AAAGH!!! Silly eBayer AGAIN

apprentice_tycoon

This is probably a really stupid question - but I'm going for it anyway -

Why is is always Nigerians that attempt these scams? if it is a 'good' scam that sometimes works (it must work sometimes or they would have given up by now) why is it only Nigerians that have the knowledge (or brass neck) to pull if off? Why not Italians, Polish, Tunisians etc...

soolin

These scams are actually known as 'Nigerian' scams or 419 scams after the section in the Nigerian legislatation that it breaches. It is , I believe but wait to be corrected, the second largest income generator in Nigeria.

There are some identical scams operating out of Amsterdam now and Spain is also beginning to feature. Do a Google search for 419 scam or Nigerian scam and you will get more information.

Going back to the OP, take the BIN option off the phone and sell by ordinary auction. that way you can keep an eye on the bids at the last moment. Alternatively, a suggestion on another thread that is currently running on the same question that suggests if you do want the BIN only auction set it up for immediate payment required by paypal.

Soo

SandLake

I posted on another thread how to block bidders from outside the area you are prepared to ship to, it's in your preferences

Let me know and I will send/post the instructions

fatboyonadiet

I stopped listing phones as buy it now because of this, just list it as a normal auction and watch it at the end

OllieLong

Searcher wrote:

Nope, they use fake postal orders :mad:

Or you get an email from a fake company saying that they will only release the payment when you provide tracking details, of course this is a scam.

nads

Thanks for the advice people, I'm going to try relisting again later on today, see what happens

nads

Sorry one mroe question... When i relist the item, I haven't found way of changing the listing duration from 10days to 7 days. Is this possible to do?

tigermatt

There's also an option in one of the eBay preferences or listing preferences or auction preferences or somewhere that you can turn on and it means that you must pre-authorise all bidders before they can bid. Obviously, this might not be orth it for a phone but it is certainly worth it for a higher value item.

Also use the bidder blocks to block users who are registered in countries to which you don't ship, although I'm sure scammers have a way around this it is always a help to do this.

As scammers as often new users there's always the block users on feedback score which I think is a little unfair because everyone was new to eBay with 0 feedback once! There's also the ability to block users who have received X (1, 2 or 3 I think) anount of non-paying bidder marks in the last 30 days.

Just do a search in eBay's help as this should reveal more

tigermatt

nads wrote:

Sorry one mroe question... When i relist the item, I haven't found way of changing the listing duration from 10days to 7 days. Is this possible to do?

Are you relisting it as "List similar item"? If so, it might be that you can't change this in there as I know there is some settings like this. Also make sure you go back far enough using the "Back" feature at the bottom of each page as certain information on the summary page can't be changed via an "Edit" link.

nads

hi tigermatt, I'm using the Relist Item option