Scam?

[thegreatsoprendo]

A colleague of mine put an ad on a Freeads site last night to sell a secondhand TV, and has just received the following e-mail from someone who:

a) Seems to be semi-illiterate
b) Claims to have seen the ad several days ago, but has had trouble getting in touch with her, even though she only posted the ad last night.

My first thought is that it's a scam of some sort, but what? Here's the e-mail:

Potential scammer said:

Hello, I am ****** **** from ******,I saw your advert (SANYO FLAT Screen TV, 28'') internet(********.co.uk) some days ago but i have been always busy with my work so i found it a little bit hard to get in touch with you then.so i will like to know if it's still available for sale or not in your reply. Although i have seen the price of the item on the website you placed it but will really need to hear from you directly as a confirmation to what i read on the website and the condition of it and also i will be glad if you can forward the recent pics of it aswell. Expecting to your mail back. Mr.**** Regards, ****** **** ******@hotmail.co.uk

>> Edited by thegreatsoprendo on Thursday 16th February 16:33

[chim_knee]

Could be a way of a spammer getting "live" email addresses?

If he trawls all the ads on all free-ad sites it might be worth while.

[minimax]

looks fairly genuine to me...(awaits flaming )

[Ahhh Moneypenny]

Looks dodgy to me, the amount of times they ask for her e-mail address, or contact details, I think (not sure) but by replying to these kinds of e-mails (we get them all the time at work) they then know your e-mail is a 'live' account and keep spamming you all the time, whatever it is doesn't sound right to me
K

[z1000]

Assuming that she was mailed via the advertising site , it might be a way of collecting valid mail addys for spamming ? Just a guess.

Perhaps they can scan these sights and automatically email everyone , inserting the product to personalise it?

[Lion-O]

almost definitely a scam. In any case, anyone whose grasp of English is so tenuous should not be sold a television on the grounds that it will not do the poor blighter any good.

[john75]

Sounds like a potential 419 scam to me.

[minimax]

Lion-O said:

almost definitely a scam. In any case, anyone whose grasp of English is so tenuous should not be sold a television on the grounds that it will not do the poor blighter any good.

fair point

[simpo two]

thegreatsoprendo said:

Claims to have seen the ad several days ago, but has had trouble getting in touch with her, even though she only posted the ad last night.

Then it's a 'copy and paste' reply which will try to draw you in to falling for some scam, like his brother's seriously ill and can you just cash a cheque...

Bin it or string him along for fun, but don't expect to sell him a TV.

[nickjm]

Looks dodgy to me! I'm getting plenty of ebay ones like that through at the mo'

>> Edited by nickjm on Thursday 16th February 16:57