Ebay Fraud - such an odd case

[dl8860]

So Thursday before last I got an email confirming my order for 12 pairs of socks for £92.50. Didn't recognise the order at all, and no one else has my ebay account details, so instantly called credit card company. They saw the card charge so I told them it was fraudulent, so they informed me they marked it as fraud and it should get solved in a few days. They also cancelled the card completely. Great.

I then call ebay to tell them both about the order and that my card has been cancelled. Amongst some terrible overall customer service, I am told that the order has been cancelled and to change my password, which I then immediately did. I also changed my paypal password, as it went through that.

A few days later the charge was reversed on my credit card statement, matter resolved. I thought.

Wife goes to post office to pick up two items that failed delivery earlier in the week (was actually expecting 2 items so seemed legit). I get home tonight to see that it's the 12 pairs of socks. ****

So I call ebay to say why the hell have these been delivered, I thought the order was cancelled and the payment definitely not gone through. They faffed around for a few minutes and told me the order was now definitely cancelled and recorded as not being made by me. And that I had nothing to worry about at all. I asked about my obligations regarding the items, and could I just put them in the bin, and she said I should return them to the post office to return to sender. Will take 10 minutes, but fine.

One thing puzzling - the ebay seller has pretty great feedback overall: score of 54537 and 99.7% positive.

Surely with fraud like this it's either
a) An expensive purchase for an irrelevant item, as the seller is the fraudster and will keep the cash and never send the goods

b) A cheap purchase for crappo goods where they are just testing the card is legit before they make another purchase.

A £92.50 purchase from what looks like a legit seller and the goods are actually delivered seems to make no sense at all.

I'm now worried they will try to say I have no proof I didn't make the purchase and that the goods were delivered hence I'm liable for payment. But if that was the case, wouldn't the companies feedback be littered with fraud accusations? So confused here.

I guess I'm overthinking it, but I just can't work it out!

 

[Jono8]

12 pairs of socks for £92.50!

 

[dl8860]

Even weirder now, they are only £15.45 for the same order when I look at the actual listing

 

[Rannoch]

12 pairs of socks for £92.50!

I bought a pair today for £18. Hiking socks though, I value my feet.

 

[kitfit1]

I guess I'm overthinking it, but I just can't work it out!

You might be overthinking. But 2 things are for certain, both your ebay account and your paypal have been accessed. The seller is a victim as much as you are, so do try to go lightly as far as that goes.

My thoughts, might be overthinking as well lol. With a lot of online finance company's a minimum up front payment of £92.50 is required when borrowing £10,000. Could it be the perpetrator of your account was testing the usefulness of your credit card to borrow money online ?

 

[bainbridge]

Did you get in touch with the ebay seller about this at all? Seems a bit of a leap to cancel your credit card without first getting in touch with the seller (who sounds like an honest businessperson) to see if they could have resolved it.

 

[MooMoo444]

12 pairs of socks for £92.50!

Sounds ok for good quality ones

 

[Feek]

12 pairs of socks for £92.50!

Sounds ok for good quality ones

I wish I could get a dozen pairs of the socks I wear for £92.50.

 

[Efour]

Wife baught them for her lover... The plot thickens.

 

[SMN]

There goes your birthday present from the missus.

 

[balky12]

I had an extremely weird fraudulent case years ago. I had anti virus software purchased on my card, but delivered to my girlfriends mates bfs house....

It was delivered about a week after our first and only visit there... after ordering pizza and paying for it via my card.

Was weird receiving a phone call from the fella asking why I had ordered anti-virus software to his house... No idea how the transaction got through. They would have had no idea what my billing address was... delivery address obviously from the pizza delivery address.

 

[justintime2001]

I got home one night to find someone had won an excavator for £157k using my account. I called eBay who put me through to their fraud dept and everything was sorted in a few minutes, thank goodness.
I nearly ******* myself when I saw the original order & cost

 

[Quartz]

Drop-ship fraud is common in America: the item gets put on your doorstep and the thief picks it up before you get home.

 

[Nexus]

I had an extremely weird fraudulent case years ago. I had anti virus software purchased on my card, but delivered to my girlfriends mates bfs house....

It was delivered about a week after our first and only visit there... after ordering pizza and paying for it via my card.

Was weird receiving a phone call from the fella asking why I had ordered anti-virus software to his house... No idea how the transaction got through. They would have had no idea what my billing address was... delivery address obviously from the pizza delivery address.

I believe sophisticated fraud is quite layered and clearly organised crime.

I had something similar happen a few years back; I was visiting my folks place (where I used to live), a courier unexpectedly arrives at the door with two packages for me. I open them up and it's two brand new phones from O2, I was confused, but thought perhaps it might have been because I'd been a good customer and I did originally have the house as my billing address.

A few minutes later, another courier arrives with more two phone packages, this time from Vodafone. This was now ringing alarm bells, so I checked my bank accounts and could not see anything untoward.

About 30 minutes later, yet another courier arrives at the door and says "Call the Police". He had parked in the road and as he was walking towards our driveway, a man approached him and said it was for him, but the Courier wasn't having any of it, and came straight to our door.

I was eventually able to conclude that it happened something like this:

(i) Fraudster rang up each of the mobile phone companies to place an order for new phones. Having spoken to a senior EE representative, she admitted to me that identity checks over the phone are not as stringent as in store or online so quite easy to get away with. They had assumed my identity, which was reflected by the fact that there were credit checks on my file for the phones.

(ii) The Fraudster used somebody else's stolen bank account details to actually make the payments.

(iii) The phones had my name on the delivery address, but the actual house address was labelled incorrectly as a house that was being built directly opposite my parents home. So the fraudster had clearly hoped the courier would go to that house, but as nobody was living there and they recognised our family name, none of the couriers did that.

A neighbour had already spotted the the guy looking quite shifty and had luckily taken his number plate down a little earlier.
The Police came around very quickly but couldn't find the car. They however did tell me that having tracked it on ANPR, it had come from some 60 miles away. I think the fraud had probably been based on the criminals finding houses where nobody is actually living, then trying to find the identity of somebody who lives close by. It didn't work in this case though.

 

[linktoinsanity]

<SNIP>

That is quite a scary story. Has anything similar happened since?

 

[Nexus]

That is quite a scary story. Has anything similar happened since?

Nothing else happened after that luckily.

A Police team visited and took away all the phones and told me to give the crime reference number to the mobile phone companies so they could claim them back if they wanted to. As the car had come from and was registered to somewhere the other side of London, they told me they had handed it over to their colleagues in the force there to investigate. They said it was likely to be part of a fraud ring and that the guy coming to do the pickup most probably was the equivalent of a drug mule.

The main annoyance for me was just having to go through the hassle of following it up with all the phone companies and trying to get my credit report amended to show that they were fraudulently made checks.

 

[linktoinsanity]

Nothing else happened after that luckily.

A Police team visited and took away all the phones and told me to give the crime reference number to the mobile phone companies so they could claim them back if they wanted to. As the car had come from and was registered to somewhere the other side of London, they told me they had handed it over to their colleagues in the force there to investigate. They said it was likely to be part of a fraud ring and that the guy coming to do the pickup most probably was the equivalent of a drug mule.

The main annoyance for me was just having to go through the hassle of following it up with all the phone companies and trying to get my credit report amended to show that they were fraudulently made checks.

Sounds a pain, but at least it was not worse.

 

[Tunney]

One thing puzzling - the ebay seller has pretty great feedback overall: score of 54537 and 99.7% positive.

Hacking genuine accounts is a common tactic. Because of the lag between committing the fraud and getting negative feedback, they can rinse the account for a while before anyone suspects anything.

 

[jimjamuk]

Did you check with the seller to see if he had any extra details with the order - like a request for an alternatuve address for example - sounds to me like someone figured out your PP account details

 

[Semple]

That's a pretty worrying tactic if they're able to do things like that.

I mean i've been on my driveway washing the car, and a courier has been happy to hand over a parcel to me. Could be entirely possible someone could go to extreme lengths like that.

Also gives reason for regularly checking your credit file.