Friday ad potential scam - opinions?

singlemumstudent

My friend is trying to sell a pushchair/pram on Friday Ad. He got an email within an hour of placing the ad, asking for further details, eg. price and photos (these were already on the ad.) He emailed some photos to the interested buyer, and then got this email response.

Hello

Thank you for your response,i will like to let you know that the price is ok with me.Concerning the shipping of the Item,i have a Shipping agent that would be responsible for the pick up of it at your location.

I will be paying by a cheque and i will wait for the cheque to clear your bank before the pick
up arrangement is made,I would instruct my client to issue out a cheque to you and the cheque would cover both the price of the Item and the shipping charges,so the amount on cheque will be £2,500.I would want you to pay in the cheque into your Bank account and when it clears,you would deduct the cost of the Item and then send the rest of the money to my Shipping Agent via the nearest Western Union outlet in your Area.

Ps:I want you to remove the advert from the Internet and consider it sold to me,on which i would be glad to compensate you with an extra £50 for doing do.

Email back with your following details..

Name on cheque:

Full Contact Address:

Phone numbers:
Regards.

I have told my friend this must be a scam, but it would be great if anyone on this forum could offer their opinions - (he always wants to see the best in people!) and had any suggestions, you've been really helpful before! Thanks.

liam8282

Your right, it is a scam!

frugallass

100% scam all the way

ivavoucher

Its a scam.

The cheque clears and once the real account holder finds the funds missing from their account the bank will take the cash back off you.

soolin

I thought that scam was just about dead now..maybe some of the scum haven't realised they are out of date!

Meepster

But surely it will cost a fortune to ship to Nigeria??

1984ReturnsForReal_2

"the item"

Repeated time & time again.

scam scam scam

cyberbob

Don't they sell Pushchairs, laptops mobile phones in Nigeria?

vet8

Singlemumstudent, this scam works because if it is a cheque from abroad it can take weeks to clear. So if you think it has cleared after the usual 4 days and even if the bank says it has, it can still be taken back for up to, I think 8 weeks.

When I accepted a real cheque from someone who paid from the US the bank told me to wait 8 weeks before I despatched the item.

I must say I have never heard of this scam for something as cheap as a pram, usually it is a car or boat or something like that.

pinkshoes

Anything that says "the item" rather than what the item actually is, is a scam. It's a generic reply the send to all adverts over a certain amount of money, hoping that one of them will actually go through with it.

tiannaleigh

I have also just advertised with friday ad to find homes for my cats kittens,I received 3 seperate emails from people,who asked me for details such as price that were included in the ad,they all wrote in broken english and all 3 said they were deaf so could only email and not speak on the phone
I was so confused why anybody would try and scam for a kitten but reading this I think it may have been to do with banks,checks etc and nothing to do with the kitten,I ignored all the adds but was quite baffled