Possible eBay fraud attempt against me -- what do you think is happening here?

[Dan Druff]

I have a gift card to an online store that I am selling on eBay. These gift cards are not connected to me or anyone (like typical gift cards). This makes me an easy target for fraud, as these gift cards are essentially gift codes, and would be very hard to trace once stolen.

I have listed a few of these gift cards before without a problem.

The most recent one sold in a very suspicious fashion:

- Someone used my "buy it now" button for a ridiculously high price -- 98.5% of the gift card's value. I set it to such a value because I thought it would be easier to detect fraud this way. These gift cards typically go for 88-94% of value.

- The person requested the codes on the gift card instead of the cards themselves. I actually offered this as an option in the item description, but again it indicates a higher chance of fraud.

- The person paid me on Paypal immediately, but Paypal notified me that the payment is on hold for review.

- The Paypal came from a guy named Jimmy in Florida.

- The person communicating with me on eBay is named Michelle, and is from New York, according to eBay.

- The person just created their eBay account on September 30th, and has already made at least 8 purchases since then. They have good feedback, but this could easily be a future chargeback scam. You cannot leave bad feedback to a buyer on eBay (a big flaw, IMO).

- When I asked them to provide me with ID to prove they were the person listed on the Paypal, I got this indignant response:

If you'd like to cancel, feel free. I will leave appropriate feedback. I won and paid for the item immediately. I am both credit card AND bank verified on paypal (that alone took 3 days for the deposits to my bank). I will not share my driver's license with you and would gladly notify ebay if your attempted intrusion into my sensitive personal information which is clearly outside the scope of paypal's seller protection requirements.

you can either email the codes (as you offered) or mail them fedex to my address as listed. I do not trust them being in my mailbox while im at work.

Also interesting that someone who joined eBay on September 30th would know so much about PayPal's seller protection requirements.

So what do you think this person's angle is?

My guess is that they are buying up untraceable merchandise like these gift cards with their friend's Paypal account, and then will claim that they were "hacked" and both will split the proceeds.

Or something like that.

No way I'm sending this person the gift cards. Shady as hell.

[Cokehead]

I agree this is totally a scammer at work. Guy has been on the site for three days and is quoting regulations to you!



This is not only a scammer but a dumb one at that.

[Belly Buster]

You can request a buyer's account details to get their registered phone number and address.

If there's no phone number, or a false number, or the details don't match up, this against eBay's TOS and if the guy neg DIXs you eBay should strike it out.

[Cokehead]

You can request a buyer's account details to get their registered phone number and address.

If there's no phone number, or a false number, or the details don't match up, this against eBay's TOS and if the guy neg DIXs you eBay should strike it out.

Wow i did not know that, how do you request this.

About 3 months ago some fuckface bought a portable dvd player from me and said he never got it. HE reported that I sent him an empty box. Like I would ever do that if I was going to rip him off, what wuold be the point? Charged back on paypal and he got all his $ back even though I fought it. I wanted to call him and give him a few words of encoragement to pay up but didnt have a way to get his # or so i thought. Plz help.

[Belly Buster]

You can request a buyer's account details to get their registered phone number and address.

If there's no phone number, or a false number, or the details don't match up, this against eBay's TOS and if the guy neg DIXs you eBay should strike it out.

Wow i did not know that, how do you request this.

About 3 months ago some fuckface bought a portable dvd player from me and said he never got it. HE reported that I sent him an empty box. Like I would ever do that if I was going to rip him off, what wuold be the point? Charged back on paypal and he got all his $ back even though I fought it. I wanted to call him and give him a few words of encoragement to pay up but didnt have a way to get his # or so i thought. Plz help.

There's a guide here which is quite good: http://reviews.ebay.co.uk/HOW-TO-GET...00000003198457

As ebay moves all their links around all the time, you can use this form to get their info: http://www.ebay.co.uk/sch/ebayadvsearch?_sofindtype=9

Be a little careful though when you get their info, they get your info too.

There may well be a time limit though.

[Mdwst Hstlr]

First thing, which you all ready know I'm sure is don't send anything untill Palpal releases the funds.
Next, only deliver by a trackable shipper with delivery confirmation. Delivery confirmation is free if you ship through ebay plus all your tracking info is automatically send to the buyer. Don't offer codes sent through e-mail.
Ebay has seller protection that is pretty good but you NEED to do every thing by there book. I've made sales for top dollar that ended up being to scam-buyers and/or hacked accounts but because I did every thing by the book I kept the money and Paypal either takes the hit or recovers what they can. One pitfall many sellers fall into is not adding signiture confirmation to sales of I think $249 and higher. If you don't get the sig on those larger sale and there is a chargeback which is a regular scam, you will lose, but if you get the sig your good.

[Dan Druff]

First thing, which you all ready know I'm sure is don't send anything untill Palpal releases the funds.
Next, only deliver by a trackable shipper with delivery confirmation. Delivery confirmation is free if you ship through ebay plus all your tracking info is automatically send to the buyer. Don't offer codes sent through e-mail.
Ebay has seller protection that is pretty good but you NEED to do every thing by there book. I've made sales for top dollar that ended up being to scam-buyers and/or hacked accounts but because I did every thing by the book I kept the money and Paypal either takes the hit or recovers what they can. One pitfall many sellers fall into is not adding signiture confirmation to sales of I think $249 and higher. If you don't get the sig on those larger sale and there is a chargeback which is a regular scam, you will lose, but if you get the sig your good.

What if there is signature confirmation but the buyer claims there was an empty box (or the merchandise was bad), like what happened to Cokehead? Does Paypal typically rule for the buyer there?

BTW, confirmed scammer. Just got this e-mail:

Hello Todd Witteles,

PayPal Payment Review helps you lower risk and reduce loss by alerting you to potentially problematic transactions.

We've completed our review of the transaction below and found the payment may not be authorized by the PayPal account holder or may be the result of suspicious activity. As a result, we’ve cancelled this transaction.

No wonder this person acted so indignant when I called them out on what they were doing.

[Mdwst Hstlr]

Oh and only ship to there verified address. Thats a big one sellers get screwed on. The buyer asks you to ship to a different addy for any number of reasons and if its not there paypal verified address you have no protection.
After going through lots of different situations dealing with all the scammers on there I don't try to figure it out anymore in fact I try to ship ASAP after the payment CLEARS because if I do everything right I'm covered. Sometimes Ebay/Paypal figures out that a buyers account maybe under someone elses control but if you ship before they do anything about it you still get payed.

[Mdwst Hstlr]

What if there is signature confirmation but the buyer claims there was an empty box (or the merchandise was bad), like what happened to Cokehead? Does Paypal typically rule for the buyer there?

BTW, confirmed scammer. Just got this e-mail:

Hello Todd Witteles,

PayPal Payment Review helps you lower risk and reduce loss by alerting you to potentially problematic transactions.

We've completed our review of the transaction below and found the payment may not be authorized by the PayPal account holder or may be the result of suspicious activity. As a result, we’ve cancelled this transaction.

No wonder this person acted so indignant when I called them out on what they were doing.

It used to be very tilted in the buyers favor but because that got abused so much by scammers its has got way better. Every one I knows who sells this way incuding me has at least one horror story with paypal, but like I said not so much anymore. If Im shipping a very high dollar Item I'll take it to fedex or UPS and take pics of it being packed and of the worker and the shipping reciept.

[Dan Druff]

Oh and only ship to there verified address. Thats a big one sellers get screwed on. The buyer asks you to ship to a different addy for any number of reasons and if its not there paypal verified address you have no protection.
After going through lots of different situations dealing with all the scammers on there I don't try to figure it out anymore in fact I try to ship ASAP after the payment CLEARS because if I do everything right I'm covered. Sometimes Ebay/Paypal figures out that a buyers account maybe under someone elses control but if you ship before they do anything about it you still get payed.

What is the requirement for items under $249?

What kind of confirmation do you need that you actually shipped it, and that it was delivered?

[Mdwst Hstlr]

Oh and only ship to there verified address. Thats a big one sellers get screwed on. The buyer asks you to ship to a different addy for any number of reasons and if its not there paypal verified address you have no protection.
After going through lots of different situations dealing with all the scammers on there I don't try to figure it out anymore in fact I try to ship ASAP after the payment CLEARS because if I do everything right I'm covered. Sometimes Ebay/Paypal figures out that a buyers account maybe under someone elses control but if you ship before they do anything about it you still get payed.

What is the requirement for items under $249?

What kind of confirmation do you need that you actually shipped it, and that it was delivered?

Delivery confirmation. If you want to really cover youself on these cards go to the post office and take pics or better yet a vid of you sealing them in the envelope and having the casher adding the postage and delivery confirmation. Make sure you get a good shot of the card with the codes.

[chinamaniac]

How do you ship through ebay?

[Mdwst Hstlr]

How do you ship through ebay?

If you are a seller on ebay you go to your "My Ebay" page and in your sold and need to be shipped list next to each item in your list there is a "ship" button.
There may be some initial setup(it's been awile since I set mine up). Anyway once you push that button it takes you to a page with lots of shipping options and all addresses related to that sale. You can print a label from there on your regular printer and just tape it on your package. The shipping price comes right out of your palpal account. You also get a very nice discount on rates because its through ebays account.

[Belly Buster]

What if there is signature confirmation but the buyer claims there was an empty box (or the merchandise was bad), like what happened to Cokehead? Does Paypal typically rule for the buyer there?

BTW, confirmed scammer. Just got this e-mail:

Hello Todd Witteles,

PayPal Payment Review helps you lower risk and reduce loss by alerting you to potentially problematic transactions.

We've completed our review of the transaction below and found the payment may not be authorized by the PayPal account holder or may be the result of suspicious activity. As a result, we’ve cancelled this transaction.

No wonder this person acted so indignant when I called them out on what they were doing.

Todd - did you initiate the review or did paypal just send this to you anyway?

Also sounds like this guy needs a call from Alvin Finkelstein.

[Crowe Diddly]

When selling a gift card or gift cert, you pretty much know 100% you'll be able to sell it for 85% or better every time, right? If a buyer does ANYTHING out of the ordinary, don't even waste your time, can them immediately. A real buyer will be around quick enough. The way ebay is now, if you have a bad feeling, you are probably right. Don't even waste time considering the extra 5-15 bucks if there's even a half-decent chance you'll end up losing 100% of your merchandise.

[cmoney]

I had someone rip me off on ebay once.

I then sent them a picture of a person in the driveway of the address the item was shipped to.

No idea if the person in the picture was the scammer but I promptly paid after they received that picture.

Overall lost money on it since I had to hire someone to camp outside the address but was worth it.

This might be known I would never send money via paypal as a "service" if there is any chance you will be disputing it. Even if it is actually a service they are providing send the payment for a "good."

For example, you send a pre payment of 400 for web work. Put in the description "Software CD" this way if they fuck you you can tell Paypal you were expecting a CD with all the software you hired them to create.

Maybe this has changed in recent years but I got fucked with the "Good" vs "Service" thing before as paypal claimed since i paid for a service I couldn't prove I didnt get what was delivered and therefore was not eligible for their protection policy.

[Jasep]

I pretty much gave up on ebay, to many headaches to make to little money...

There are lots of sites that buy gift cards for around 85% or, even better, do gift card exchanges and trades

[Dan Druff]

They also bought an Apple gift card from someone (who I just contacted and warned), as well as some weird stuff like a stack of fifty $2 bills.

[ErickAA]

Druff, you should consult Micon on this. He seems to be well versed in selling junk on ebay. Also, I once bought something illegal on Ebay (unknowingly). I got the item mailed to me and a refund of my money. Was pretty cool IMO.

[Belly Buster]

I pretty much gave up on ebay, to many headaches to make to little money...

It's OK though cos they've updated their logo. Well worth the $$$$m they no doubt had to pay.