Mean streets

Chris Chan said her life was changed forever the day she was approached in Tsim Sha Tsui by a woman who "wanted to cast me in advertisements". It was the summer of 2003.

Although skeptical at first, Chan gradually gained confidence after the scout, who said she was from a "production house" called Space 2, assured her company had been set up by a reputable celebrity.

"The salary I was earning from my full-time job was barely enough to ends meet," she said. "I just wanted a part-time job to make some spare cash for emergencies. The woman told me I would not have to pay for anything."

She handed over her cell phone number to the scout and left. Within days, she received a call asking her to an office for a casting session.

The first step was filling in a questionnaire about her financial background and then a chat with a manager.

"During that meeting, I was shown a portfolio of all the advertisements and projects the company had done for major newspapers and magazines. It all looked very convincing. It looked real," recalled Chan.

A common skill of such fraudsters is flattery, with potential victims made to feel like they are the agency's most beautiful or talented clients. In Chan's case, the buzzword was "money".

"They told me how easy it would be to make money. That I could earn HK$200 an hour for one advertisement that takes five to six hours to finish, even if I was a nobody," said Chan. "If I became famous one day, I could earn up to HK$800 an hour."

After the initial interview, Chan was escorted to an empty room to deliver a self-introduction to a digital camera.

Over the following days, she said her cell phone was "bombarded with calls" from workers at the agency informing her she was a potential candidate for several advertisement campaigns. She finally gave in and agreed to another casting session.

This time she was greeted by another male manager, who after about an hour started to talk about a HK$30,000 package that included a set of comp cards (marketing tools for actors and models) and consultant fees for styling and hair design.

"That was when I knew it was a trap," said Chan. "I insisted on leaving and the manager quickly dropped his pleasant act. He told me that there is no such thing as a free lunch and that I could not leave that easily.

"He shouted that, no matter what, I still had to pay."

At this point, Chan began to worry about her safety and decided to hand over the money. Today, she feels she was not cheated, but robbed.

"It's absolutely outrageous for any company to require you to pay before you get the job," said Tam at Grandee Model Management. "There's no way a proper modeling company charges you up front."

She added that, even during projects, modeling agencies pay nothing for stylists or make-up artists because they usually work for free on the condition their names appear on the advertisement.

"I was so ashamed, I couldn't tell my parents. I even thought about killing myself," said Chan. "Neither the police nor the Consumer Council accepted my report against the company. They both suggested that, as I didn't have a gun pointed at my head, I was under no obligation to pay."