Nigeria Ebay Scam

[warken]

I was selling one of my laptops on ebay, this user won it, then got Suspended by Ebay, I just found out why after lookin at my Spam box.

First Email:

Dear Seller,

I'm Pleased to be a winner of your auction.I live in UK,Fulham to be precised,i am presently out of the UK for an official assignment in my place of work.I'm relatively new to Ebay as you can see,I have never bought anything on this site.I heard its very convinient and easy thats why i'm trying it now.This item is a gift for my fiance......... who is currently in Ibadan..Nigeria,I'm buying it for him for his up coming graduation (Masters).I will be paying you.......for this deal to be conclude very fast from my Bidpay account and payment will be deliver to your contact address within 2-4 working days of payment confirmation.Please let me have the total cost plus shipping down Ibadan Nigeria,I'll be paying for the cost and I will like you to send it through USPS/ROYAL MAIL service,if you dont have any courier office near you then i will want you to use a secure postal service.
And please get back to me with your names in full and contact address with a secured email address...so that i can pay you at once.
Do get back to me ASAP.

Best Regards,
Mary.

Second Email

I got your invoice....I am currently out of town due to some official assignment for my company and I will like you to ship out the item to Nigeria to my finacee who is studying his masters degree program and I will pay you any amount for the shipping cost through Royal mail express.....I will make the payment through bidpay online auction payment which is ok, fast, secure, reliable and they protect both the buyers and the sellers....I will need your informations, FULL NAME, TELEPHONE NUMBER, CONTACT ADDRESS and A SECURE EMAIL ADDRESS plus the shipping cost to ship the item to Nigeria and once I have all the necessary informations, I will go ahead to make the payment through bidpay....Below here is the shipping address:
Ekpemede Joseph
13, Oyo Road Oremeji Mokola
City: Ibadan
State: Oyo
Country: Nigeria 23402
Get back to me soonest and I await your possitive feedback....Thanks.
Regards,
Mary.

End of Email

Is this a scam .. if it is or isnt im not shipping to Nigeria. On my auction it said ships to USA only. hm.

[hesperus]

It doesn't sound very inviting, does it. I can't see exactly where the scam comes in if you take a few precautions. Don't give out any personal details. Bidpay (which is terminating service at the end of this year, btw) requires that you have an account there, but the payee only needs to know your seller ID on the site, which she already does. No address is required. The funds are deposited directly into your account. Make sure the money clears, then ship it. A po box return address would be nice.

However, chances are she has set up a bidpay account with a stolen credit card. If this possibility bothers you, then just move along. She was suspended for a reason.

[nihil]

Hmmmm,

Seem to be a lot of strange coves living at that address:

http://forums.ebay.com.hk/thread.jsp...=1110659882819

13, Oyo Road Oremeji Mokola

Yet when I google it, I don't get a college or institution



EDIT: this thread is a warning:

http://forums.ebay.com.au/thread.jsp...=1133131921756

[rapier57]

I've heard of some of these. There was a news report recently of ocal laptop sellers losing the entire laptop and shipping costs, since they agreed to accept the payment from this bidpay system, which may or may not actually exist. They get a check and ship the stuff. Then the check comes back and no good.

Let the seller beware.

[Blunted One]

These damn ebay scammers are ruining the great service ebay provides to the world. I have been a victim of this as I wanted to get some computer equipment, but as soon as me and the others buying this equipment sent in our money this guy flew the coupe and would keep telling us that he was going to send it asap. He must have left with a few thousand dollars and was just posting the equipment as a ploy. Some things are too good to be true and some people have no morals and should burn in hell!! or at least have a painful life and death. What is wrong with people these days and for that matter how f-ed-up is this world we live in?

And that's my two cents.

[superstarent]

Great News I am a web designer and I tried to sell an item and the same dam thing happen to me . These Bums send you a check , you deposit it in your bank then send them the difference. What this does is that by the check clears it turns out to be bad and because you give them the money you then have a serious problem with the bank you you must pay the bank back that went to the bum . Protect your self these are fraud seekers. Thanks

Originally posted here by warken
I was selling one of my laptops on ebay, this user won it, then got Suspended by Ebay, I just found out why after lookin at my Spam box.

First Email:

Dear Seller,

I'm Pleased to be a winner of your auction.I live in UK,Fulham to be precised,i am presently out of the UK for an official assignment in my place of work.I'm relatively new to Ebay as you can see,I have never bought anything on this site.I heard its very convinient and easy thats why i'm trying it now.This item is a gift for my fiance......... who is currently in Ibadan..Nigeria,I'm buying it for him for his up coming graduation (Masters).I will be paying you.......for this deal to be conclude very fast from my Bidpay account and payment will be deliver to your contact address within 2-4 working days of payment confirmation.Please let me have the total cost plus shipping down Ibadan Nigeria,I'll be paying for the cost and I will like you to send it through USPS/ROYAL MAIL service,if you dont have any courier office near you then i will want you to use a secure postal service.
And please get back to me with your names in full and contact address with a secured email address...so that i can pay you at once.
Do get back to me ASAP.

Best Regards,
Mary.

Second Email

I got your invoice....I am currently out of town due to some official assignment for my company and I will like you to ship out the item to Nigeria to my finacee who is studying his masters degree program and I will pay you any amount for the shipping cost through Royal mail express.....I will make the payment through bidpay online auction payment which is ok, fast, secure, reliable and they protect both the buyers and the sellers....I will need your informations, FULL NAME, TELEPHONE NUMBER, CONTACT ADDRESS and A SECURE EMAIL ADDRESS plus the shipping cost to ship the item to Nigeria and once I have all the necessary informations, I will go ahead to make the payment through bidpay....Below here is the shipping address:
Ekpemede Joseph
13, Oyo Road Oremeji Mokola
City: Ibadan
State: Oyo
Country: Nigeria 23402
Get back to me soonest and I await your possitive feedback....Thanks.
Regards,
Mary.

End of Email

Is this a scam .. if it is or isnt im not shipping to Nigeria. On my auction it said ships to USA only. hm.

[dalek]

These Bums send you a check , you deposit it in your bank then send them the difference

What, am I the only person who has ever heard of "wire transfers", "Money Orders", why do people insist on personal cheques from it's too good to be true scams.........most banks have a clearing period (usually 3 to 5 days), by then they are long gone.....

You want a cheque, get the "cheque" certified first, (will mean that the sender has the funds available) then you know it will be legit......

Everyone is looking for that golden goose of a deal.......never happens, stick with what you know is legit and avoid anything suspicious....(beef up your junk controls/spam filters).

[superstarent]

I own an E-Commerce Internet Business and this is another Scam that people use. They try and order over $2000.00 in GPS Products or Bodybuillding products from my online store or via email asking to have it shipped to another Country just like they do on EBay.
They then try and use a credit card that belongs to someone else , and tell you some bull hockey story so you finalize the deal.

The Scam is this; someone they know that lives in New York and works there as well they get them to copy a persons information from their Credit Card, then send it to their friends in another country and they attempt to use the persons credit card to buy products.

The stupid people don't realize that you now need the billing address information in order to proceed. What I do as a Merchant is to call Visa or Master Card or any credit card company to verify the card. They then give me the telephone number of the issueing bank and I verify the cards that way before the sale takes place.

What I have found is that every Credit Card sale that comes from another country are most of the time fraud charges. The Credit Card companys have told me to not take any charges from other countries without verifying the cards.

Have a great day!

[bagggi]

whatever happened to paypal sevice ebay was providing.

they take your card details. these guys cant bypass that on registration. and more over ebay warns people of not sending their details or accepting western union orders.

well, they do make it sound very secure.

[ShippMA]

Hi,

bagggi: Yeah, plus i believe that just by using Paypal you have some form of insurance.

As for the fraud, when selling anything i NEVER post the item until the money has cleared into my account. The way i see it is that if they want to send me a cheque rather than use a more secure way then fine, but then THEY have to wait for it to arrive in the post AND then the 3 days for it to clear into my account.

The other method of payment which i find quite handy is just a straight transfer to my account. Within the same country its free, and if THEY are that desperate for the product to be posted then, THEY can take the risk of the transfer, and hope that i'm not a scammer (which of course i'm not).

When buying, i'm the exact opposite. If the item is of a small value then i don't mind how i pay, but for anything over say £50 i pay using paypal, credit card, etc. Something that gives me protection.

Basically ebay is great as long as your sensible.

Warken: My advice is to send a mail back that says yeah i can ship it to Nigeria, but it will cost X and the shipping insurance will be Y so the final price is Z. Then go on to say that you will only ship once the money has been sent to you/deposited in your account and has CLEARED. Once the money has cleared then you should be fine, however judging by the links nihil sent and by the fact that you say this person has been suspended, i would not even bother with that and just put it back up for auction, unless your desperate for the money, whats another 5 days to ensure you have a real buyer and not a fake one...

Matt