Buying a PS5 from FB Marketplace - Pitfalls?

[Beanicles]

I've had a quick search through the PS5 mega-thread and this pops up in passing, not not conclusively.

As much as I loathe the idea of having to shell out to scalpers, 12 months on there's no clear alternative to get my son a PS5 for Christmas. My work and family commitments make it difficult to monitor the stock checkers and be in a position to act quickly.

Whilst grudgingly happy to pay over the odds for a scalper's console, I'm obviously keen to avoid a scam.

There are numerous PS5 Disc Editions for sale local to me on FB marketplace. Prices are less than I would have expected at around £550/560 (I believe that the disc edition is £499 in the UK?) which makes me concerned.

Here's the thing though. The items are collection only, I can pay cash (so no upfront/online payment) and they also offer that I can unbox and test the console before leaving. That being the case, what exactly is the hustle here, as I can't see how I'd be parted from my money without actually getting the console? One final thing that makes me suspicious... When I view the sellers, they all have more than one console for sale (although they're selling other stuff too) and when I view the profiles they're all quite quiet since, say 2019.

Thoughts? Has anyone here bought one from FB marketplace, or know of what a given scam is likely to be?

 

[TheVoice]

Disc edition is £450 so you're paying a £100 premium for the privilege. That's the equivalent of two games or a headset.

You've got three months, I'd suggest holding off and seeing what Sony's plan is for the inevitable Christmas demand. Obviously the scalpers will be out in full force too but it may become easier for regular, honest, civilised people to get hold of one in the process.

 

[Smokey26]

Walk into your local game and give your name and number. Took me 10 days to get one. Do not buy off FB or any other crap.

 

[Beanicles]

Disc edition is £450 so you're paying a £100 premium for the privilege. That's the equivalent of two games or a headset.

You've got three months, I'd suggest holding off and seeing what Sony's plan is for the inevitable Christmas demand. Obviously the scalpers will be out in full force too but it may become easier for regular, honest, civilised people to get hold of one in the process.

Ah I see, that makes more sense if they're pocketing £100. I understand your thinking vis-a-vis holding off, but my genuine fear is losing out - I'd never normally be considering Xmas purchases this far out but I'd hate to let him down two Christmases on the trot, and I fully understand the whiff of rank consumerism around all this. Still, I remember getting by Spectrum +2 back in Christmas '86 (I think!) and it meant the world to me...

 

[Beanicles]

Walk into your local game and give your name and number. Took me 10 days to get one. Do not buy off FB or any other crap.

I might try that if it's genuinely going to be that easy. My fear is of losing out through the legitimate, correct channels and demand is only going to grow as the festive period approaches.

 

[TheVoice]

I might try that if it's genuinely going to be that easy. My fear is of losing out through the legitimate, correct channels and demand is only going to grow as the festive period approaches.

Got to be worth a try, as said you've got plenty of time in the meantime and if it gets to November and you've come up fruitless, the scalpers will still be more than happy to take your money.

 

[theone8181]

Fwiw I joined a couple of discord/twitter things a few weeks ago and managed to bag one, but I don't normally sit down during the day this week has been unusual as I could just leave it refreshing on my phone. Its worth joining some though.

 

[Smokey26]

I might try that if it's genuinely going to be that easy. My fear is of losing out through the legitimate, correct channels and demand is only going to grow as the festive period approaches.

It worked for me. Worth a shot being this far away from Xmas still.

 

[The_Arbiter]

No warranty, no thanks. Even if you could watch it boot in their house, you've got to be mad.

If cash is of little value, do as said above, go into a shop and get put on a list, and throw the person behind the till some cash, with a bonus on receipt. Or find a friend who has time, and who wants to earn some cash and get them to buy one for you from a retailer.

The more you fund scalpers, the more they'll scalp you.

 

[SexyGreyFox]

I know you say you haven't got time to search but I set my browser to open up around 6 shop pages all on the PS5 page and one day ARGOS were showing stock.

 

[dave28]

Why would you do that, join amazon prime and a stockalert email. it works just have patience

 

[GoRedwings19]

Op>I bought one off FB market place. I didn't want to but with Sony not being able to keep up with demand and when there is stock available then the scalpers uses bots to pre order for them. So I think I paid £550 for mine although that was the Disc Edition+1 years psn network. As much as I hate to fuel the scalpers I view it as I only gave them £50 extra but even then still I didn't help matters by buying from them. Funnily enough shortly afterwards I got a Email from Currys that my PSN lottery was sucessful and I could use the code to reserve one. So I just gave it to a friend so that he can pick one up for his son.

And with the new batch of PS5 coming and arguably being worse than the first gen I have no regrets. If you think the PS5 scapers are bad you should take a look at the graphics card they sell there....

 

[Rroff]

n/m

 

[theone8181]

Op>I bought one off FB market place. I didn't want to but with Sony not being able to keep up with demand and when there is stock available then the scalpers uses bots to pre order for them. So I think I paid £550 for mine although that was the Disc Edition+1 years psn network. As much as I hate to fuel the scalpers I view it as I only gave them £50 extra but even then still I didn't help matters by buying from them. Funnily enough shortly afterwards I got a Email from Currys that my PSN lottery was sucessful and I could use the code to reserve one. So I just gave it to a friend so that he can pick one up for his son.

And with the new batch of PS5 coming and arguably being worse than the first gen I have no regrets. If you think the PS5 scapers are bad you should take a look at the graphics card they sell there....

Why worse? Font tell me that heatsink again.

 

[The_Arbiter]

He's doing his best to justify getting scalped.

 

[Witcher1980]

I got 3 series X and 4 PS5s last year. It took a week of hitting refresh on various sites but I paid normal prices and all family members who wanted consoles got one. Keeping in mind the time I spent doing this £50 extra probably is not so bad. Not sure about £100 extra though.

 

[SexyGreyFox]

Why would you do that, join amazon prime and a stockalert email. it works just have patience

They are not quick enough, believe me I was signed up to everything.
It's hurtful when people say just got one off X and I never got an email.
I'd also worked out talking to others that those who did get stock alerts were all hitting the shop at the same time with 1000s of people trying to order, doing it my way I was seeing the stock before the emails went out.

 

[Raymond Lin]

A lot of this is down to luck, you can sign up to things and if you re busy in that moment, like happened to be driving then you will miss it.

Or you get lucky like me, walking into John Lewis 6 months ago ask for a PS5, they had a XBox Series X with discount due to a tear on the box, and someone here gave out a Currys VIP code. So i managed to get both without signing up to any alerts.

Saying that, just be on this forum alone people have pointed out various drops and i did, in the interest of science, to see if i can, and several times i have been able to add to basket and get right to the end of the check out page. So it's much easier since May than earlier in the year.

 

[stoofa]

Just nope - wait, you'll get one.
You'll be told about scalpers - it's headline, it's a nice and easy thing to blame if you fail to secure one. But considering we're at about 13m PS5's in the wild and the scalp rate is 10% - 15% (Maximum) - at the very least, 11m have sold at RRP.

It is all about being signed up to the right alerts - The "HotStock" app being my personal favourite.
Around a month ago I managed to secure two in a week - brother-in-law and first cousins (parents) were extremely thankful as you can imagine. That was doing nothing more than tapping an alert as soon as it popped up.
In that same time I could have had two more.
I still have the app on my phone - out of interest more than anything, last week I could have had one more.

There will be some disappointed people between now and Christmas, but they are literally making as many of them as they can (there are more PS5's available right now than there were PS4's at the same time post launch - is an interesting point on just how many of these things they are making).

 

[wwwebber]

Your son is very lucky to have that kind of money spent on him at Christmas. Me opinion would be - if you cant get one - you cant get one - he'll have to wait. There's no way I'm spending £500 if there's risk involved - maybe get one for his birthday. As a side note - I bought one a month ago from Game without trying and before that gave a friend a Currys code so I could've had two by now with zero effort.