Beyond pissed

[Sparty]

I have simple rules for not getting scammed:

I know this limits my buying ability, but I ONLY meet in person and only deal in cash. This applies to both selling and buying

Haven't been scammed yet

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[Jeeperjamie]

I have simple rules for not getting scammed:

I know this limits my buying ability, but I ONLY meet in person and only deal in cash. This applies to both selling and buying

Haven't been scammed yet

That's a good philosophy I used as well until someone slipped me a few fake 20's a couple yrs ago and I mean these things looked legit. I guess if I had pen to check them then I would of known but they felt real like the other 20's and looked the same. The only way I found out they were fake was when I tried to buy something at CVS and the guy felt the area around the neck on the bill and it was smooth instead of rigid like the rest of the 20's. He didn't call the cops or nothing but I was out $40 on a $120 transaction.

 

[PlayfulBird]

I know this limits my buying ability, but I ONLY meet in person and only deal in cash. This applies to both selling and buying

Good rules, the cash part is getting harder...
Respect sticking to that, it seems harder and harder to stick to this, and honestly harder to resist buying the too good to be true stuff we all know to say no to

 

[ShadowsPapa]

So how exactly is this happening? A bunch of knock offs with no chips inside?

Lunentucker explained these particular cases, however, some companies are warning - some of the BT adapter makers have warned - beware of eBay and Amazon imitations using their name on counterfeit Chinese knock-offs.
It's happening big in electronics because it's so easy. Buy a product, reverse engineer it, have it made for pennies in China, sell it on Amazon and eBait.
I don't know if it's happened with the tazer or not, but I have seen warnings on USB devices, code readers, OBD adapters and other electronics.
And never buy software on Amazon or eBait. some is good, but a friend, an actual government IT person, got scammed buying Microsoft products on Amazon. Microsoft said they'd ignore him if he helped them nail the @#$% on Amazon. Shortly after, Amazon removed a lot of software sales from their pages. Woke them up, too, I guess. If you've ever been involved where the feds come marching in waving papers and badges ordering everyone near a computer to put their hands up, away from the keyboard, touch nothing and back clear away from any computer......... it's quite a thing. It's real, it happens, not just on TV.

 

[ShadowsPapa]

I have simple rules for not getting scammed:

I know this limits my buying ability, but I ONLY meet in person and only deal in cash. This applies to both selling and buying

Haven't been scammed yet

That works if you are willing to drive a lot.
I sold my 70 Javelin, rare combination car, over the internet. I simply informed some folks it was for sale, posted an ad or two in the AMC fakebook pages and it took off from there. One young guy in Texas decided he wanted the car. I had a lot of people saying "I'll take it!" so I told them - I'd need $xx to hold it - Paypal the money to me. They'd be protected, i'd be protected. Otherwise - CASH sale only, in person.
They came up, looked at it, agreed, handed over the cash less what they put in my PP account. They arranged to have it shipped to TX in the coming weeks.
A week after the car was picked up by the shipper, I got a notice from PP that a transaction was being disputed. WTF - it was that "earnest money".
I had saved the ads, pictures, even videos and pictures of the trucker loading the car and strapping it in the enclosed trailer and taking off with it. The pics clearly showed the car being driven into the trailer, and the license on the trailer and pickup hauling the trailer. And I had the full email conversation.
I sent all that to PP.
PP came back to me later with "it has been resolved in your favor, another family member of the buyer saw the transaction, didn't know what it was for and disputed it".
The kid contacted me later all apologetic.
But - had THEY been truly trying to scam me or for whatever reason that could have happened, I had my ducks in a row. I had photos, even video of the loading of the car and the whole communication chain.

For other smaller items, one has to watch that the seller actually owns the item, too.
There's so much stuff going on, it's pretty scary.

In any case, KEEP RECORDS! Don't delete any emails until well after you are happy with the transaction. Take pictures, whatever.

 

[Jefe1018]

Lunentucker explained these particular cases, however, some companies are warning - some of the BT adapter makers have warned - beware of eBay and Amazon imitations using their name on counterfeit Chinese knock-offs.
It's happening big in electronics because it's so easy. Buy a product, reverse engineer it, have it made for pennies in China, sell it on Amazon and eBait.
I don't know if it's happened with the tazer or not, but I have seen warnings on USB devices, code readers, OBD adapters and other electronics.
And never buy software on Amazon or eBait. some is good, but a friend, an actual government IT person, got scammed buying Microsoft products on Amazon. Microsoft said they'd ignore him if he helped them nail the @#$% on Amazon. Shortly after, Amazon removed a lot of software sales from their pages. Woke them up, too, I guess. If you've ever been involved where the feds come marching in waving papers and badges ordering everyone near a computer to put their hands up, away from the keyboard, touch nothing and back clear away from any computer......... it's quite a thing. It's real, it happens, not just on TV.

See this is what I was picturing, a knock off item, not so much a full blown scam…. People suck.

 

[jjs3845]

The scammers even go after you if you're the seller. I had a wood stove insert that I replaced with a new pellet insert, and posted it on FB Marketplace. Within 20 minutes I started getting FB messages asking if its still available and they would like to buy it and for me to text them at a particular phone number. Thankfully I didn't fall for it and found out soon after that its a scam to get your phone number so they could sell it and blow up your phone with ads and calls and texts and whatever else I can't think of. The only reason I didn't fall for it was that all of the interest in the item just didn't fit and it didn't sound right. I mean how were so many people interested in a wood stove in July? Plus there were people from Montana wanting to buy it right now (and I live in PA). Something just didn't sound right. And why do they all want to communicate by text rather than FB messenger all of a sudden? None of sounded right.

Please don't fall for that.

 

[legacy_etu]

Lunentucker explained these particular cases, however, some companies are warning - some of the BT adapter makers have warned - beware of eBay and Amazon imitations using their name on counterfeit Chinese knock-offs.
It's happening big in electronics because it's so easy. Buy a product, reverse engineer it, have it made for pennies in China, sell it on Amazon and eBait.
I don't know if it's happened with the tazer or not, but I have seen warnings on USB devices, code readers, OBD adapters and other electronics.
And never buy software on Amazon or eBait. some is good, but a friend, an actual government IT person, got scammed buying Microsoft products on Amazon. Microsoft said they'd ignore him if he helped them nail the @#$% on Amazon. Shortly after, Amazon removed a lot of software sales from their pages. Woke them up, too, I guess. If you've ever been involved where the feds come marching in waving papers and badges ordering everyone near a computer to put their hands up, away from the keyboard, touch nothing and back clear away from any computer......... it's quite a thing. It's real, it happens, not just on TV.

Yeah, the amount of counterfeit stuff coming out of China is mind-blowing.

I was looking for a used Ipod to replace my ancient one. Shopped around on Ebay and found used ......and also "NEW" Ipods available!! Hmmm, that's interesting since Apple stopped making them last year. The ad says "ships from China". I'm shocked that Apple hasn't cracked down on this.

 

[BUZZHEAD]

Well I am kinda in that boat of being scammed .
I bought a black AKC german shepherd pup.
$300 to hold on paypal remainder cash when I picked her up. $900
Now mom and dad came from POLAND breeder is telling me AKC is giving them a hard time on getting papers.
6 months now and no papers ,I have went back and forth with breeder even threatening to contact an attorney.
I should have known now seems like it was a puppy mill operation. You cannot trust people nowadays.

 

[charliez]

I won't buy anything from an individual anymore.

 

[Jeeperjamie]

My son almost bought a cloned car last month. He came to me about a BMW for sale on Facebook, like a 2020 model 428i with like 62,000 miles for $12,000. I told him somethings up, went and looked at it ran the vin which appeared to be clean but I felt something wasn't right. Let my wife's cousin at the DMV do a more thorough look into and she said that people are getting stolen Vehicles and do a revin on them and making them appear to be clean vehicles. By the time it's discovered if it ever is the seller is long gone. We ended up passing on it and the same guy got caught recently and was on the news for trying to sell another vehicle it and it had been cloned. These people are getting crazy smart at ripping people off.

 

[ShadowsPapa]

The scammers even go after you if you're the seller. I had a wood stove insert that I replaced with a new pellet insert, and posted it on FB Marketplace. Within 20 minutes I started getting FB messages asking if its still available and they would like to buy it and for me to text them at a particular phone number. Thankfully I didn't fall for it and found out soon after that its a scam to get your phone number so they could sell it and blow up your phone with ads and calls and texts and whatever else I can't think of. The only reason I didn't fall for it was that all of the interest in the item just didn't fit and it didn't sound right. I mean how were so many people interested in a wood stove in July? Plus there were people from Montana wanting to buy it right now (and I live in PA). Something just didn't sound right. And why do they all want to communicate by text rather than FB messenger all of a sudden? None of sounded right.

Please don't fall for that.

There and Craigslist. "Is this item still available" is a tip, IMO. If you have been looking for that item, you know what it is - say "is that front bumper still available". Watch out for cashiers checks (that's an old one and maybe they don't do that any more) or "a friend will pick it up" or "I have a check for $400 (when your asking price is 200), poor English and/or grammar, misspelled words, (although in the USA these days, that's a natural born American). A friend was trying to sell a big Kohler whole-house standby generator he'd totally rebuilt. He asked a friend to list it on CL because they don't do internet. ALL of the dozen or so responses were scammers. So he gave up, put in a concrete pad and set it up for themselves. They came out of the woodwork when a high dollar item was listed.

Yeah, there are almost always "tells" sort of like a poker game......... watch for the signs.
I got to the point I gave things away. I hauled things up to the end of the driveway and put a sign out that said "free" I was so sick of dealing with it. Big Forney stick welder complete with cables, tubes of rods, helmet, extensions. I was thrilled with a local industrial arts teacher came by asking me to hold it while he went home and got his truck (on his way home from teaching a a local HS)
My son took it a step further and literally trashed things they weren't taking with them to FL as he was sick of the scammers and low-ballers - offering 1% of what something was worth. He said I'd rather throw it away then let them pull that.

 

[jjs3845]

My son almost bought a cloned car last month. He came to me about a BMW for sale on Facebook, like a 2020 model 428i with like 62,000 miles for $12,000. I told him somethings up, went and looked at it ran the vin which appeared to be clean but I felt something wasn't right. Let my wife's cousin at the DMV do a more thorough look into and she said that people are getting stolen Vehicles and do a revin on them and making them appear to be clean vehicles. By the time it's discovered if it ever is the seller is long gone. We ended up passing on it and the same guy got caught recently and was on the news for trying to sell another vehicle it and it had been cloned. These people are getting crazy smart at ripping people off.

Can you imagine how awesome things would be if these people used the smarts and ingenuity they have to make things better rather than scam people for a quick buck?

 

[exfil offroad]

Made the mistake of purchasing a tazermini through forum member Gates007. Went on a cruise. Got home, no tazer…..search finds member banned “scammer”. Thought I did my due diligence in talking with them but apparently wasn’t quite diligent enough.

I always use pay pal for this kind of thing.

 

[AHenry014]

I have been buying/selling via forums for around 18 years and have had no issues until recently when I got scammed out of 200 bucks. I listed a WTB, he contacted me, sent me legit pictures of exactly what I was looking for with info to back it up, and we agreed to an accurate market value price. "I dont have paypal" led me to paying through Zelle, which I had used for another deal in the months prior, so I didnt think anything of it. No parts and no recourse. Oh well...live an learn.

I had another interesting deal recently, but the funds went through Paypal, so I knew I'd be good regardless of how it went. Buyer from Massachusetts contacted me through my FB marketplace post, wanting the willys wheels and ko2's I had for sale. He was just under a 3hr drive from me, so he floated the idea of having a courier come pick them up. Knowing of the "courier" scam, I was apprehensive, but I said we're doing this through paypal or youre coming to me with cash in hand, otherwise have a nice day. I was paid in full up front via Paypal goods and services, including the 3% paypal fee on top of our agreed upon price. I rolled the wheels outside into the driveway, the courier he set up picked them up the following day, and I haven't heard a peep from the buyer since. Had records of the entire transaction on facebook messenger just in case.

Sorry for your troubles here, but it happens and all we can do is protect ourselves and not fall for their tricks.

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