ebay scam?

F

firehawk

Veteran
Hi all.
I just sold a laptop for $1399 on ebay listed with me paying shipping in 48 contiguous USA. As soon as the auction ended I received the following message from the buyer. I'm pasting the responses below. I ___ out part of the names for privacy in case they are legit:
*Buyer*
Hi, I do hope the item is in great condition as listed as am buying it as Gift to USA. Do calculate the shipping cost via Fedex
overnight or UPS Next Day Air only and I will be very happy to pay the postage cost. Also confirm if this is your
ho____6@gmail.com paypal email id for the payment to be made without making mistake. You can also email me the pictures of the
product and send paypal payment request to H______@gmx.com

I then responded by reminding them that I had many photos on the listing and asking if they want me to calculate the additional charge for overnight shipping

*Buyer*
Okay,Do calculate the shipping cost via ups nextday air or fedex overnigth only also send me Paypal Reques to h____@gmx.com for the payment to carried out asap
Sent: Wednesday, December 20, 2017 at 10:35 PM
---

*Me*
Hi Olivia.
Did you see all the pictures on the listing or have anymore questions? The item is as described in the listing. It is used but in excellent condition.
I will be happy to visit UPS or Fed Ex to get an overnight shipping calculation.
First, can you confirm that this is the correct address you will want it shipped to?
John C__e
175-57 148th Rd, Jamaica, NY 11434

When I did a search that address shows up as R&A International Logistics. 17557 148th Rd, Jamaica, NY 11434. Are you sure this is the correct address? Thank you.


They repsonded by confirming the address. That is all.

Is this likely a scam? I have little ebay experience.
Are they trying to get me to ship it out fast so they can stop payment after it's already in transit and I'm robbed?
the buyer's name is herryjone76 100% positive
 
Simply skimming through that, and sorry if this offends anyone, but when I see something that seems sketchy COMBINED with poor grammar/spelling, I generally assume it's a scam. I will follow up with more question to try to suss it out but so far I've been rigt.
 
My old roomate got ripped off with this. Overnighted a package and somehow they were able to get the paypal charge reversed. This was years ago though, so I'd hope paypal protects against this now.
 
Call up eBay and see what they think. Be very careful to ship to only confirmed addresses and using signature confirmation. Ebay has special rules when dealing with shipping forwarders that mostly play in a seller's favor.

Also, I would just say you're not able to do honor that request for next day shipping. Say you're out of town, busy, nervous, that it's your policy or whatever you want. Wait the 3 handling days you probably listed and ship out as you originally said you would. Only thing about this next day stuff that makes me twitch is that it could be a stolen account or credit card and they want you to send the item before the fraud department alert kicks in.

On the other hand, it could all be fine. Last 4 out of 5 items I sold on eBay (iPhones) all went to Eastern Europe via freight forwarders. Stressful. Sorry!
 
Thank you. Looks like the scam here is they want you (me) to respond via email so then they have my email address so they can send a fake paid paypal notice so I will then rush deliver the product before I realize I've been scammed. Notice they are trying really hard to start communication via email. I later then would figure out I don't really have the money but the product has already been overnighted so it's loooong gone. So then I'd be out the product and the paymant.
Hope this helps someone else in the future.
 
SCAM!!! They pulled this same crap on a guy that works for me. I stopped him before he shipped his stuff. Be prepared for them to get nasty with you when you call them on it and try and bully you into sending it.
 
Looks like you did the best thing you could: You listened to your gut and got suspicious. If you think it's a scam, it probably is. And the bad grammar and bad/weird syntax is usually one of big tells. Just like on the "Nigerian Prince" type email scams.
 
English as a second language is not necessarily an issue, but the moment someone wants to do a private PayPal transaction instead of the standard way through the eBay portal you know it's a scam. A private transaction has no protection or refund via eBay.
 
jlpskydive said:
SCAM!!! They pulled this same crap on a guy that works for me. I stopped him before he shipped his stuff. Be prepared for them to get nasty with you when you call them on it and try and bully you into sending it.
Click to expand...

At the kind advice of more experienced users I told the buyer that I cannot offer overnight shipping and will be happy to cancel the transaction.
The response was
Hello seller, i will pay the shipping cost of the item item ,or calculate the usps express mail

Looks like they are still trying to get me to ship it. Still no funds in paypal, of course. They were unsuccessful at getting my email to send me a fake paypal paid message.
I called ebay as suggested and they said they would look into it. In the meantime I cannot just cancel the transaction.

Filed an unpaid item dispute and waited the required 48 hrs. The scammer never paid (of course) so I was then able to close the case and recover the selling fee.
I'm thankful the scam was not successful
 
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