Has anyone used LockDeal Escrow when buying a car?

TheJP

Hi all, im interested in buying a car privately, the seller wants to use a company called Lockdeal Escrow (Belfast based) who handle the sale and deliver the car. They hold the money for 10 days until I say im happy for the money to be given to the seller. Just want to see if anyone has legitimately used them and can offer any feedback.

TheJP

So it was too good to be true, this is a scam company. So glad i was able to find more information before i handed over my cash.

facade

What did you find?

As far as I can find on the interweb, they are a legitimate company address Unit 7, 18 Heron Rd , Belfast BT3 9LE

Their web page is disturbingly American though, it could just be a lazy cut & paste job, as they supposedly started in the US & Canada, but it puts me off......

There are plenty of posts to car forums from people who claim to have bought cars through them, even one from a person who went to their address as he was local and checked them out.

I find it hard to believe too, even if they are legit, I bet 90% of people wouldn't even deal with them through fear of a scam, so they can't have much business.

TheJP

facade said:

What did you find?

As far as I can find on the interweb, they are a legitimate company address Unit 7, 18 Heron Rd , Belfast BT3 9LE

Their web page is disturbingly American though, it could just be a lazy cut & paste job, as they supposedly started in the US & Canada, but it puts me off......

There are plenty of posts to car forums from people who claim to have bought cars through them, even one from a person who went to their address as he was local and checked them out.

I find it hard to believe too, even if they are legit, I bet 90% of people wouldn't even deal with them through fear of a scam, so they can't have much business.

Its a complete scam, when looking at some of the detail on the website it doesn't add up with companies house. They also used to trade as Logisnet escrow as i found the same building but with that logo. Very elaborate and has swindled about 4 people out of £10k each. I also found by putting the car make and reg into Facebook search some posts about the very same car being a scam.

It looks like they have created many accounts on those websites to back themselves up.

TheJP

TheJP said:

facade said:

What did you find?

As far as I can find on the interweb, they are a legitimate company address Unit 7, 18 Heron Rd , Belfast BT3 9LE

Their web page is disturbingly American though, it could just be a lazy cut & paste job, as they supposedly started in the US & Canada, but it puts me off......

There are plenty of posts to car forums from people who claim to have bought cars through them, even one from a person who went to their address as he was local and checked them out.

I find it hard to believe too, even if they are legit, I bet 90% of people wouldn't even deal with them through fear of a scam, so they can't have much business.

Its a complete scam, when looking at some of the detail on the website it doesn't add up with companies house. They also used to trade as Logisnet escrow as i found the same building but with that logo. Very elaborate and has swindled about 4 people out of £10k each. I also found by putting the car make and reg into Facebook search some posts about the very same car being a scam.

It looks like they have created many accounts on those websites to back themselves up.

I also checked the address out and it doesn't appear to have any mention of them trading on site. My family live in Belfast so im tempted to ask them to do a driveby. The company director according to companies house is greek and lives in Canada another red flag. I also suspect that by placing 'the business' in Belfast will deter English victims to go and visit the property. 

facade

I wouldn't deal with them anyway

There are no Trustpilot reviews fake or otherwise, they claim to work with Pistonheads, but no mention on Pistonheads website (searching pistonheads for Lockdeal Escrow gets nothing), and googling for pistonheads and Lockdeal Escrow gets nothing either.

Here's a thread on a merc forum though

https://www.mbclub-forum.co.uk/review-forum/bussines-topic/threads-view/discussions/gki1e6ic4is3/Has-anyone-heard-of-LockDeal-Escrow-Forum-mbclub-forum.co.uk.html

It is 6 months old, but the positive responses are from people with thousands of posts on there, not new accounts, which seems a bit odd if it is a scam.

GrumpyDil

The element that flags this up to me is why on earth would a private seller want to use them? As a private seller, describe the car accurately, get the money, hand over keys and deal with paperwork. Job done. 

TheJP

facade said:

I wouldn't deal with them anyway

There are no Trustpilot reviews fake or otherwise, they claim to work with Pistonheads, but no mention on Pistonheads website (searching pistonheads for Lockdeal Escrow gets nothing), and googling for pistonheads and Lockdeal Escrow gets nothing either.

Here's a thread on a merc forum though

https://www.mbclub-forum.co.uk/review-forum/bussines-topic/threads-view/discussions/gki1e6ic4is3/Has-anyone-heard-of-LockDeal-Escrow-Forum-mbclub-forum.co.uk.html

It is 6 months old, but the positive responses are from people with thousands of posts on there, not new accounts, which seems a bit odd if it is a scam.

What my research tells me is that its the same type of thread on bmw, merc, pistonhead forums. My guess is its a number of people creating accounts and replying to comments with lockdeal in the title. Here is a link to the car which also has a facebook post on why its a scam https://www.top24-market.com/tiguan-155221962328.html?fbclid=IwAR3UIwTogL_0mjLxvg0uCXTX3uwxAk9RQinEMSs6n5LuXE-Imod_n4HYsec

facade

Turns out that page I linked to is not actually on the mbclub website at all, the url is wrong, looks like someone created a whole fake page. The posters are real mbclub members, but searching on the real mbclub site, they have not posted to that thread.

Odd that if you hover over the location they seem to be Belfast not where they say, but clicking on the locations or usernames takes you to a wordpress page.

Well, it gave Kaspersky a bit of a workout I suppose

EDIT: The biggest giveaway is that 2016 R-Lines are on Autotrader for at least twice what that one is, I'd have thought WBAC would pay a lot more than  £10,000

ontheroad1970

There are a few threads on here about escrow things from Isle of Man and Belfast.  Leave well alone.

Herzlos

GrumpyDil said:

The element that flags this up to me is why on earth would a private seller want to use them? As a private seller, describe the car accurately, get the money, hand over keys and deal with paperwork. Job done. 

Bingo. Why pay a 3rd party some fee to handle this stuff when you can just make the buyer come to you, look at the car and hand over cash / do a bank transfer.

Any indirect car sales (unless you've approached a car buying agent) is almost certainly a scam.