Is this a possible scam?

soolin

burnleymik wrote: »

Firstly, thankyou all for the replies.

The amount of money isn't much ~£30.

This is the exact message I recieved from the seller:

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I agree it could be perfectly innocent, but if I do as he asks I lose my protection as a paypal buyer do I not?

Also, why would they specify "as a gift"?

I am always a little wary on ebay because of the number of scams and scammers, but I do wonder if sometimes I may be being a little paranoid.

I do not consider worrying about spending £30 with no buyer protection as paranoid.

personally having seen that message I would stick with the responses above, tell them you are perfectly happy to wait the 2-3 days so you can pay them direct. See what they come back with.....

prowla

Sending as a gift means you pay the paypal fees.

RHemmings

Edit: Just noticed that the post I put here essentially repeats what has already been said.

I.e. I agree that you can: be polite, say that you're not happy buying via paypal gift, and give them a few days to sort it.

Mandy44

The gift part is to avoid paying certain paypal fees, also suggests the seller isn't too 'naive' about how paypal works either

burnleymik

Thanks all. I have contacted the seller telling them I am happy to way the 2-3 days so I can maintain my buyer protection.

I guess if this seller had a good rep I might have just fulfilled their request, but it's a zero feedback seller.

Also, if there was something wrong with the item when I recieved it I would have no recourse if I sent as a gift to a Paypal account not linked to that Ebay account or can you still reclaim 'gifts' through paypal?

soolin

prowla wrote: »

Sending as a gift means you pay the paypal fees.

Not necessarily, unless you are funding via a card, balance payments are still free.

The reason for not using paypal gift payments is that buyer gives up all buyer protection.

soolin

burnleymik wrote: »

Thanks all. I have contacted the seller telling them I am happy to way the 2-3 days so I can maintain my buyer protection.

I guess if this seller had a good rep I might have just fulfilled their request, but it's a zero feedback seller.

Also, if there was something wrong with the item when I recieved it I would have no recourse if I sent as a gift to a Paypal account not linked to that Ebay account or can you still reclaim 'gifts' through paypal?

You have no buyer protection at all, so no possibility of an INR or a SNAD claim. Nada, nothing zilch- you are merely sending the recipient money as a gift.

This is the latest 'scam' on Facebook selling, people believe paypal is safe, whatever, so seller explains they can save money by sending as a gift payment,'but it's still paypal so you will be OK' and bang runs off with the money. There's an argument on one of the selling pages at the moment- someone posted the warning about gift payments being unsafe and other people are telling them they are wrong and gift payments are just a way of stopping the tax man finding out about all these unregistered traders. It is actually quite heated with parties defending the right of sellers to insist on gift payments to avoid problems with the tax man.

happybiker

It's not actually a scam, more a way of the seller making making more money with no possibility of a comeback.

There would be no consumer rights when making a gift payment: also

The item costs £30.00. Seller is paid normally via Paypal. he will recieve £30 - (3.4% +20p) and have the chance of making a refund due to a claim.

The buyer pays the £30 as a gift and pays all the fees ( 3.4% +20p)
so the item actually costs them £31-22p . The seller gets the full £30.00 and the buyer hasn't got a leg to stand on if anything goes wrong.

The buyer is in effect, paying extra for the privilege of losing all protection

theonlywayisup

If a seller is savvy enough to know there aren't any fees to pay for a gift payment receipt, they are savvy enough to know there is no protection for the buyer.

burnleymik

hi all, this is still dragging on. I asked on Friday if they were any closer to getting the matter resolved and they told me they should be accepting the payment that night, then today I recieve this email:

Dear XXXXXX,

Hi there, ive

contacted ebay about the payment that you sent which is still pending. Its because when you sent the payment it was sent to the wrong email address (this is one of the problems i had when setting up my paypal account) in the message they sent to me theyve told me to ask you to log into your paypal account and cancel the pending payment and go onto the tab which is labelled 'send money' and send it to the correct email address which is
'xxxxxxxxxxxxxx@hotmail.co.uk' if you could do this it would be very much appreciated. Having said this your item is in the post on its way to you as promised

Sorry about all this

Many thanks.
-
XXXXXXXX

This is now the third different email address they have given me. The original one, the one for their 'daughter' and now this one.

Does this sound like something ebay would tell someone to do? (I don't ever really sell anything on there so unsure).

I would appreciate any help/advice on how to proceed.