Ebay car buying scam
Discussion
Hopefully this will help someone else, wouldn't want anyone to get caught out.
So I spotted a classified ad for a classic Lotus Elan +2 on ebay the other night, at a ridiculous bargain price of £4700 (too good to be true - lesson learned). The advert looked to be written by the wife and gave an email for enquiries, so I dropped an email to enquire! The ebay advert has since been deleted, and i can't remember the ebay account I'm afraid. Big clue should have been no location given on the ad. Here follows the emails verbatim with my details redacted. It turns out that he has used virtually the same email format to scam many people in the past (I just googled a section of the script).
On 9 Feb 2017 2:51 p.m., "Ian M Davies" <ianmdavies77@gmail.com> wrote:
I am sorry for the late reply. The car is still for sale and available for viewing in Elgin, Scotland. Excellent condition and it has no damages or faults. Al paperwork present. It belonged to my brother who unfortunately passed away 3 months ago and the car has been in storage since then. If this is going to be a quick sale, I will let it go for £4900 delivered at my costs. Please see photos attached.
See below some info on the car:
1972 Lotus Elan +2 S130/4 Coupe.
Lagoon Blue with Corect Silver roof denoting it has the 130hp Big valve engine.
This Iconic Classic British Sports car has been parked up for over 10 years and is now in need of restoring to its former glory.
It has undergone a previous restoration at some time and has had a Spyder chassis fitted.
The interior has also been retrimed in Blue Fabric which is in very good condition.
The engine turned over freely by hand, so we changed the oil and filter, drained the fuel tank and added fresh fuel, cleaned out the carbs and the engine started and ran.
There appears to be no damage to the body work but the paint is blistered all over which is no doubt due to a poor previous poor quality respray.
It has Electric Windows, Heated rear screen and a period radio.
We have the V5 logbook, Original Handbooks and an extensive file of receipts and old MOT's .
Kind regards,
Ian
On Fri, Feb 10, 2017 at 12:03 PM, StrokesUK> wrote:
Hi Ian,
Unfortunately Elgin is rather far away for me (Birmingham), so I will have to look into the logistics of viewing the car!
Regards
StrokesUK
Hi again, Unfortunately I am working in Berlin at the moment for the next few months...and Elgin to far away to arrange viewing for each offer i get. I suggest going through eBay for your peace of mind. As for payment we will use PayPal - Pay After Delivery which gives you 14 days for the car to be delivered/inspected before any funds are released to me. Regarding delivery someone will collect the car and will transport it safely to your location.
Please read the PayPal (Pay after delivery) terms by clicking on the link below:
https://www.paypal.com/uk/webapps/mpp/pay-after-de...
This purchase protection guarantees that the car is exactly as I described it; basically, once delivered, you'll have 5-7 days to inspect it and if you decide not to keep it you will get refunded in no time and they will charge me with the return costs. I will get paid only after you confirm that you received the car in good order.
Let me know if you want to go ahead as I still have quite a few more offers from potential buyers. If you do want to go ahead please email me your full name and address along with your daily contact number.
Kind Regards,
Ian
Be warned. Hopefully I haven't broken any rules by posting this!
So I spotted a classified ad for a classic Lotus Elan +2 on ebay the other night, at a ridiculous bargain price of £4700 (too good to be true - lesson learned). The advert looked to be written by the wife and gave an email for enquiries, so I dropped an email to enquire! The ebay advert has since been deleted, and i can't remember the ebay account I'm afraid. Big clue should have been no location given on the ad. Here follows the emails verbatim with my details redacted. It turns out that he has used virtually the same email format to scam many people in the past (I just googled a section of the script).
On 9 Feb 2017 2:51 p.m., "Ian M Davies" <ianmdavies77@gmail.com> wrote:
I am sorry for the late reply. The car is still for sale and available for viewing in Elgin, Scotland. Excellent condition and it has no damages or faults. Al paperwork present. It belonged to my brother who unfortunately passed away 3 months ago and the car has been in storage since then. If this is going to be a quick sale, I will let it go for £4900 delivered at my costs. Please see photos attached.
See below some info on the car:
1972 Lotus Elan +2 S130/4 Coupe.
Lagoon Blue with Corect Silver roof denoting it has the 130hp Big valve engine.
This Iconic Classic British Sports car has been parked up for over 10 years and is now in need of restoring to its former glory.
It has undergone a previous restoration at some time and has had a Spyder chassis fitted.
The interior has also been retrimed in Blue Fabric which is in very good condition.
The engine turned over freely by hand, so we changed the oil and filter, drained the fuel tank and added fresh fuel, cleaned out the carbs and the engine started and ran.
There appears to be no damage to the body work but the paint is blistered all over which is no doubt due to a poor previous poor quality respray.
It has Electric Windows, Heated rear screen and a period radio.
We have the V5 logbook, Original Handbooks and an extensive file of receipts and old MOT's .
Kind regards,
Ian
On Fri, Feb 10, 2017 at 12:03 PM, StrokesUK> wrote:
Hi Ian,
Unfortunately Elgin is rather far away for me (Birmingham), so I will have to look into the logistics of viewing the car!
Regards
StrokesUK
Hi again, Unfortunately I am working in Berlin at the moment for the next few months...and Elgin to far away to arrange viewing for each offer i get. I suggest going through eBay for your peace of mind. As for payment we will use PayPal - Pay After Delivery which gives you 14 days for the car to be delivered/inspected before any funds are released to me. Regarding delivery someone will collect the car and will transport it safely to your location.
Please read the PayPal (Pay after delivery) terms by clicking on the link below:
https://www.paypal.com/uk/webapps/mpp/pay-after-de...
This purchase protection guarantees that the car is exactly as I described it; basically, once delivered, you'll have 5-7 days to inspect it and if you decide not to keep it you will get refunded in no time and they will charge me with the return costs. I will get paid only after you confirm that you received the car in good order.
Let me know if you want to go ahead as I still have quite a few more offers from potential buyers. If you do want to go ahead please email me your full name and address along with your daily contact number.
Kind Regards,
Ian
Be warned. Hopefully I haven't broken any rules by posting this!
100% the same. Something of a cooincidence the car is in northern Scotland, was previously owned by his dead brother and he is based in Germany, no? All done to a script. I googled his email address and it lead to another ebay advert for a motorhome, dread to think how many seperate scams they run at a time.
As for how they make the money - I believe this PayPal pay on delivery does not actually cover vehicles or similar. As far as they are concerned it is between you and the seller, not their problem.
As for how they make the money - I believe this PayPal pay on delivery does not actually cover vehicles or similar. As far as they are concerned it is between you and the seller, not their problem.
StrokesUK said:
100% the same. Something of a cooincidence the car is in northern Scotland, was previously owned by his dead brother and he is based in Germany, no? All done to a script. I googled his email address and it lead to another ebay advert for a motorhome, dread to think how many seperate scams they run at a time.
As for how they make the money - I believe this PayPal pay on delivery does not actually cover vehicles or similar. As far as they are concerned it is between you and the seller, not their problem.
If it's pay on delivery then you would have the car before you paid so there must be more to it?As for how they make the money - I believe this PayPal pay on delivery does not actually cover vehicles or similar. As far as they are concerned it is between you and the seller, not their problem.
herewego said:
If it's pay on delivery then you would have the car before you paid so there must be more to it?
You pay the funds into a supposed Paypal / Ebay Escrow account before any delivery happens on the pretence that it will be refunded if you are unhappy, except it is a fake Escrow service and your money is now with the scammers. As soon as you do that you will never hear from them again.mannyo said:
herewego said:
If it's pay on delivery then you would have the car before you paid so there must be more to it?
You pay the funds into a supposed Paypal / Ebay Escrow account before any delivery happens on the pretence that it will be refunded if you are unhappy, except it is a fake Escrow service and your money is now with the scammers. As soon as you do that you will never hear from them again.There's loads of this on ebay atm.
There's a set of photos of an 05 Boxster S reg ending GYA that keeps coming up at £5k.
They seem to be hacking proper e-bay accounts, one was from a registered dealer in Edinburgh...
In the last week I've reported it to the garage, ebay and online fraud watch thingy...
I actually paid for an HPI check on a VX220 a few years ago for one of these scams... muppet.
There's a set of photos of an 05 Boxster S reg ending GYA that keeps coming up at £5k.
They seem to be hacking proper e-bay accounts, one was from a registered dealer in Edinburgh...
In the last week I've reported it to the garage, ebay and online fraud watch thingy...
I actually paid for an HPI check on a VX220 a few years ago for one of these scams... muppet.
http://m.ebay.co.uk/sch/i.html?sid=tombirch16&...
This fella's selling all kinds of gear he doesn't own!
This fella's selling all kinds of gear he doesn't own!
AF1 said:
http://m.ebay.co.uk/sch/i.html?sid=tombirch16&...
This fella's selling all kinds of gear he doesn't own!
"No search results found." Good!"This fella's selling all kinds of gear he doesn't own!
Sounds like the seller I reported a few days ago when I spotted a ridiculously cheap classic bike. He had advertised everything from motorcycles to tractors.
If this was real, people would not travel to see a car they would just sit at home and wait for the car to turn up and then say "nah don't want it mate" and its cost them no money or time.
The seller has to pay all the fees, they could do this 10 times before they sell it, would you do this to sell a car?
Too good to be true.
The seller has to pay all the fees, they could do this 10 times before they sell it, would you do this to sell a car?
Too good to be true.
I occasionally patrol the Hi Fi adds where similar scams operate, items always based in the highlands or Shetland etc. As someone said, an email address in the description or the photos is the giveaway. Usually hacked ebay accounts which haven't been used for ages. If there has been any recent activity it will be for extremely low value items yet they'll be selling £10k speakers or the like, just to build the image of a good seller etc.
The Google image search is a great function, take the ebay photo link and Google will search for the same/similar pics. Often you will get results of a different advert with the same pic, it can be on ebay, gunmtree, craiglist etc. Also apply a similar technique with a sentence used in the description to see if it has been used in another advert somewhere.
Companies check, if you have a company name you can now look up detailed info via Companies House for free. Check dates of incorporation, directors, previous names and any returns, usually the last one won't be available as the company is too new and will probably be dissolved before the filing deadline.
If the company is very new and has traded under similar names before then time to run...
The Google image search is a great function, take the ebay photo link and Google will search for the same/similar pics. Often you will get results of a different advert with the same pic, it can be on ebay, gunmtree, craiglist etc. Also apply a similar technique with a sentence used in the description to see if it has been used in another advert somewhere.
Companies check, if you have a company name you can now look up detailed info via Companies House for free. Check dates of incorporation, directors, previous names and any returns, usually the last one won't be available as the company is too new and will probably be dissolved before the filing deadline.
If the company is very new and has traded under similar names before then time to run...
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