SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (KELO AM) - The Better Business Bureau likens asphalt cons to gypsies: families working their way up the country with phoney pitches, inferior or no work done and leaving town with thousands.
Jessie Schmidt says a church in the Sioux Empire lost $16,000 in an asphalt paving fraud.
Schmidt says the con artists are savvy. She says they had the church pay them with two $8,000 checks. That way the payments don't raise the attention of the IRS who will want paperwork on anything over $10,000.
The traveling asphalt company offered the church a "good deal" to pave their parking lot. They said they had some leftover asphalt and they would do the job at a discounted price. And, as Sioux Falls Police will tell you, "if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is."
The checks were cashed and the contractor never once returned to the church.
Schmidt says for any door-to-door sale's pitch ask for state and local licenses, references, don't pay the bill up front and don't fall prey to an urgent sales pitch.
The BBB is warning residents and businesses in the upper Midwest that if they are approached by asphalt gypsies call BBB at 800-