Nervous transaction through eBay/Paypal.

Oh look its another thread where craterloads cant shut the hell up :D because he's never wrong!

1 guy opens brand new account, has zero feed back and instantly starts bidding on multiple macbooks. yeah completely genuine! And he calls Bacs payers idiots :D
 
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The Geezer said:
This !

Follow your own instinct - new bidder, new PayPal account, pays via eCheque.
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WHAT ON EARTH IS WRONG WITH PAYING BY ECHEQUE?!!??

Come on, seriously guys, there's nothing dodgy about echeques, I've sent a few myself, it just means the buyer doesn't have a card linked to their account or that their card has expired and so the funds are coming from their bank account directly.

As long as you send it after the payment clears it's just the same as any other method of receiving PayPal payments!
 
I might have missed something, but so far the facts are:

OP is selling something
Buyer signs up to eBay to bid on this item (and 2 similar items), but only wins this one. All the screenshot earlier proves is that they bid quite close to the end of each auction.
Buyer and seller make contact, there is some delay in setting up PayPal account because they're going through the correct PayPal verification stages
Buyer sends seller eCheque via PayPal, legitimately, and gives notice that this payment will take longer.


The correct next stage according to eBay/PayPal would be to send the item with appropriate insurance to the confirmed PayPal address once the payment has fully cleared. If you report this to eBay absolutely nothing will happen as the buyer has done nothing wrong.

I'm not saying this is definitely not a scam, but the story so far does not necessarily indicate that it's definitely a scam either, as some are suggesting.
 
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Sipha said:
Hi guys/girls.

I'm just after a little bit of advice/reassurance to be honest, and hopefully some answers from experienced folks who have done the same thing.

I have recently sold my Mac through eBay, all well and good. But the transaction is of a very high value (over £1000) and I'm understandably nervous.

My problem is my Buyer has (0) feedback and joined eBay that same day. HOWEVER, I immediately asked the buyer to contact myself after winning the item, which they did promptly and we had a short conversation stating that he is using a new account of his girlfriends. And will pay as soon as he gets the funds through his paypal. We swapped telephone numbers and left it at that. They seemed like a genuine person ?!

a few days later i had a text stating that they are having to wait for paypal to setup a new PP account and the 2x deposit amounts to confirm through the their bank. This duely happened and the buyer was back in touch today to say they are sending the funds.

I recevied an eCheque from their paypal for the full amount today which apparently will take a week or so to clear. The buyer also text me stating that this was the case and if there are any problems to call. Sounds ok I think.

The buyers address in Paypal is confirmed. I will only send it to this once the payment has cleared and will use RMSD fully tracked and insured for the total amount to do so.

Am I being overly paranoid here or does anything sound untoward ? Also what steps can I take to make 110% I am fully covered/safe to send the Mac. It's a lot of money and I can't afford to lose out here.

Any help and advice is greatly appreciated, sorry for the wall of text !

Thanks !
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You're not being paranoid at all, it's a lot of money to lose. Things to make sure of:

1) if you're posting it, make sure its trackable delivery with a signature required. So long as it's a registered address and you have a signature you're covered by seller protection even if the PayPal account turns out to be stolen, etc.

2) be very wary if he offers to come and collect it - if he pays via PayPal you're aren't covered by seller protection. If he insists on collection insist on Cash on arrival. Don't state this in the auction however keep it to private emails as eBay don't allow you to refuse payment by PayPal - a known loophole.

3) if he states it arrived damaged/not working you will have to accept it back, however much you argue. Accepting it gracefully will make it less likely he will deliberately damage it before returning. Also mention you've got serial numbers of all the equipment - even if you havn't it might make him think twice about making a switch. Take photographs if need be. Probably should have been mentioned in the auction listing.

4) as a private seller you don't have to pay return postage - if you're a business seller, you do.


But honestly, if you're this worried about selling it via eBay then maybe you should have sold it privately via an ad in the local paper or similar and taken cash for it.
 
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Phil99 said:
WHAT ON EARTH IS WRONG WITH PAYING BY ECHEQUE?!!??

Come on, seriously guys, there's nothing dodgy about echeques, I've sent a few myself, it just means the buyer doesn't have a card linked to their account or that their card has expired and so the funds are coming from their bank account directly.

As long as you send it after the payment clears it's just the same as any other method of receiving PayPal payments!
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It's a new account. No card linked = no charge back. Assumption it is coming from the actual buyers account and not some dodgy taken-over account.

I'm not saying they're bad when it's used correctly - but we all know how great a reputation PayPal has for not being used by scammers (/sarcasm).


M.

P.S. To OP if I was you I would take pictures of the serial number with newspapers, etc. next to it with your username written on it. Personally, for that money, I'd want to meet up and exchange items.
 
Tell him you're visiting London for a few days and offer to deliver it with cash on delivery? if he's a scammer he'll be like:

donotwantk.jpg


Uploaded with ImageShack.us
 
mmj_uk said:
Tell him you're visiting London for a few days and offer to deliver it with cash on delivery? if he's a scammer he'll be like:

donotwantk.jpg


Uploaded with ImageShack.us
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Do this to see his reaction.

I have nearly 1000 feedback on eBay and I just would not send a laptop in this situation. Its not worth the stress or risk to be honest. Relist and try again.

I have my profile setup so that 0 feedback people cannot bid on my items. Don't care if they are legit or not, they are not wasting my time or me theirs.
 
Spit said:
I have my profile setup so that 0 feedback people cannot bid on my items. Don't care if they are legit or not, they are not wasting my time or me theirs.
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How do you do this? The best I can lock mine down to is -2 feedback, which is a bit pointless as buyers cannot get negative. I only get an option to block 0 feedback if they have no card on file.
 
wannabedamned said:
Oh look its another thread where craterloads cant shut the hell up :D because he's never wrong!

1 guy opens brand new account, has zero feed back and instantly starts bidding on multiple macbooks. yeah completely genuine!
Click to expand...

And another thread where your'e completely clueless :cool:

I thought he bought 3 MacBooks? Or was it he bought 1 and then continued bidding on others?

And he calls Bacs payers idiots :D
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And again, it seems your intentionally ignoring the context of, paying by Bacs on eBay :rolleyes: Which would be idiotic, and im sure most would agree especially for any considerable amount.
 
chief barker said:
Ok Mr Charlie big ******** how about if the OP does the deal and it turns out to be a scam will you refund him the money?

** Please fully star out swearing **
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I'm not saying do the deal :confused: I'm just pointing out what he is being told on here, by people who don't have clue, is categorically wrong and not to make a decision based off this. If he genuinely feels something is dodgy, i would say go with your gut, but don't make a decision based off jokers screaming SCAM.

Someone posted a screen shot showing bidders bidding activity. Everybody jumped on and claimed that this is the smoking gun. Bidder has bought 3 MacBooks, only scammers do that. Bidder has bought a MacBook and continued bidding on other MacBooks, only scammers do that. When in fact the screen shot did NOT show this, in fact as pointed out by me it showed he had won 1 MacBook and bidded on another 2 earlier or at a similar time. I pointed out this is perfectly normal behavior.

Secondly it was claimed eCheques were some mysterious form of payment, which scammers use to con out their victims. Some dishonest form of payment, when in fact it just a normal and safe way of paying by Paypal. In fact its probably safer as is coming out of a bank account rather than from a credit card.

Now shoe on the other foot, are you going to refund the seller £75 when the genuine buyer, who is well within his rights, tells the seller to do one when he tries to cancel the transaction which he fairly won? Are you going to remove the neg feedback on the seller account, when the buyer, again well within his rights, leaves a negative feedback?

All i have said is for the seller to base his decision off on the facts, and not because of quite frankly laughable claims on here. Ultimately there's £75 at risk and a lost sale, because some guys in GD think the buyers dodgy based off misconceptions they clearly have no clues about.
 
Haggisman said:
Actually, ultimately there's a £1000 laptop at risk. :rolleyes:
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Not particularly. If the OP ensures that he follows the rules to the letter -- ie. wait for the eCheque to clear, and post the laptop using a tracked postal service to the confirmed Paypal address, then he is covered by eBay if it all goes **** up.
 
Pestilence said:
Not particularly. If the OP ensures that he follows the rules to the letter -- ie. wait for the eCheque to clear, and post the laptop using a tracked postal service to the confirmed Paypal address, then he is covered by eBay if it all goes **** up.
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No, the buyer could still defraud him under PayPal's Buyer Protection. The buyer could send back a brick in a box via tracked delivery and as far as PayPal know or care the item has been returned.

For an item of this value it is simply not worth it to sell on ebay, when you factor in risk + the exorbitant fees involved.
 
if ebay/paypal can't see that this is a scam and side with the buyer then seriously they need to look at themselves.
it should still be safe to sell items of this value as long as common sense it used

uk only bidders
paypal only payment
don't let people with no feedback bid etc
 
Pestilence said:
Not particularly. If the OP ensures that he follows the rules to the letter -- ie. wait for the eCheque to clear, and post the laptop using a tracked postal service to the confirmed Paypal address, then he is covered by eBay if it all goes **** up.
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So what happens if the buyer swaps the OP's working Macbook with a broken one and "returns" it claiming it was broken when it arrived?
 
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