?

Can you put together 2,000? Do you have that in your bank?

I personally don't.

That's not want the hustlers want to hear.

Why don't you get what you can, let us see what you've got. And, you know...1,500?

If you want me to go and do this, why don't you put your name there.

Before the mark goes off to the bank, the hustlers give her the new syndicate form to sign,

but will it all be for nothing?

I'll fill it in, you guys go to the bank, get back as fast as you can.

She's still not convinced, but she goes off with her friend

to see how much cash she can get together at short notice.

Did you get to the bank OK? Did that all work out?

OK. How much do you have for me?

Let me count it out for you, I'll do that.

The mark has decided to go for the deal. She hands over the cash.

I know. I'll tell you what, I'll put it right in the safe, it won't go anywhere.

So how much has she managed to get her hands on?

All right, well, that is... That is £1,700.

There's just one thing left to do and that's to take the ticket to a newsagents,

have it scanned by the lottery till, and receive a winner's print-out

which she can use to claim a cheque of the winnings.

OK, I'll get this in the safe.

Alex and Jess take the mark to a nearby shop with a lottery machine.

The mark is carrying a ticket that she thinks is worth £130,000.

And a big chunk of that money should be coming her way.

Because it's quite a small shop, I'll come in with you.

-You guys wait outside.

-Alex takes the mark into the newsagents.

Unfortunately, there's someone at the till so they'll have to wait until she's finished.

Actually, it's Polly, who's making sure to keep her back to the mark at all times

so she doesn't get recognised.

Alex has to take a phone call, leaving the mark and her ticket.

He sends in the mark's friend.

The mark's friend turning up is Polly's cue to leave.

It means the hustlers can disappear into the night

long before that ticket gets anywhere near a lottery machine.

The ticket is scanned by the newsagents.

It may have the real winning numbers, but it's definitely not a real lottery ticket.

In fact, the hustlers printed it themselves using blank lottery paper.

The mark's been told her ticket isn't a winner.

In fact, it doesn't even have a proper bar code on it.

She goes out to find her fellow syndicate members,

but they're long gone.

Along with all her money.

It's BLEEP.

She just ran off with all of our money.

I checked it with them on the website and everything.

It said all the numbers, it said the date and everything.

We were convinced that we were going to get all this money back.

And obviously, like, it's got my name on the back and everything. Well, my last name.

I asked the woman to check it over and she said it's not a winning ticket.

I asked her to check it again, and she said it's not.

I really didn't think the girls would go for it.

I just think I wouldn't, but when you're in that situation you don't know.

Each step I thought nah, they're not going to buy it, they won't buy it,

and each step they just kept on buying it.

Gemma had started thinking of dreams and already spending the money, and it made me feel really bad.

This is one of those situations where it all seems a little too convenient.

A winning lottery ticket belonging to someone with exactly the same name and initials?

A lottery ticket is just a piece of paper, so when someone asks you

to hand over your hard-earned money for it, you should stop and think.

You're probably dealing with scammers trying to find a mark.

And if you're not careful, it could be you.

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