Potential Tide Buyer Scam??

purplegirl09

Hi,

Need some advice with this. Have just had an item sold on FB marketplace and having agreed on bank transfer the buyer is now saying they have to send an extra £200 to my account which I then have to pay back to them as they are using a ‘Tide Premium Buisness’ account. 

I received a dodgy looking email from Tide?? If it is them - doesn’t look legit. It provided the following reasoning:

This might happen if it’s your first time receiving a payment from a Tide bank user via goods and services method, your payment with us would remain on hold until the buyer contact us for resolution purposes and we shall proceed to credit your account immediately.TIDE is a bank. We are a business banking system under the service of Clear Bank in the UK, also a business financial platform and the leading provider of digital business banking services in the UK. Is this your first time receiving a payment from a Tide bank user? If this is your first time receiving a payment from a Tide bank user via goods and services method, an additional payment of GBP £200.00 will be transferred by the buyer to save your bank account details on our payment database for the team-in-charge to clear your funds GBP £375.

caprikid1

SCAM 100% DO NOTHING MORE DO NOT COMMUNICATE WITH THEM.

The money sent to you will be reversed, they will get your £200.

Robin9

Walk -  even run away !    If you have any doubts don't go ahead.

molerat

SCAM. Tell the buyer the sale is off.  Very professionally worded explanation from Tide - NOT !

Buyer sends you someone else's £375, you send £200 back to a different account then your bank takes the fraudulent £375 off you and likely blocks your account.  And a possible fraud marker.

I wouldn't touch it with someone else's bargepole !

purplegirl09

Thank you all sooo much for the replies!!! Was pretty sure it was dodgy and haven’t messaged them back since they told me this. 

Now feeling super weary as up to point where we were talking money he seemed legit so have already passed on my account number and sort code as well as my address!!!! Now considering if it’s safe to ask my bank for a new card?? Is this necessary??

PRAISETHESUN

purplegirl09 said:

Thank you all sooo much for the replies!!! Was pretty sure it was dodgy and haven’t messaged them back since they told me this. 

Now feeling super weary as up to point where we were talking money he seemed legit so have already passed on my account number and sort code as well as my address!!!! Now considering if it’s safe to ask my bank for a new card?? Is this necessary??

100% dodgy!

You might get an uptick in spam/phishing emails, calls, etc, given they have some extra info about you and may appear slightly more legitimate than the usual "dear customer" type scams. You need to be on alert as you could be on a "suckers" list and attract more attempts in future.

It's also possibly it's worth alerting your bank that fraudsters have your account details and ask if they can put some higher security on your account in case someone calls them trying to impersonate you. Other then that the damage is probably fairly minor given you haven't actually sent any money.

penners324

I would speak to your bank to advise that the payment is potentially a scam.

CaveDweller2024

I've just had one of these and went along for the ride a bit. Email contains some bizarre wording.