TW/EAUCTION Scam - BEWARE

daffodilhil

As I do a fair bit of buying and selling on eBay, I recently authorised a credit card payment for £1.23 to receive a free information pack called "The Home Business Auction Toolkit". The payment has gone through okay - listed as "TW/EAUCTION" on my statement.

Six days later, another (unauthorised) payment to TW/EAUCTION has hit my credit card - for £51.01

A quick search on Google throws up lots of similar stories. TW/EAUCTION ... eauctionsuccess ... Pacific Webworks Inc - the same scam with all of them. You authorise what you believe is a one-off payment and then they take regular/frequent unauthorised payments.

Alliance & Leicester say that, as I authorised the first payment, the retailer is "known" to me, and therefore the 2nd payment is not fraudulent at this stage. I need to contact A&L's "banking disputes" department - who aren't open on weekends!

I've cancelled the credit card, ordered a new one, and I'll be contacting the disputes department tomorrow morning.

Insult to injury? I haven't received any "Home Business Auction Toolkit".

Karl.H_2

Hi and welcome to the forums.
Thanks for the warning. What is this "The Home Business Auction Toolkit" suppose to be?

daffodilhil

Hi Karl H.
The Toolkit was supposed to be a link to a downloadable info-pack, I think.

Kavanne

cancelling the card won't work if it's a continuous payment authority

daffodilhil

Should have said - A&L have also blocked TW/EAUCTION.

Jemma-T

Fools and their money are easily parted.

Or, I prefer a new one for the 2000s, "Don't give away your private information as it may be a very painful experience". Not as catchy but much more pertinent. I hope you didn't give them anything apart from your eBay/PayPal info.

Sorry to rub it in but you really aught to know better.

Gem83

In response to daffodilhil's post, I too have had a similar experience.

I purchased a kit for a similar amount, but this was done through "Google", and was supposed to help you earn money from home.

I have just checked my statement properly and noticed that 2 payments of around £45 have been taken from my account. One from TW/Eauction, and another from Pacific Webworks.

The company is based in Salt Lake City, Utah, USA - I have just emailed them but I don't expect a response, so I'll try going to my bank this afternoon.

I too have not yet received such starter kit!

competitionscafe

"The real scary part to me is that all credit card processing is done by a company called IntelliPay, Inc. IntelliPay is a company of PacificWeb Works and they are hawking merchant accounts. This means that the same people running these scams may already have your credit card information. There are reports of people being charged without ever ordering but that can not be verified. "
http://www.scamtimes.com/headline/intellipay-tradeworks-marketing-inc-fundworks-inc-eauction-tutor-and-pacific-webworks-inc/

"This is the same as many other scams run by Pacific WebWorks and the Utah house of Scams and Shams."
http://www.scamtimes.com/headline/fake-news-pacificweb-works/

Pacific webworks also appears to be linked to several work at home /'google kit' scams as this investigation reveals:
http://strangelyperfect.tv/5146/more-on-google-profits-and-pacific-webworks/

As the company is US based your best option is to file a complaint with the FTC (online form) at https://www.FTC.gov / https://www.ftccomplaintassistant.gov/

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PROLIANT

Kavanne wrote: »

cancelling the card won't work if it's a continuous payment authority

Not so, I have a had reminders that my card was declined from Equifax, Experian and my Web Server host (all CPA) as the card had expired.
No payments were taken from my account, so this CPA theory is sporadic it seems. :think: