First-Class Prize-Winning Thinking

The Post Office had a nice, big sign in the glass of the front door, which is useful as it keeps people from being scared by their views in or out of the front door through. The poster warns: “If it costs $250 to collect your prize it’s probably a scam.”

It’s the “probably” that gets me. Someone with the Post Office No Scam Bureau looked over the records and found, yeah, these first 88 money-for-prizes deals were frauds, but then here came two ones where they legitimately turned the prizes over, and the copy went from “it’s a scam” to “it’s probably a scam”.

Also, boy, you have to figure the guy running the cash-for-prizes scam who was charging just $247.85 was looking at those posters and thinking, “Whew! Under the wire! Nobody’s going to suspect me yet!”