e-bay scam

[Nigel]

Hello fellow forum members, only motoring related as I was selling my car.

I've heard of this before, but from my conversation with a nice lady from west mercia police today, three people have fallen for this in the last fortnight in her area, so perhaps worth reminding people.

I advertised my old beemer on ebay, gave the usual stuff, only uk bidders, less than 10 feedback, contact me first etc.

A Canadian redgistered user with zero feedback used the buy it now button, has sent me a load of broken english e-mails, and today a cheque arrived.

The cheque was of course for more than the amount of the car sale, and I was to pass the difference onto the "shipper", the cheque itself was issued against a Welsh company, but sent from a French speaking African country, the cheque was dated two days after the letter was posted, but otherwise looked very good.

I contacted west mercia police, they seemed uninterested, so I contacted Barclays bank ( it was drawn on a barclays account), the advice of the stupid lady at barclays head office in london ?..........bank it, see what happens !

A WPC from West Mercia contacted me this evening, and she was very interested, and now has all the e-mails, the cheque, envelope , Canadian address,etc

She says the Police are losing patience with the banks, apparently they often give this advice when contacted, then moan about the scammers.

I can't believe people can be so dim as to fall for this, you will lose your car, and end up owing the bank the entire sum on the cheque ( I'm not sure how the banks get away with this, must be some loophole somewhere, as once its cleared, I'd regard it as their problem).

[Darren]

The whole reason for having 3 working days to "clear" a cheque is so that they can check it's legitimate. Are they now saying they don't do this?

I know that Banks want to get rid of cheques in favour of using cards as the systems behind card checking on transactions are much more complicated and efficient at detecting fraud, also, it's nearly all automated so nobody has to manually do anything.

I remember when I used to own an online store a few years ago Worldpay would clear almost anything on a card, and if it turned out to be a fraudulant card, it was the trader (me) that had to pay for it. Not Worldpay who were responsible for the checking of credentials, card details etc.

Basically the banks want to make the money and have none of the responsibility.

[Angus]

This con works because foreign cheques take weeks to clear (and UK ones can take longer than 3 days too!)

The banks will usually allow you to draw on a cheque after 3 to 5 working days. I forget their phraseology, but there are two terms -one means "we think it's ok so you can have the money", the other "we've seen the money, it is ok & you can have it".

Apparently the way to get these people to lose interest in you is to say that there's a tracker system fitted and that it will work in their country. l

[7db]

We refuse foreign cheques in our business for this reason. If in doubt, insist on cash...

[Nigel]

The clever bit is, it isn't a foiriegn cheque, its drawn on a Welsh company, and the branch is Bangor.

The police and Barclays fraud department have been in touch, the police to update me ( the wpc sounds gorgeous), and Barclays fraud to very red faced apologise for the advice I was given.

This welsh company have had loads of problems, and even changed accounts at one point, but its happening all over again.

Its so obvous that I can only think people get caught out threw pure greed.