Elaborate eBay/royal mail scam

03022242

I think I have been caught up in an elaborate eBay scam, 

so in summary 

bought iPhone £500ish on best offer
seller accepted
posted out via Royal Mail 48 hour service
item was delivered somewhere, photo of the delivery is not mine 
I contacted seller who has now unregistered 
contacted eBay and filed a claim via PayPal 
paypal rejected claim as it’s been delivered 
contacted AMEX as I paid through PayPal via that, I am awaiting their thoughts

i am also going to RM delivery office tomorrow, apparently RM vans have trackers so they can see if they were in my street in that time/ day

what else should I be doing? 

knightstyle

If it was bought through Ebay then if you show it was delivered to the wrong place you should get your money back. You nwwd to tell Ebay what happened.

IOWJJBTM2025

An item was sent via Royal Mail. There should be a tracker number.
This will have an address that the item was to be delivered to. (Hopefully your address)
The post person has a scanner that scans the parcel and takes the photo as proof of delivery with a date/time stamp.
It will also record the name of the post person who delivered it.
Suggest that the RM delivery office may be able to help?
If the delivery tracker shows your address would suggest it is not a scam.

savergrant

03022242 said:

I think I have been caught up in an elaborate eBay scam, 

so in summary 

bought iPhone £500ish on best offer
seller accepted
posted out via Royal Mail 48 hour service
item was delivered somewhere, photo of the delivery is not mine 
I contacted seller who has now unregistered 
contacted eBay and filed a claim via PayPal 
paypal rejected claim as it’s been delivered 
contacted AMEX as I paid through PayPal via that, I am awaiting their thoughts

i am also going to RM delivery office tomorrow, apparently RM vans have trackers so they can see if they were in my street in that time/ day

what else should I be doing? 

Is your postcode recognised by the Royal mail system as the delivery postcode?
Can you see the address label on the proof of delivery photo?
Does the tracking show delivery by your local delivery office, and which mail centres handled the item?
Ebay should be able to see this is fraud (easily if the item was delivered in a completely different part of the country) but as advised you need to contact ebay and say the tracking number is fraudulent and you have not received the parcel.

03022242

Yes the postcode is recognised as mine, it was “delivered” by my local office, the photo give isn’t readable and doesn’t look like a shape of a parcel that would contain a phone 

I did wonder whether the seller has a person on the inside of Royal Mail, who changes the route creates a fake “delivered” message but whatever it is it’s definitely a scam as the seller has now unregistered eBay 

will update after I’ve been to the delivery office 

RFW

IOWJJBTM2025 said:

An item was sent via Royal Mail. There should be a tracker number.

That's what I was thinking. If it was Tracked 48 it should show the full route of the parcel right up to delivery. Delivery will have the co-ordinates and a map of delivery area as well as the image. If it was just RM48 it will still have the delivery coordinates. There's no reason to visit a Royal Mail office. If there is an image there will be coordinates and you should be able to see within a few addresses. You just need to add the tracking number to the RM site rather than look at it on Ebay. 
If that doesn't help try adding the image to a local Facebook group and see if anyone recognises the door.

My concern would be that the 48 hour delivery options don't cover that kind of value. I get £150 cover with an RM account, without it's only £75, not sure what it would be buying postage from Ebay.

You say "I contacted seller who has now unregistered", did they answer you prior to unregistering? If so it may be them who think they are being scammed. If they unregistered immediately after the sale then you should have some recourse to Ebay, try contacting them on X/Twitter after checking the RM details.

savergrant

Unless it was a business seller the item will have been sent by eBay simple delivery, which covers up to £750 (although not sure if listing price was over £750). Ebay will supply the label but it seems possible for scammers to tamper with the labels somehow. The labels I've seen have a qr code and house number and postcode underneath, not sure whether a scammer could change the postcode slightly to have a dummy package delivered to an address nearby and leave ebay footing the bill)
What kind of account was it? I've never spent £500 on an ebay item myself.

03022242

It was a personal account, not much feedback, unregistered soon after I told him that it had been sent to the wrong address. The image that RM have provided shows a couple of parcels on a desk (partial view of a chair in the background) this suggests that it’s an office somewhere, or the process has been tampered with. 

I went to the RM office today and told them and they will get a manager to look in to it. 

The item was a £500 iPhone, and I am wary that eBay may turn around to say that your item is only covered for £75? I’d have been happy to pay for extra coverage should it have been available. 

I can’t seem to get through to email who have closed the claim as “they have proof it has been delivered” 

in have asked on my street WhatsApp group but no one has it. 

We await RM findings and il keep on at EBay 

se2020

The amount the parcel/postage was insured for makes no difference to you as that would only be for the benefit of the seller (if the item was not delivered or damaged)
If it was a private account with simple delivery then it would be covered for the full amount anyway regardless of the service used.

The first thing I would do for a high value item is wait at home and catch the postman (book a collection for a letter addressed to yourself if you don't regularly see them)
Ask them what they did with it and either get them to collect it or go and fetch it.

If ebay have already closed the INR case you have a problem as you will need to provide evidence for an appeal. This would normally be simple as you would just show them the GPS map tracking for the point of delivery (not delivered to my address) but it doesn't sound like you have that.

The possibility of an elaborate scam is remote.
It is not possible to manipulate the GPS location on the scanner when the item is delivered. 
(Or, someone who could do that would be doing stuff far more elaborate than £500 ebay scams)
So, either the scammer is a postman, they have sold you the item, driven to your address,  scanned the lable, and left.
Or, they are in on the scam with your local postman and just happened to get lucky that they found a buyer on his round.

The postman that made the delivery scan will have a big problem with his boss if it's been scanned at your house but actually taken/delivered elsewhere.

It might well be worth calling ebay and see what they say in person. 
The seller might not have closed the account.  Ebay may have closed it due to a number of frauds being reported.  In these situations they normally refund easily enough. 

Poppy2012

I have posted about exactly same scam and now found this post. I’m yet to prove to EBay that I have not received my phone. I’m trying to understand how this kind of scam is pulled off by the seller. In my case I went to the local delivery office and they said they never had it in the local area, provided me with GPS coordinates and a map of delivery miles away. Upon ringing customer service I have discovered they had a completely different address and post code in their system to deliver to and they advised EBay has those as well yet somehow it’s very difficult to prove to them as they rely on the tracking info. Im trying to get a written confirmation from Royal Mail in hope it will be accepted as a proof of non-delivery. It’s not easy as the customer service representative kept repeating they fulfilled the delivery contract they had with the seller, they can not share address provided by the seller and they do not get involved in EBay disputes and it was my issue to resolve, not theirs. I’ve emailed them and am awaiting response. Otherwise not sure what else can be done. I submitted such evidence as picture of my door, GPS co-ordinates and a map, crime ref number; mentioned I can submit a ring door bell video with date and time stamp of the delivery date and time or even a full day of the cctv coverage but somehow all these is not sufficient evidence.