A new type of eBay Scam that could bankrupt your business!
A new type of eBay Scam that could bankrupt your business!
Hello everyone and welcome to this weeks newsletter. This week I will be continuing
with my eBay theme and to be more precise, the eBay scam theme! I`ll just give
you a bit of background information first, last week I managed to accumulate
over £1,000 in eBay fee’s. None of these fee’s were genuine and were all
related to a new type of eBay scam that I became a victim of. Read on to hear
the full story.
Last Thursday (3rd August) at around 5pm UK time I started receiving a large
amount of emails from eBay saying that one of my shop items had been sold. Great
I thought….but not so, the emails kept coming and coming so I quickly went
to the eBay item in question to take a closer look.
To my surprise around 50 of the items – priced at £44.99 each had all
been “bought” by the same bidder with 0 feedback. I quickly knew something
wasn’t as it should be so I blocked the bidder from bidding on any of my items.
That stopped the buying…..for now.
I logged off and then came back online the next morning, I loaded up my mail
client to find 375 unread mail messages from eBay, all saying that the shop
inventory item had been sold. The scammer had created another eBay account and
was doing the exact same thing, as this was going on I was in bed asleep so
I couldn’t block them from buying my listings.
/ / / / – – – / / / /
Auction SOS has now sold out of all but 1 of the bonuses at the time of writing.
Thanks to everyone that purchased, you helped to make the launch a huge success.
I am sure you liked your unadvertised bonus as well 😉
/ / / / – – – / / / /
I logged into my eBay and look what it showed:
This scam buyer had racked up over £20,000 in sale to my eBay account,
but obviously none of these items had been paid for BUT what happens about my
eBay fees? This is what happened to my eBay fees:
As you can see from the screen above, (or not as the case may be!) this scam buyer had managed to accumulate
over £1,200 in eBay fee’s to my account. I don’t have £1,200 in
my paypal account so I don’t know what would have happened if eBay decided to
charge me the fee’s. I guess I would have my eBay account suspended for avoiding
the fee’s, even though they were accumulated from fraudulent transactions?
The good news is that eBay have looked into the case and have banned all members
in question, they have also credited all fee’s to my account so no harm done
in the end. Plus it gave me something to write about in this weeks newsletter
😉
I should probably say these scammers should remain anonymous but screw them,
they deserve all they get. Take a look at the bidders list and I’m sure that
you will be able to see for yourself the damage this sort of scam can cause:
http://offer.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewBidsLogin&item=9520445880
If you have ever encountered a scam such as this, or any other scam involving
an eBayer that you would like me to cover then please leave a comment or get
in touch with me. I would be happy to cover your case. Remember that you can
also report all bad ebayers
and ebay scams on
one of my other websites – www.auction-arses.com
How would you go about combating this scam, to be honest I have no idea! I
can’t think of an obvious way to avoid this type of thing, if you have any suggestions
as always please feel free to leave a comment.
I’m now going to go slightly off topic but I know a lot of you are parents
so you will be interested in this information. Pat Graham, a keen newsletter
subscriber has put together some free reports on drug addiction in children.
These reports aim to give parents information about the problems and facts related
to drug addiction in children, it’s a serious problem that any of us may have
to deal with in the future so I’m sure these reports will give us some great
information. You can open the free reports in your browser by clicking on the
links, or to save to your PC right click on the link and select “Save target
as”:
Marijuana:
Some Facts Parents Need To Know
Salvia
Divinorum – Nature’s Legal Hallucinogen
I’m sure Pat would love to hear your comments so as always feel free to leave
your thoughts on this weeks newsletter and/or Pat’s free reports!
Receive Free Email Updates When A New Entry Is Posted. Join Them! |
Comments
12 Responses to “A new type of eBay Scam that could bankrupt your business!”Receive FREE Email Updates, according to one reader it's....
"Better Than A Poke In
The Eye With A Sharp Stick"
Currently Enjoy This Blog More Than Christmas.
Follow Me Via RSS!
Subscribe to this site's RSS feed.
Actually this happened to me and started on July 31, 2006! However I have a twist to this, since I had a buyer who bought 9 eBooks from me. This buyer has onlu a 98% feedback rating with 5 negative feedbacks and 6 withdrawn feedbacks. His account reads of a bad person to deal with. Well, he bought the eBooks, I sent them out in record time because we handle our eBooks personally, each and everyone of them. They were all sent within hours of the auction close. The next day he sends me 4 of the same exact email stating the abooks were full of ads and that is fraud. I personally wrote 4 or 5 of the eBooks and others wrote the rest, all of the eBooks though I have opened and know for a fact were not full of ads. Basically a buyer who wanted a refund, and in our auction’s we state we do not offer refunds since they are ebooks and stored on the buyers computer with full access. So he sent me three threateneing emails saying I would pay in the long wrong and it was going to cost me. Within a few days of this a new bidder called tsmtkk with zero feedback bid on 195 auctions of mine, the highest amount which was $99.00 each. He now has 2 feedback but mostly all his feedback are from the same person. for one penny auctions, so this also sent up a red flag. And shortly thereafter that a few days later, two more people with zero feedback bid on two more of my items (the same exact items as the tsmtkk guy). so now I had 197 sold auctions totall about $19,000+ with eBay fees over $1,100+. First thing I did was to immediately file the threatening letters with PayPal and eBay. Then I went in and filed additional emails reporting the malicious bidding. Then because I am a store owner, I called eBay and was able to talk to them about this since the return emails from them were taking too long. I eventually spoke with a supervisor and they were looking into the matter, well after a few calls and a few hours on the phone with eBay and having to wait the 7 required days for turning in a “non payment” request for reimbursement, they finally shut this guy down and one of the other two. The say they cannot connect them to my unhappy buyer of 9 eBooks earlier, but at least this tsmtkk and jsmith3740 are shut down. My auction item was 7422046306 for the malicious bid auctions of 197 of them.
Unfortunately eBay is not very well equipt at handling things. If you do not have Selling Manager Pro (but I still can’t get it to work right for doing these 197 auctions for reibursement of fees), then you cannot supposedly eradicate this problem all at once, but have to manually go in and send each and every one of those (197 in my case) auctions for reimbursement.
Also a few side notes. eBay did tell me that one could go into their eBay account and prevent new buyers from buying multiple items. Do it now, so that you are protected! Also set your account to not let any eBayers that have negative feedback under 5 (this is the highest) from bidding on your items. This will also help!
Don’t go through this alone! Contact eBay! Get it all in writing and sent to eBay via their contact email system. And become a store member so that you can call eBay directly about your store and speak to a live person. Do not give up in reporting this fraud! If we all report it, they will eventually be able to stop this fraud and prevent others from going through the same problems!
The 9 eBook eBay Buyer who was so nasty to DataWorkZ still has our 9 positive feedback. HIs auction user name is “jcarrollauctions” and we do not recommend that eBayers deal with this man.
By the way feedback rating for DataWorkZ eBay store is still at 100%. While I cannot control what others leave for us, we do leave positive feedback for those who pay on time, have great communication with us, and for those who follow all eBay’s and our auction rules!
The eBook titles that this 9 eBook eBay buyer purchased were:
Horse Photography, Scenic Photography, Digital Photography Collection, Hobby of Photography, 2006 Photography Market, 75 Creative Ways to Make Money with Photography, Earn 300 Pouns/Dollars Per Week with Photography, Wedding Photography secrets and Tips, and Selling Photography on eBay.
Also one final note, if you are sold these eBooks by this jcarrollauctions guy or John Carroll, let me assure you that he and his auctions do not have legal rights to distribute or resell this eBook at anytime! And if he does sell them, then it is FRAUD and DataWorkZ.com will prosecute anyone to the furthest extent of the law that breaks any copyright rules. WE do not tolerate theft, nor do we tolerate fraud!
Good luck to you and your eBay auctions and stores. You can email me anytime about this eBay happening at DataWorkZ@DataWorkZ.com!
Hi there, In relation to fake bidders, and I have had a few from eastern block countries, you just file a non-paying bidder and after 7 days you will be entitled to a credit on fees.
I have had a different scam pulled on me. Person A buys a high priced item and someone very close to them (the partner) under a different name, buys a cheap item. You innocently post out both items to two different people, who happen I to live in close proximity.
Next week you get a frantic email from buyer A saying that they received the wrong item, some low priced widgit, when they paid $x for a higher priced item. Because you don’t want negative feedback you send them a new item and ask that they return the cheap (mistake ?) item. They say that they will only return the cheap item when they have received the right item. Ultimately you get it back (the cheap item).
Meanwhile, buyer B complains that they didn’t receive anything at all and that they want a full refund of their money including post costs.
Even though I had the post office receipt for a heavier item, I kept thinking, perhaps I did make a mistake. But, in my gut, I felt that I was scammed.
Two weeks later the same occured to two (different ??) people. They just opened up new eBay a/cs. And I fell for it a second time without connecting the use of the same post code.This time they used the same post code as the previous purchases.
But knowing it and proving it are two vastly different things. They were on the other side of Australia and wouldn’t return my phone calles.
cheers – greg
Those are some very interesting comments. In a way i’m glad it didn’t just happen to me but it’s a worrying trend that seems to be appearing more and more frequently.
I’m in the UK and as far as I know we don’t get phone support for having an eBay store, the only way you get phone support is by becoming a gold powerseller.
Luckily I am a pwoerseller so my emails get answered quicker than normal, eBay have already said they are crediting all fee’s to my account but this could take upto 60 days!!!
I have selling manager pro so I will go down the non-paying bidder route as well.
Thanks for your feedback,
Dan
Maybe I misread something here…but how did the scammer manage to rack up ebay fees if your item is a buy it now? I looked at your auction link and it says “buy it now”…doesn’t that mean he would have to actually pay for it before buying? I apologize if I missed something…
Free Popup Creator:
I believe that only applies if you have “Immediate payment required” turned on. If you don’t then as soon as they push the “commit to buy” button then as far as eBay is concerned that’s the sale completed and they charge you the fee’s.
Using the immediate payment required feature would be a good idea though, I hadn’t thought about that.
Isn’t there an option to prevent buyers with low feedback to buy more than 10 items from you? Pretty sure I’ve seen it.
That would have prevented this.
I had a problem that started on Yahoo Auctions
and ended up on Ebay.
I bought an ebook I wanted for 99 cents…1000
Clips and Sayings for Scrapbooks…ot something
like that.
I paid the guy on Yahoo and have the confirmation
email from PayPal. After 3 or 4 emails requesting the
download link, I emailed Yahoo and they said that it
looked like I had been a victim of fraud.
I went to Ebay to see if someone else was selling it
and was surprised to see it there twice, for more
money, and being sold by a buy with the same email
but different name. I sent him another email asking
him how I could trust this auction when he didn’t
deliver on the yahoo one.
The next day I got an email from someone else who
told me that he never sold anything on either Yahoo
or Ebay. He also told me that he noticed that I had
paid him 99 cents and offered to return it. I told him
about the Ebay auction and that he should check it out
for someone using his email account and committing fraud.
I also got another email from Yahoo telling me that I had won
the auction…the original 99 cent auction that I purchased thru
Buy Now…but now it had 5 items bought instead of the 1.
What a circle jerk!
I don’t think I will be using Yahoo again and will start being
a lot more observant on Ebay. I felt sorry for the guy and
didn’t ask for the 99 cents back…good karma.
Pat
Dan
That scam has been around and people have had to pay much more the £1000 before,I don’t know if any of you remember butt_pipe? But eBay did not use to bother and just wanted their fees weather the buyer paid or not
I do remember butt_pipe, infact I think he once bought an e-Book from me. I remember he always used to have these stupid items that made it to eBay pulse, one I remember was “my cock and balls”. Which was a stuffed cockrel toy and some small rubber balls or something.
Is he still around?
Hi
I was very interested by what DataWorkZ said (above), and I’d be interested to know how to go into my eBay account and prevent new buyers from buying multiple items, and also how to set my account to not let any eBayers that have negative feedback under 5 (this is the highest) from bidding on my items, please can you tell us how to do these two things? Also, does anyone have a contact phone number for eBay, here in the United Kingdom please? As I was rushed into hospital a few weeks back, for an emergency operation, and needed to get hold of eBay urgently regarding my auctions, but I didn’t have Internet access in hospital, and I couldn’t find a phone number for eBay anywhere! Even the hospital registrar tried for me, but even she couldn’t track down a telephone number for them! Surely there MUST be a phone number, isn’t there?
I’ve said it before, but it warrants repeating, that eBay should do far more than they currently do to protect their Sellers! They INSIST upon Sellers providing a valid, current credit card details BEFORE they can begin selling on eBay, and this of course offers eBay some protection, as they can validate the person’s details BEFORE allowing them to become Sellers and begin trading on eBay. So why therefore, do they NOT INSIST upon the SAME criteria BEFORE allowing people to register and begin BIDDING and BUYING in eBay? By INSISTING that EVERYONE who wishes to register with eBay, whether as a Seller OR a Buyer, MUST include details of there credit card, eBay could then check out their address details, and ensure that they are genuine as well! There is an auction site in South Africa, that tells ALL it’s members, that they MUST register a valid credit card on their account BEFORE they can register to sell OR buy, and that if they then bid and win an item, but don’t then pay for it, that the auction site will automatically charge their registered credit card with 10% of the total of the goods that they bid for, won and haven’t then paid for! So in the cases that we have been told about here, of fraudulent fake buyers bidding for and buying THOUSANDS of pounds or dollars worth of items, if eBay had the same rules applied to THEIR auction website, these fake buyers would have had their credit cards charged with 10% of the total that they bid for and won, amounting to several HUNDRED pounds being deducted from their credit cards! Now THAT would teach them a lesson and put a stop to their little games wouldn’t it?!!! I have even written to eBay and suggested they implement this as part of their registration proccess, but they claimed that they would be unable to (bull s**t)! eBay simply want as many people as possible to register and use their websites, they really don’t care whether they are genuine or not, or how much harm they do to their poor Sellers, who let’s face it, are totally responsible for ALL of eBay’s profits!
Sorry to rattle on folks, but eBay’s irresponsibility and ‘couldn’t really give a damn’ attitude REALLY bugs me, especially when you consider how high their fees are for us poor old Sellers! We deserve far more from eBay then we currently get!
EJ
Good post EJ,
I agree with everything you said. I think a great way of stopping these bogus sellers (and buyers!) would be to have every eBay member enter a valid phone number, then after the registration process they receive an automated call saying “Push 1 to verify your phone number”. Squaretarde use it to verify sellers identities and it would stop all of these buyers registering the fake accounts with invalid details.
To answer your other question, eBay don’t have a phone number unless you are a gold powerseller. It’s about time they pulled their socks up and got one!
The last couple of days i have been having real issues with 50 or so buyers pertaining to be from iehter sweden or holland and sometimes china. the ISP they are using is chinese . This guy must be spending all day setting up accounts . At first it was fine . a bit annoying but fiune cos all he was buying was 1p auction that are there to boost my feedback anyway and he was leving me gleeming feedback . before i have even sent the item .
But over night last night he bought 45 of the same item giving me ebay fees of about 35 quid .
So this morning i had to Block all the buyers from buying agian and then change my buyer requirement so that only buyers with creditcards or paypala account linked to their ebay accounts are able to purchase.
I have contacted ebay . but i`ll probably have to wait the 7 days and then manually cancel all the sales and then wait another 10 days sto get my fees back .