Someone tried to scam me!!
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Joined: Jul 2003
Posts: 358
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From: Los Angeles
Someone tried to scam me!!
Wanna hear something CRAZY??!! 
Someone tried to scam me as I am trying to sell my car (not the S2k, but my C-class)!!!
So get this - I've gotten these two emails since posting up my car on Autotrader - one from a guy in Nigeria, and ther other from a buy in the UK.
First email:
--- steve harry wrote:
> Dear Sir,
> We are a trading company of auto motor parts and car
> dealer situated in Nigeria.
> We inquire further details on this car Mercedes
> Benz.
> Kindly furnish us with the shippment cost that will
> ship this car to Nigeria Port Authority.Also make
> price negotiable because we want to buy.
> Feel free to contact us on our e-mail address:
> I await your swift response.
Whatever - sounded sketchy, and he was trying to bargain with me to sound legit, and I wasn't going to ship my car to Nigeria anyways.
So Second email by another potential scammer -
"Thanks for the patience.However, am happy to tell you
that we have concluded with our
client and he has instructed to carry on with his
check, that means that payment will get to you in a
cashier check of $26,000.00 which is a refund payment
of a cancelled order earlier made by my client.
Due to company policy this check has to be made out in
this amount to you ,because company policy only allows
a refund payment on one cashier check,so you are
required to deduct cost of your car $18,900 when
payment gets to you and refund balance $7,100.00
(after deducting western union charges ) to my
customer via western union money transfer for him to
be able to offset shipping charges down here.
After payment has reached you and balance sent back to
him,our agent will come for the pick up and drive to a
prepaid shipper to be shipped to my customer,while
title papers and other necessary documets will be sent
by you via fedex courier to my customer.
Please Confirm this and provide name,address and phone
number for check payment to be delivered to you via
fedex courier.
I hope you can be trusted with such amount of money .
Thanks ,
Mauri"
Sounds good, right? Luckily, I found this site online that highlights these types of potential scams, and actually has a forum where people who have gotten scammed share their stories, and it broke my heart to read all that!
This is how it works -
The buyer actually sends the cashier check out to you. You bring it to the bank, and the bank typically makes the funds available to you in a few days. In the meantime, the buyer is emailing you and pressuring you to wire the agreed amount to him. So you wire it to him. However, the cashier check (especially out-of-country ones) can take anywhere from weeks to 3 years *gasp* to fully clear. In the meantime, you've already wired that money to the buyer, and when the bank discovers that the cashier check was counterfeit, the buyer is long gone and you are assed out of that amount that you wired him, and responsible for it.
Crazy, huh?? This all made me pretty scared, and thankful at the same time that I didn't bite. I've heard stories where the phone number printed on the check is actually the phone # to the scammer or their associate, so they can pretend to be a bank overseas and verbally clear the check, giving the victim a false sense of security.
I wanted to post this up so in case you ever sell a car online in the future, please be very careful in doing so!!!!!
This makes me MAD
Someone tried to scam me as I am trying to sell my car (not the S2k, but my C-class)!!!
So get this - I've gotten these two emails since posting up my car on Autotrader - one from a guy in Nigeria, and ther other from a buy in the UK.
First email:
--- steve harry wrote:
> Dear Sir,
> We are a trading company of auto motor parts and car
> dealer situated in Nigeria.
> We inquire further details on this car Mercedes
> Benz.
> Kindly furnish us with the shippment cost that will
> ship this car to Nigeria Port Authority.Also make
> price negotiable because we want to buy.
> Feel free to contact us on our e-mail address:
> I await your swift response.
Whatever - sounded sketchy, and he was trying to bargain with me to sound legit, and I wasn't going to ship my car to Nigeria anyways.
So Second email by another potential scammer -
"Thanks for the patience.However, am happy to tell you
that we have concluded with our
client and he has instructed to carry on with his
check, that means that payment will get to you in a
cashier check of $26,000.00 which is a refund payment
of a cancelled order earlier made by my client.
Due to company policy this check has to be made out in
this amount to you ,because company policy only allows
a refund payment on one cashier check,so you are
required to deduct cost of your car $18,900 when
payment gets to you and refund balance $7,100.00
(after deducting western union charges ) to my
customer via western union money transfer for him to
be able to offset shipping charges down here.
After payment has reached you and balance sent back to
him,our agent will come for the pick up and drive to a
prepaid shipper to be shipped to my customer,while
title papers and other necessary documets will be sent
by you via fedex courier to my customer.
Please Confirm this and provide name,address and phone
number for check payment to be delivered to you via
fedex courier.
I hope you can be trusted with such amount of money .
Thanks ,
Mauri"
Sounds good, right? Luckily, I found this site online that highlights these types of potential scams, and actually has a forum where people who have gotten scammed share their stories, and it broke my heart to read all that!
This is how it works -
The buyer actually sends the cashier check out to you. You bring it to the bank, and the bank typically makes the funds available to you in a few days. In the meantime, the buyer is emailing you and pressuring you to wire the agreed amount to him. So you wire it to him. However, the cashier check (especially out-of-country ones) can take anywhere from weeks to 3 years *gasp* to fully clear. In the meantime, you've already wired that money to the buyer, and when the bank discovers that the cashier check was counterfeit, the buyer is long gone and you are assed out of that amount that you wired him, and responsible for it.
Crazy, huh?? This all made me pretty scared, and thankful at the same time that I didn't bite. I've heard stories where the phone number printed on the check is actually the phone # to the scammer or their associate, so they can pretend to be a bank overseas and verbally clear the check, giving the victim a false sense of security.
I wanted to post this up so in case you ever sell a car online in the future, please be very careful in doing so!!!!!
This makes me MAD
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