Ebay Scam!

[Switcher]

I was over on the freelancer website, looking at some of the jobs that are posted.

I found this guy trying to hire folks to increase his ebay feedback, Ebay sure isn't what it was when they first started up, back in the 90's.

Here is the post:

Description Hello, I have a accounts that need feedback and I am looking for about 15 to 30 people with relatively old and reputable feedback accounts. It should not be less than 3 months old accounts. You should have more than 10 feedbacks. Your score should be over 95%. I will give you daily item number to "bid on" OR to "buy now". You purchase, you leave feedback, and you mark as payment sent. You don't really pay for the items. I will pay you weekly 15 cents per item you purchased and left feedback for.

[mc-motorsports]

What would possibly be the advantage? That guy is going to have to pay initial listing and completed listing fees...?

That is some kind of major scam brewing....

[fish1234]

These guys are like the guys who have the "Penny" auctions. You buy some PDF file that is bunk and then they won't send you positve feedback until you give them positive feedback. You need so many feedbacks to be able to use PayPal and other seller resources on e-bay. So now it looks like some of these guys are desperate to get enough feedback to use the "Buy it now" option on whatever they are selling. If they are selling a big ticket item and have changed there e-bay sellers account or opened a new one and want to use all the resources right away they need the feed back to do so.

Jeff

[ger21]

Paypal can (and will) hold your funds for 21 days if you're rating is less than 100. Happened to me a few weeks ago.

[Switcher]

I'm not sure what the guys motive is, just that he wants his feedback looking great in a short amount of time.

I only posted this here on cnczone to show others, that a really high Ebay feedback isn't always what it seems.

I went to leave a message at Freelancer to report it (lol ger21 knows what I'm talkin about , I report Spam here all the time), at Freelancer they want you to signup, to send them a message. I just couldn't believe how bold the guy that posted the Ad is. That's the first time I've been on freelancer, maybe Ads like that are common on that site?

[BarnBurner]

High feedback that is brand new sometimes is an indication of a scam; guys will sell stuff cheap for three months or so, build it up and then suddenly disappear with a hundred sales or more.

Paypal is the worse scam of all; they have the right to take your money, freeze your account, withdraw from your account 'at their sole discretion'.

[stoneyreef]

Freelancer used to be a great site a few years ago, lately I have not been able to get anyone to bid on jobs. I actually found my server guy on freelancer. He is from Satu Mare and still is working for me now!

[Switcher]

I used PayPal back in Jan. 09, I wanted to buy something on Ebay, everything was good, PayPal let me pay the money, as soon as the money went thru to PayPal they told me my account was locked becuse I don't use the account very much (once or twice a year at most). Man I was pissed, they could have told me that before they took my money! So they held up the auction for 2 weeks, & it was a Buy It Now auction.

I told my wife we'll never use PayPal again.

The way I'm thinking was PayPal is probably doing this to a lot of folks trying to buy stuff on Ebay, so they hold money in their bank, draw interest for a couple of weeks, I'm sure the traffic that PayPal gets is very high, that adds up to a lot of interest money, for them.

Anyone have any good alternatives to PayPal?

[stoneyreef]

google checkout

[KIMFAB]

I still use paypal it is a handy and cheap way to get paid by credit card but you MUST have a totally separate bank account for it and only keep the minimum in the account.
As far as the scams go you will see them everywhere paypal is no exception.

[Servo Wizard]

Switcher,

Originally Posted by Switcher Ebay sure isn't what it was when they first started up, back in the 90's.

eBay has never had the buyers protection in mind. I won the bid for a copy of Camsoft CNC Professional and the seller insisted on being paid with money orders. I went to the Post Office and purchased the money orders and sent them to her via registered mail. One week had passed by and I had not received the software so I e-mailed her and she claimed to have had a death in the family. One and one half weeks passed by and I had not received the software so I called her and she claimed that they were having DSL installed so she wasn't able to leave the house, but she would get in the mail the first thing next morning. Another week passed by and I had not receved the software so I attempted to call her again, but this time my phone number had been blocked. I spent the next month trying to get help from eBay but all I got was form e-mail messages thanking me for my input. eBay's SafeHarbor was an absolute joke without a funny punch line. The ***** re-listed my software and I went absolutely BEZERK. By that time I had already contacted everybody from the dog catcher to the head of of the FBI and no one seemed to give a damn about my situation. My next move was to take a trip to Tucson, Arizona and collect my software and beat the **** out of the ***** and her cowardly husband. I went to my neighbors house to see about having him take care of my dogs while I was away (probably 3 to 5 years) and he sensed that I had a problem so we began to discuss the matter. His brother worked for the United States Postal Inspectors Office and he said that she had committed wire fraud by accepting the USPS money orders and failing to perform to terms. The USPS Inspectors Office took the the case and I received a copy of the letter that they sent to her, it would have made John Gotty piss down his leg. Three days later I received a phone call from the ***** and she wanted my f???ing mailing address so she could send the f???ing Camsoft CNC Professional to me. The fact that she had to ask for my mailing address pretty much proves that she had no intention of ever sending the software to me.

Don't ever think that eBay will protect you from a crooked seller.

Ron

[MonoNeuron]

I have a friend that was scammed a few weeks ago. He lives in Australia and works all over the world when needed and he decided to buy a Ducati motorbike that was going cheap for around $15K. He didn't win the auction but got a second chance from the seller at his original bid of $5200. Great deal....or so he thought.
The money went through by money transfer as it was the only way the seller would accept it and the bike never showed up and the seller disappeared.
The thing was, after he went through the whole eBay rigmarole, he was told that the site was a fraudulent one and setup for a scam. He sent me the link to the bike etc and all the links worked as they should and it appeared to be the legitimate eBay web site but it wasn't.
These mongrels are getting very good at what they do and I think the only way to keep safe is to actually type in your address in the address bar where you want to go and not use a link and only buy stuff by PayPay or direct deposit into a legitimate bank account.
You have to be so darn careful now-a-days.
My credit card supplier told me if I travel overseas then I should get a new credit card on returning because even legitimate companies are using the card a few months later and scamming money from them. Predominately, the Asian countries are renowned for this.
Apparently they make a small transaction, like a song on Itunes, then see if it goes through then a few days later hit it for the maximum withdrawal.
Life was so much better when you got paid cash in hand and knew where it was all going. Now I have to pay a bank to keep my money and it's compulsory for me to do that. I cannot receive my pay check in cash.
Now all I can do is try and MINIMISE my debts.