selling a used car? watch out for scams like this

hothothot_3

Just some quick background - I have been advertising a used car for sale and used as many sources as I could to advertise - this included free ads. I got the following email today that they were prepared to pay £300 extra if I could sell the car directly to them. Cautiously I said they were welcome to come and view. I then received this odd email back;

Hello,

Thanks for the mail, I really appreciate your prompt reply and i'm glad you are selling to me... [i didnt say I was] First,I'm okay with the selling cost, secondly i don't want you to bother about the shipping process [shipping?!!!!!!?I didnt say anything about this! ],I have a shipping company that handles my shipments,All you need do is to keep the car in a safe and good condition.

I will instruct my staff associate to issue out a cheque for the payment and shipping to you, When you get the payment you are to deduct your £900 for the item and send the remaining funds to my shipper via Western Union or Money Gram to enable him come down to your location for the pickup. I bought some other mechandise too and my shipper will be picking them up also,so they will need the remaining funds to enable them come for the pickup.

It takes 3-5 working days to clear a cheque, so cheque must clear before pickup. Notify me immediately when you get the funds so i will email you with my shipper's information who will be coming for the pickup at your location. "I HOPE I CAN TRUST YOU WITH MY FUNDS"?I'm sure you can await the payment in the mail, It will be sent to the Information as requested below you will provide for me:
Full name...
Residential address...
City..
State.. [obviously not UK knowledgable]
Zipcode... [obviously not UK knowledgable]
Country...
Phone number:
Cell Phone:........ [obviously not UK knowledgable]
Home Phone:............
Can you remove it from the posting and consider it sold to me? I will be happy if you can do that today ok..I will be looking forward to read from you.

Regards,


For anyone who hasnt realised - this is clearly an advanced fee scam and you should under no circumstances withdraw your own money from your account and send it to them via Western Union unless you want to lose it all!!

now does anyone think I should send a funny reply? Im a bit immature that way? :rotfl:

korny88

Thanks for that. Have had this a few times, when advertising a car on https://www.gumtree.com. I have therefore stopped placing the email address and only allow them to contact me via telephone, which these conmen aren't interested in doing. I think they just want your email address as they seem to spam me with similar type of emails even after the advert has been removed.

I hope no-one falls for their scam.

dacouch

Tell them the price has gone up, they will agree to ridiculous increases, after a while of keep increasing it, tell them you want to increase it by 419 and see if they bother replying

Inactive

Oldest scam going, I thought that everyone had seen it before, or at least heard about it.

pcombo

Lol this happend to me it took me about 10 mins to sit and work it all out. I actually allowed them to send cheques and bankers draft just for the fun of it.

CHR15

I agree, have some fun with them and string it along as long as possible.

Tell them it caught fire so the seats are missing..other than that its a great runner, I bet they will still be interested.

It's bewildering that people would fall for it but alas...they do!

nitr02007

Whenever we've sold a car in the past we are always plagued with phone calls from brokers offering to sell it for us, they have buyers waiting (they say), and all it would cost us was an up-front fee of £50 - £100.

I hope everyone realises that any sale where the seller has to spend money up front is a scam.

If you've got the time then its fun to see what ridiculous conditions thay will accept before they give up on you. :rotfl:
The same with tele-marketers - i don't hang up but say "Mr so-and so is very old and he's on his way to the phone please wait" then leave the phone off the hook until they give up. This means that they will phone less people that day = result!