Selling my car - Is this a scam?

cwoolhouse_2

Hi,

I've had my car for sale in Autotrader for a week now, and just had a call from an African bloke who wanted to buy it and said he's looking to export it to Kenya. He's not seen the car and offered me £300 less than the asking price of £5000. He wanted to come over today and pay cash but I've been stung with forged notes before, so said I would want to meet him in the bank for payment so I can get the notes verified before handing over the keys. He agreed that this was OK but wanted to give me a deposit so I could remove it from sale. To pay the deposit, he's gone down to a branch of my bank and paid in £500 in cash (with my name, account number and sort code, nothing else). I can see that on my online account. He's then going to meet me in the bank later in the week (Weds or Thurs) to complete the transaction.

I can't see anything wrong here but it feels like a scam, and I am aware of car export scams, but these generally involve a forged bankers draft for more than the cost of the car. The reason it feels like one is that he's put £500 into the account of someone whose address he doesn't have, who is selling a car that he hasn't seen, and let's face it, I could disappear with his cash couldn't I? His actions are illogical and he mentioned exporting it (why should I care what he does with it?).

My questions are:

i) If this is a scam, how does it work? I'm currently £500 up and am not going to hand him over the keys until I see the remaining £4200 in a bank and have them checked by the teller..

ii) Could he have paid in forged notes which then become apparent later? If so, what's he going to gain here? If the forgeries become apparent before we meet in the bank, then no car. If he hands over the rest in the bank and those notes are checked, at best he's got a car £500 cheaper (and I could live with that).

iii) Why does this feel so dodgy?

All advice gratefully received!

vax2002

He cancels the sale, you refund the £500, then the deposit payment is cancelled and you are left £500 out of pocket.
It is a text book scam and of the OLDEST scams in the book of scams.
It is know as a 419 scam and has been around since the 1970's
People STILL fall for it today.

cwoolhouse_2

Vax. Thanks for that. It did cross my mind that this would be the case, but the payment was made across the counter at a branch of my bank.

If he cancelled the sale, I wouldn't refund the deposit anyway, as I've taken the car off the market!

crazyguy

Phone the bank and check up reguarding the previous deposit paid and let them the know the situation and your concerns.

If the notes are ok then meet for the full payment and make sure the bank check all the notes in full.

Personaly though I would not have given my bank details to a stranger, so if theres a scam it may well involve clearing your account after the event, my suggestion is to withdraw all funds and re open a new account and never give details out unless you know them, ie:- wages or dd's

McKneff

I only read the first 3 lines of your post and yes, it is a scam.

worried_jim

I just scanned and saw the word "export". Scam.

crazyguy

But if he has paid in £500.00 over the counter at a bank what can he be up to ?


Other than having your full account details, I cannot see there is much he can do here !

vax2002

cwoolhouse wrote: »

Vax. Thanks for that. It did cross my mind that this would be the case, but the payment was made across the counter at a branch of my bank.

If he cancelled the sale, I wouldn't refund the deposit anyway, as I've taken the car off the market!

OK, I did Warn you.......
When you finally cotton on call the Banks EMERGENCY fraud team immediately and tell what has happened.

s_b

they usually ring me up and ask for appointment please sir my man

cwoolhouse_2

Just rang the bank's fraud department. They said they could tell me on Mon whether it was a cheque or cash. They said he couldn't do anything with my sort code and account number. Feel a bit of a fool now.

vax2002

Dont touch or spend in to the £500, it will be automatically recalled and you may be charged £30ish for a letter from the bank telling you so.
Call back on monday and ask the bank to investigate the transaction and act proportionally, they may not charge for the letter then.
You will be bombarded with threats to return the £500 in the period prior to the cancellation of the deposit transaction.