Matt Allan
11-22-2004, 4:17 PM
Should be common sense but I thought I would make a post about the 15+ scam attempts I have recived while selling 2 of my cars online in the past month or less.
Might be moving so I have put 2 of my cars for sell on autotrader.com, not sure if the next house will have a 3 car garage and with 4 cars, 3 of which must be garaged I currently have 2 up for sale. 1 goes I keep the other, etc.. That isn't the important part though, it's just my sad story :)
Within 2 horus of the first car being listed I recived a generic email asking about the car, answered the questions then I recive a professioanlly typed offer saying he is a car brooker and his client wants the car. Most brookers are sleazy anyway so I keep reading even though it seems suspicious. He then goes on to tell me I will receive a cashiers check for around $20K over the price of my car. Ah what? I am to cash this check and then send him the refund via Western Union. I basically laughed out loud at this point but I thought I would ask some questions. Once you ask a question and these guys have to go off their original template it's just classic. All caps, no spelling at all, doesn't make a bit a sense. It's good times to mess with them when bored.
I guess these scams are very common though, mostly run out of Nigeria. They mail you a fake cashiers check. You cash it thinking you got the money, you send them some real money back and never hear from them again. Weeks later your bank tells you it bounced and you lost all your money. Get this, some have even had the car PICKED UP and shipped out!!!!! So basically you paid 20k for someone to steal your car. And the kicker is since you GAVE them the car and the title is transferred, they say there is nothing you can do. I feel terrible for anyone this has happened to. But come on, think a bit...
So if you are selling a big ticket item, either get a wire transfer or if you take a money order call the issuing bank and verify it. AND NEVER SEND ANYONE MONEY! This also happens on ebay a fair bit too on big ticket items. Like I said within just a few weeks I have got at least 15 of these emails, mostly from yahoo.com. There isn't much you can do either, because unless they send you a fake money order they haven't done anything wrong yet. I don't exactly want to give these Nigerians my address either. Doubt even if I got the fraud check anyone is going to do anything over there. So just be careful. Lot of people must be falling for this for so many to be trying it.
And for your amusement I am posting a few parts of some of the emails they replied back with. I just mess with these guys now. I reply with random gibberish and make it seem like I am interested just to waste their time and see what they say next.
Warning: You will be stupider after you read these emails.
<i>Subject: RE: UNDERSTANDING 4 SHIPPING MENT</i>
Here we have a nice use of numbers for words, gives it that professional I'm so important I don't have time to type 3 letters feel. And spell check is for sissies.
And this is just some of the body of the email after the initial template when I start messing with them. I have no comment for this, but the first person to tell me what "BT D COMPANY" means get a prize.
<i>MR MATT ,MY NAME IS RAMSY .U HV A CAR U WANT TO SELL .AND SOMEONE WORKING 4 A COMPANY.HIS INTERESTED IN THE CAR.BT D COMPANY HE WORKS 4 WANT TO PAY IN CHECK.BCOS DAT IS THE RULE OF D COMPANY HE WORKS FOR.NOW THIS AMOUNT GIVEN TO U IS MUCH THAN D AMOUNT U ASKED 4 UR CAR PRICES
IF U ARE NT INTERESTED IN IT PLSSSSSSSSSS LET ME NO .SO I WILL NO HOW TO EXPLAIN TO MY CLIENT.EARLY D BETTER ,MORE BUSINESS.IF U WANT ME TO GO ON WITH U .</i>
Might be moving so I have put 2 of my cars for sell on autotrader.com, not sure if the next house will have a 3 car garage and with 4 cars, 3 of which must be garaged I currently have 2 up for sale. 1 goes I keep the other, etc.. That isn't the important part though, it's just my sad story :)
Within 2 horus of the first car being listed I recived a generic email asking about the car, answered the questions then I recive a professioanlly typed offer saying he is a car brooker and his client wants the car. Most brookers are sleazy anyway so I keep reading even though it seems suspicious. He then goes on to tell me I will receive a cashiers check for around $20K over the price of my car. Ah what? I am to cash this check and then send him the refund via Western Union. I basically laughed out loud at this point but I thought I would ask some questions. Once you ask a question and these guys have to go off their original template it's just classic. All caps, no spelling at all, doesn't make a bit a sense. It's good times to mess with them when bored.
I guess these scams are very common though, mostly run out of Nigeria. They mail you a fake cashiers check. You cash it thinking you got the money, you send them some real money back and never hear from them again. Weeks later your bank tells you it bounced and you lost all your money. Get this, some have even had the car PICKED UP and shipped out!!!!! So basically you paid 20k for someone to steal your car. And the kicker is since you GAVE them the car and the title is transferred, they say there is nothing you can do. I feel terrible for anyone this has happened to. But come on, think a bit...
So if you are selling a big ticket item, either get a wire transfer or if you take a money order call the issuing bank and verify it. AND NEVER SEND ANYONE MONEY! This also happens on ebay a fair bit too on big ticket items. Like I said within just a few weeks I have got at least 15 of these emails, mostly from yahoo.com. There isn't much you can do either, because unless they send you a fake money order they haven't done anything wrong yet. I don't exactly want to give these Nigerians my address either. Doubt even if I got the fraud check anyone is going to do anything over there. So just be careful. Lot of people must be falling for this for so many to be trying it.
And for your amusement I am posting a few parts of some of the emails they replied back with. I just mess with these guys now. I reply with random gibberish and make it seem like I am interested just to waste their time and see what they say next.
Warning: You will be stupider after you read these emails.
<i>Subject: RE: UNDERSTANDING 4 SHIPPING MENT</i>
Here we have a nice use of numbers for words, gives it that professional I'm so important I don't have time to type 3 letters feel. And spell check is for sissies.
And this is just some of the body of the email after the initial template when I start messing with them. I have no comment for this, but the first person to tell me what "BT D COMPANY" means get a prize.
<i>MR MATT ,MY NAME IS RAMSY .U HV A CAR U WANT TO SELL .AND SOMEONE WORKING 4 A COMPANY.HIS INTERESTED IN THE CAR.BT D COMPANY HE WORKS 4 WANT TO PAY IN CHECK.BCOS DAT IS THE RULE OF D COMPANY HE WORKS FOR.NOW THIS AMOUNT GIVEN TO U IS MUCH THAN D AMOUNT U ASKED 4 UR CAR PRICES
IF U ARE NT INTERESTED IN IT PLSSSSSSSSSS LET ME NO .SO I WILL NO HOW TO EXPLAIN TO MY CLIENT.EARLY D BETTER ,MORE BUSINESS.IF U WANT ME TO GO ON WITH U .</i>