So, to start, caught this one before it went too far so didn't end up getting scammed, but it was a good effort on their part.
I advertised a near new vehicle on the Australian carsales.com.au site and had a text message that contained an email address to contact an interested party.
Emailed 'Darren' who said he worked in the mines in Queensland and was currently working in Bass Strait so couldn't physically inspect the vehicle. He was 'obsessed' with the particular vehicle we had for sale and was happy to pay the full asking price (which to be honest is a little high so we can negotiate, and that should have got me suspicious to start).
He then requests to pay via Paypal after asking for email address and full name (I am guessing to be able to address the 'official' Paypal letter with my full name), this is then followed up with an official looking Paypal request that states that the full amount has been paid + a freight a charge (in this case $2300).
The full amount is supposedly on hold until I have desposited the freight charge into a Western Union bank account.
Now, I have finance on this vehicle and know that the only way to legally sell it is to have it paid off in full and the money confirmed from the seller before doing ANYTHING, so would have cottoned on soon enough anyway.
Also know that even 'pending' or 'on hold' transaction will actually appear in your Paypal account summary when you are logged in, so this is another place to check.
The biggest give away however is the email address:
[email protected]
If anything comes from this address, no matter ho official looking, IT IS A SCAM! The other dead give away is the request for a Western Union transfer, Paypal NEVER use this method for ANY of their transactions. Aloso, please do what I did and report it directly to Paypal, simply forward any suspicious looking emails to [email protected]
Hope this helps anyone out there, just wanted to share, I am glad I didn't get caught but I can see how easy it can be to get scammed. It all sounds so convincing.
I advertised a near new vehicle on the Australian carsales.com.au site and had a text message that contained an email address to contact an interested party.
Emailed 'Darren' who said he worked in the mines in Queensland and was currently working in Bass Strait so couldn't physically inspect the vehicle. He was 'obsessed' with the particular vehicle we had for sale and was happy to pay the full asking price (which to be honest is a little high so we can negotiate, and that should have got me suspicious to start).
He then requests to pay via Paypal after asking for email address and full name (I am guessing to be able to address the 'official' Paypal letter with my full name), this is then followed up with an official looking Paypal request that states that the full amount has been paid + a freight a charge (in this case $2300).
The full amount is supposedly on hold until I have desposited the freight charge into a Western Union bank account.
Now, I have finance on this vehicle and know that the only way to legally sell it is to have it paid off in full and the money confirmed from the seller before doing ANYTHING, so would have cottoned on soon enough anyway.
Also know that even 'pending' or 'on hold' transaction will actually appear in your Paypal account summary when you are logged in, so this is another place to check.
The biggest give away however is the email address:
[email protected]
If anything comes from this address, no matter ho official looking, IT IS A SCAM! The other dead give away is the request for a Western Union transfer, Paypal NEVER use this method for ANY of their transactions. Aloso, please do what I did and report it directly to Paypal, simply forward any suspicious looking emails to [email protected]
Hope this helps anyone out there, just wanted to share, I am glad I didn't get caught but I can see how easy it can be to get scammed. It all sounds so convincing.
