Danger! Internet Car Sales Scam Hits the Hinterlands
August 24th, 2007 9:40 AM
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KAIT TV says 18-year-old Roger Turley of Wynne, AR listed his used truck online, asking $1500. A week later, UPS delivered a check for $4999. “I thought ‘something’s not right there.’ And then, we got two checks.” The mystery bidders then asked if Turley if he’d accept a cashiers check, take his $1500 out and wire the balance of the funds back to them. Instead, Turley turned the checks over to his local bank. The bank confirmed he’d been sent worthless paper. "We would have been in trouble if we had taken the $1500 out and sent them the remainder,” Turley reflected. “We would have been liable for all of it." The Cross County Sheriff's Department is looking into the matter. Meanwhile, you have been warned.
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Old news. A friend of mine ran into tons of these a few years ago when he tried to sell his car online. And if you try to sell anything on craigslist (or eBay) you'll get this one, plus the escrow scams.
May be old news to some, but not everyone, I suspect.
I have come across this one a few times. Normally, you will get a badly composed email offering to buy your item. The emails appear to be mass produced, and make no mention of what your are selling. They get easy to spot.
My dealership has had two similar scams like this come our way in the past month. They wanted us to charge credit cards and send the money to their "shipping agency". we reported the 4 different credit cards that were given and they were all stolen. it always begins with a fax or email that says something like.."I can't be reached by phone, because i'm deaf" and then "it's for my son and I'll pay cash, where should I send my deposit. One of the clowns said their address was 30 S Wacker Dr in Chicago. I'm pretty sure, but I don't think people literally live at the mercantile exchange. I thought they just worked long hours