Anyone know how this scam works?

[5STM5]

I've been selling some low value items on Facebook selling sites, and for the third time I have been approached by different facebook accounts with the following:
A couple of generic questions, not detailing what the item is they want. They then say they will buy and Fed ex or DHL the money to me at my home, when I confirm receipt of the money they will organise a courier to collect the items, all appears to be at their cost. One item had a cost of £25, and their account suggested they lived in France. The messages look like English isn't their first language. None have asked for bank details.
To me it's a scam, but I can't figure out how it works.

[Dave.]

They “miss the decimal point” and send you £2500, you send them £2475 back, the £2500 wasn’t theirs to give you, gets refunded to its rightful owners, you’re down £2475 that you sent them legitimately.

Or something along those lines.

[steveo3002]

overpay you with some dodgy payment fiddle...please send item plus the 500 i overpaid , 2 weeks later bank claws back money and youre down the item plus refund

[5STM5]

I thought about that, but I see it working if they transfer to a bank account. If it's cash delivered by a courier, can they prove how much they sent?

[Dave.]

Good ol’ fashioned laundering maybe, or just phoney notes.

[steveo3002]

or make an excuse that fedex cant take it , he paypal'd or bank transfer instead

just delete it and move on

[5STM5]

So nothing sophisticated then. PITA when you initially think you have a buyer.

[Newc]

Money laundering.

Courier arrives with your £2500, which unusually for a courier they will ask you to open, check, and sign for while they stand there, almost as if they are not in fact a genuine Fedex employee. You will then say oh, it should be £25.00. Courier will say, sorry mate, can't help you, I only deliver, you'd better get in touch with the buyer.

You email them to tell them they say no problem stick it in the bank and send to this account and keep another £25.00 for your trouble.

You transfer a now-legit £2450 to them from a legit account (yours). They have washed £2500 for a cost of £50, or 2%, which is about 18% less than asking Jimmy Two-Toes to handle it.

Your £25.00 item gets thrown in the bin. The only person who is going to get quizzed about proving the source of funds is...you.

[leef44]

Could it be similar to the bounce back loan one where they have sufficient details of you to allow them to apply for a loan gving your account details. BBL is paid to your account.

They make out it was a mistake while you think that they have paid you. You pay them back and you are left with a loan which won't be chased up for half a year.

[WolfAir]

in all honesty, if someone turned up at mine with £2500 and then i got an email asking for it back, they can go whistle.

[wibble cb]

In theory fedex et al don’t handle cash, but if they didn’t know it was cash, or as mentioned, it’s not a genuine fedex etc courier.. sounds dodgy!

[Spare tyre]

Dodgy for sure

I’d be tempted to send them to a made up address, if everyone wasted their time 100% of the time they’d get round to scamming very few

Of course they could then come and hunt you down by other means and bum you

[red_slr]

Newc said:

which unusually for a courier they will ask you to open, check, and sign for while they stand there, almost as if they are not in fact a genuine Fedex employee.

There was a DPD scam uncovered a few weeks ago. They would order high value electronics using stolen card details to an address knowing DPD would deliver. They would then watch out for the delivery and as soon as the item arrived they would go to the address in their DPD uniform with DPD id etc and say sorry they had delivered to the wrong address and the person would hand over the parcel and they would have a £2k laptop or whatever. They were caught but as with most scams probably been at it for ages.