Is Symbonet trading group safe to buy cars through?

[aidanb17]

Im about to send a healthy sum of money to symbonet trading group for the delivery of a new car.
everything seems legit and from what I can see online it is safe but I'm just bit hesitant to send money via bank transfer for a car i haven't seen. ( you get 10 days to return car if its not as described for a full refund). so i was just wandering of any one had dealt with this company and if they are safe to use.

ETA

Sorry, suspect link removed.

Edited by Big Al. on Thursday 13th October 19:47

[plasticpig]

It's a scam.

1. No physical address on website.
2 The domain registrant information:

Registrant Contact Information:
NamePERFECT PRIVACY, LLC
Organization
Address12808 Gran Bay Pkwy West
CityJacksonville
State / ProvinceFL
Postal Code32258
CountryUS
Phone[phone]
Email

3.Google "specialize in online consignment sales for individuals, businesses, and non-profit groups" and you will find links to many scam sites already identified.

[aidanb17]

Ok thanks for the help, I had seen on a few forums that people had bought stuff and it was fine to use but maybe they are fake accounts making it up?

[plasticpig]

Well ring them up and ask them why their domain registration details are hidden and why there is no physical address on their website which can be verified as being occupied by them.

Also they claim to be an Ebay.co.uk partner. They aren't according to Ebay as the only escrow services recognized by Ebay are escrow com in the US and a couple of others in Australia, Germany and Italy.

[nickuk]

URGENT do not send money to this company !!!

I paid for a car last week, and the car has not arrived, now I can not get hold of anyone at Symbonet, and the email address of the seller has been deleted as has the listing on Ebay.

Please reply here, I'd be interested to know if anyone else has been affected.

Edited by nickuk on Friday 14th October 12:04

Edited by nickuk on Friday 14th October 15:06

[aidanb17]

I'm really sorry to hear that!
I was about to buy a 56 plate Range Rover sport for £6k which seemed to good to be true.

The guy said it was in a lock up in Scotland and it would be delivered. But I said I would pay on collection and he never replied.

Its a very convincing scam!

Edited by aidanb17 on Friday 14th October 12:15

[t400ble]

aidanb17 said:

Im about to send a healthy sum of money to symbonet trading group for the delivery of a new car.
everything seems legit and from what I can see online it is safe but I'm just bit hesitant to send money via bank transfer for a car i haven't seen. ( you get 10 days to return car if its not as described for a full refund). so i was just wandering of any one had dealt with this company and if they are safe to use.

ETA

Sorry, suspect link removed.

Edited by Big Al. on Thursday 13th October 19:47

Some people really shouldn't be allowed on the internet

[anonymous-user]

aidanb17 said:

I was about to buy a 56 plate Range Rover sport for £6k which seemed to good to be true.

Edited by aidanb17 on Friday 14th October 12:15

Everything you need to know, right there.

[plasticpig]

charltjr said:

Everything you need to know, right there.

Depends on the mileage. If it's got 200K on the clock then it would be about right.

[jamoor]

nickuk said:

URGENT do not send money to this company !!!

I paid for a car last week, and the car has not arrived, now I can not get hold of anyone at Symbonet, and the email address of the seller has been deleted as has the listing on Ebay.

Please reply here urgently or contact me (Nick) 07770 756230. I'd be interested to know which car they are trying to sell you.

Edited by nickuk on Friday 14th October 12:04

Surely this has to be lurker of the century?

[lightfair]

Hello,

this is lightfair from escrow-fraud.com

escrow-fraud.com is a website that documents those fake websites and tries to shut them down.

How this scam works: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bogus_escrow

"Symbonet Trading" is the latest site in a long string of such fake sites. The last one was "Bardos Trading Corporation", before it was "RolNet Trading Corporation", "WelNet Trading Group" and several more.

http://escrow-fraud.com/index.php?page=fraud_data&...
http://escrow-fraud.com/index.php?page=fraud_data&...
http://escrow-fraud.com/index.php?page=fraud_data&...

and before it dozens more. I have not yet seen the website for "Symbonet Trading" but it probably looks like the screenshots found under the above links.

As I said, this has been a long ongoing scam and I can supply additional data for law enforcement if needed.

Other experiences:

http://forum.escrow-fraud.com/viewtopic.php?f=2&am...
http://forum.escrow-fraud.com/viewtopic.php?f=2&am...
http://forum.escrow-fraud.com/viewtopic.php?f=2&am...

http://www.the75andztclub.co.uk/forum/archive/inde...

Yes, all those cases are tied to the same scammer (or group of scammers).

[nickuk]

UPDATE

FRAUD WARNING !!!!!

Symbonet Trading Group

DO NOT SEND MONEY TO THESE PEOPLE

Apart from myself, I have now heard from two others today who have been scammed out of 4500 Pounds for the same 2007 Black BMW X5

Very convincing scam, you answer a classified ad via ebay internal messinging or piston Heads etc, the seller contacts you direct via your email (that they obtain from ebay, I guess) asking you to use Symbonet trading group to carry out the transaction because it was his brothers car who has sadly passed away, and the seller is in Germany or france. Symbonet then send you an invoice and are readily available via phone and online chat to talk to you and make you feel secure about the transaction. You make payment via bank transfer, and once your payment is received, the sellers phone does not answer, onlne chat blocks you and your emails you send direct to the seller email address have non delivery notifications. The car never arrives and you’ve lost your money.

Do Not I repeat DO NOT send money to these people .

The sellers is called Dennis Gutendorf

The ebay ad was under ebay user anothercheapcar, however I don't know how ebay are involved but for sure ebay gave my email address to the seller.

Please share as much as possible so others do not get ripped off...

[lightfair]

aidanb17 said:

Ok thanks for the help, I had seen on a few forums that people had bought stuff and it was fine to use but maybe they are fake accounts making it up?

Yes, that's exactly the "modus operandi" of this scammer. He creates fake forums (actually just single websites) that mimic existing forums. Those website then sing praise to the fake company.

Do a Google search for "bardos trading" and "Symbonet rading" (including the quotes) and you'll get the picture.

Quite a couple of legit forums have been burned by this because some victims don't notice the slight misspellings of the forum names.

Example:

fake:
http://www.the75andzt-club.co.uk/forum_php/topics/...

legit:
http://www.the75andztclub.co.uk/forum/

(you'll probably spot the additional hyphen in the fake site)

[plasticpig]

lightfair said:

Yes, that's exactly the "modus operandi" of this scammer. He creates fake forums (actually just single websites) that mimic existing forums. Those website then sing praise to the fake company.

Do a Google search for "bardos trading" and "Symbonet rading" (including the quotes) and you'll get the picture.

Quite a couple of legit forums have been burned by this because some victims don't notice the slight misspellings of the forum names.

Example:

fake:
http://www.the75andzt-club.co.uk/forum_php/topics/...

legit:
http://www.the75andztclub.co.uk/forum/

(you'll probably spot the additional hyphen in the fake site)

Hmm interesting. I didn't actually bother googling them. The fact the real domain registrant was hidden and there is no physical address on their website was enough to shout scam. Googling the first sentence on the home page just confirmed it.

[lightfair]

Here are two of the fake "forums":

http://www.coffeeshopforums.co.uk/forum/forumphp/d...
http://www.the75andzt-club.co.uk/forum_php/topics/...

The other ones are already beling pulled by the scammer:

http://front-ranger4x4.com/bbphp/forum/threads/For...
http://www.over-clocker.co.uk/forumdisplay/topics/...
http://www.uk-camp-site.co.uk/chatterphp/forum/dis...
http://hammock-forums.org/forumphp/s=ae0ec0502dc26...
http://xtreme-systemsforum.com/forumdisplay_php/vi...
http://www.wildernessurvivall.com/forums/ws/thread...

The scammer obviously has a Google alert on each new site; and once it appears in the Google results as fake he pulls it (as well as the associated forum sites).
It might actually happen that the scammer puts up a fake "pistonheads" forum in the future, just out of spite...

I have not seen the actual Symbonet site myself because the scammer always uses the "noindex" and "nofollow" tags so that Google doesn't pick it up.

And actually your observations in your first post in this thread are spot on.

[plasticpig]

I have sent you the link via the feedback system on your website.

[viklac]

nickuk i try to call you !

[viklac]

Is somebody who get back his money?
On wednesday i paid for Dennis Gutendorf 3000 pounds. This is really annoying. I called the banks for the money back, but NOTHING.
Is there any idea?

[viklac]

jamoor i tried to call you !!

[anonymous-user]

How stupid do you have to be to send these people money.

Really should not be allowed on the internet.