Weird offer for buying a car.

Usuario Invitado realised it was Thu, 20 Oct

2005 18:25:04 +0200 and decided it was time to write:

These pages tell all you need to know:

Feed Google with the right search terms and many interesting web sites come up, like this one:

Usuario Invitado ( snipped-for-privacy@upvnet.upv.es) gurgled happily, sounding much like they were saying :

The rat is firmly in the following. The rest is just filler.

So - he'll make the payment, which'll take two weeks to get to you, but he needs the car in Greece in three weeks, and the shipper'll be in contact as soon as the payment starts it's two week journey.

By the time two weeks have passed and the payment hasn't shown, what chance do you think there will be of getting in contact with him? And where will the car be by then?

[snip]

That's all you need to know - it's a scam.

We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the drugs began to take hold. I remember Usuario Invitado saying something like:

The cheque will appear to clear and the money will show in your account, but a couple of months later you'll be wondering where it's gone once the bank has taken it back because the cheque was stolen/forged.

The trick is to assume that you're gullible enough to fall for it.

Alex

the Trick is with the bank details you send him he will empty your whole bank account

Is it really that simple to empty someone's bank account? All you need is information that's on any cheque you write, or any international transfer you carry out? Gosh.

Did you know that the word "gullible" isn't in the latest Complete Oxford Dictionary?

Thanks to all for your responses.

My friend here in Spain does not speak English and is not very expert in the internet, so I am helping him with the communication. I was sure that that offer was a scam, but was not sure of where was the trick. Now I see clear.

Regards.

Jesús

Any offer like this is always a scam.

We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the drugs began to take hold. I remember "susanyoung" saying something like:

Utter bollocks.

In article , Usuario Invitado writes

I recently sold my wife's car on Ebay, and had something similar purporting to be from a young girl in Liverpool. The story was that her father was buying a car for her as a birthday present, and was prepared to pay £11,000 for one. My car was only £8250, so she would have her father send me a draft and then I would refund her the difference so that, in her words she could have "two birthday presents." Initially, the enquiry had seemed genuine enough; she asked me loads of sensible, if slightly naive, questions by Email, to which I replied. She then came back offering to pay the full asking price, and with the scamming suggestion. I simply ignored the second Email and the sold the car to someone else.

If you're taking a bank draft, never accept it unless you've spoken to someone from the branch on which it purports to be drawn confirming that they issued it and that it comes from the person with whom you are dealing; the majority of banks will do this. If it's cash, have the person pay you in a bank, and pay the money in with him/her there; that' the best way of avoiding forged notes, and there are plenty of them about at the moment.

I currently have one of my Heralds advertised on one of the club websites.

13 different enquiries so far, all similar in format. The car is quite unusual, none of the enquiries asks anything which might be relevant to the specific vehicle, the only questions in fact relate to the price. The most obvious ones have the heading of the advert inserted into the enquiry in brackets. Most of these have been so obvious that they are laughable. One or two might not have raised my suspicions if they were for an "ordinary" car, in most respects they seem plausible. The inquiries always come from anonymous email accounts, and where a telephone number is provided it is always a mobile. I did try baiting a couple of the enquirers but I soon lost interest. Anyone got a good counter-scam? Cheers, Bill.

The last word there should have been enough to warn you off.

Ian

You may well be right that "most" will, but Nationwide BS told me quite emphatically that they would not answer any questions about their "branch cheques" (the nearest equivalent of banker's draft). Since even the expensive CHAPS transfers take several hours to go through, there seems to be no way of selling a car without some degree of trust, apart from the method suggested of paying-in cash in the presence of both parties. It would serve banks right if, where buyer and seller use the same bank, they insisted the cashier count out the money for the buyer and then immediately count it back in for the seller.

That's how I bought my 2CV.

Ian

"Bill Davies" realised it was Sat, 22 Oct

2005 09:36:38 GMT and decided it was time to write:

Perhaps this web site can help with that:

Loads of educational and hilarious stories about scamming the scammers.

In article , Autolycus writes

Yes, some are less than co-operative. Amazing, really, when all you're trying to do is prevent a possible fraud, but there you are. No doubt they'll cite the Data Protection Act, or something.

Last time I got a banker's draft (some years ago), I was asked by the seller to get a letter from the bank saying it was ok. They seemed quite used to doing this.

Identity fraud/theft or money laundering operation of some kind.