So I just found out my brother got scammed out of $4300!!!

Heres what happened:

1) He posted his guitar amp for sale on craigslist for $200.
2) A buyer agrees to send him a check for $4500, but he has to wire back $4300. After that a shipping company will come pick up the amp.
3) My idiot brother agrees.
4) He gets a check for $4500 and takes it to Washington Mutual to deposit in person.
5) Wamu tells him to wait 5 days for check to clear.
6) 5 days later he goes back into the bank to confirm it clears. Everything checks out so he pulls out $4300.
7) He goes to Western Union and wires the guy $4300.
8) 1 week later Wamu notifies him that the check bounced. The shipping company never showed up and now he owes Wamu $4300!!!

So besides the fact that my 17 year-old brother is an idiot, what can we do to fix this?

1st) We're gonna try to take back the payment from Western Union. Hopefully theres some kind of security.

2nd) We're gonna go back to Wamu and tell them they're idiots for clearing the check and letting him pull out the money.


I've seen this scam before online. Anybody else been a victim to this or have any advice or suggestions?

 

What you can do is slap your brother, teach him about scams and that's it.

He could be prosecuted for passing a bad check. I'd maybe call the FBI, but otherwise leave the bank alone.

 

 

Wow dude, honeslty, who the F*** says, i have to give you $4500 so you can send me the $4300 back and the amp?

S2000RAJ said it in a nutshell.

 

Not much you can do! I work in a bank and see this all the time, we try to tell customers but they do not listen.

 

WAMU should have told him, and should have noticed that the check was out of character and asked questions. I'm a teller and I always notice things like that and ask questions. Also, there's no use going back to the bank, they won't do anything about it. But I've seen many of these pass by me and we always let the customer know what's going on, and then we keep the check, send it to our fraud department, then I get a small bonus for catching a fraudulent check .

to wamu for not noticing and to your brother for falling for that. That type scam happens so much its not even funny.

 

He didn't read the warnings on almost every page of Craigslist? I don't think there is much that can be done.

 

Since you work at a bank, have you ever heard of a case where the bank is responsible? I checked the FTC website and heres what I found:

[I]"You and Your Bank

 

OMG! I can't believe anyone actually falls for that. Now this has answered my question: "Why do these idiots keep trying these scams? Does it actually work on anyone?"

Sorry that your brother got scammed, but because of this, it motivates those idiots to keep doing this scam on CL and other sites.

 

It's not WAMU's fault. It's the scammer's fault and then your brother's fault. This is a old gag and has is well known. The check or MO in some cases appears legit, only to come back up to a month later as fake. That's why most people only take credit card (via paypal) or some other kind of electronic transfer of funds these days.

But, like other's said, who in their right mind would change hands 4500 bucks on a 200 dollar sale?