Scam Concerns
 

A friend just received a certified check for more than $10,000 the asking price of his boat advertised on Boattrader. The envelope was sent from the UK and there is a request to cash the check and send back the extra 10k to a third party agent representing the buyer. What is going on? I told him to give the certified check an instructions to the local law enforcement agency. Has anyone heard of anything like this before?

Re: Scam Concerns
 

Its a SCAM.

Re: Scam Concerns
 

I have heard of it. What often happens is the seller in this case sends the 10 grand back before the money clears because it is "certified" and guess what? He is out 10 big ones. Going to the authorities is smart. Good luck.

Re: Scam Concerns
 

Never ending phishing!!! azsholes!

Re: Scam Concerns
 

Kinda like the emails sent from africa saying that i need to set up an acct for a wire transfer and they will give me 15% for just setting up an acct.

We get calls at work all the time from unnamed printer/copier companies that ask for our make and model #'s and try to send heavily marked up parts that we didnt order....take money upon delivery type scam.

Re: Scam Concerns
 

Similar thing happened to a friend of mine. He went as far as to deposit the check, just to see if it was real. It took a couple of weeks to come back as a bad check. Needless to say, he didn't send them anything. What sucks is that these jerks keep doing this stuff because somewhere out there some sucker loses his money often enough to keep trying. Going to the authorities is probably a total waste of time because they are always overseas in some scam ridden country like Nigeria.

Rene

Re: Scam Concerns
 

run fast :mad:

Re: Scam Concerns
 

Frame it :) :)

Re: Scam Concerns
 

Scam???....Oh YEAH!!!! You bet!!!
BOING!!!!!....rubber check!!!!!
Say you were to deposit it, wait a little while for it to clear, then mailed the excess back. For some reason the banks take a bit longer to cash an overseas check. Once they find out it's bogus they'll withdraw the funds from your account. You'll be out a 20K boat, 20 K for the check plus 10K in cash that you sent, and in some cases the boat will be on it's way so you'll have heavy shipping charges to get it overseas.
Never accept a check for more than the asking price.

New scam going around involves American Express Gift Checks. A guy in Orlando received several thousand dollars worth of $500.00 checks. Deal was he should deposit them, mail a certain amount back, and keep the rest. Just like the overpayment scheme. Guy was smart, he went to the American Express website and found the highest denomination gift check they sell is $100.00. TV news showed the guy holding the &500.00 checks. Sure looked real too.

Re: Scam Concerns
 

Send him back $10k in Monopoly money and a pic of a boat and a note saying "this is as close to getting a boat as you will come with fake checks" :mad:

Re: Scam Concerns
 

This is a WELL KNOWN scam.

from other forum (googled)
http://limos.infopop.cc/eve/forums/a...2/m/5261069942

Traderonline Scam ALERTS
http://www.traderonlinesecurity.com/...pg=SellerScams

Re: Scam Concerns
 

I was standing in line and the Post Office yesterday and they have a big "scam" sign on the wall that describes what you've said to a "T".

Re: Scam Concerns
 

Deposit the check in an interest bearing account. Earn interest on it for a week or so and when they charge it back just forget about it. Then you can pocket the interest for your trouble.

Dont know if it will work but I always wanted to try it.

On second thought its probably not a good idea because the bank will be out the interest. However this fact may make them put an end to this scam which is well known.

Ron

Re: Scam Concerns
 

Yea, The check may pass through the initial stage at your bank, the amount will possibly show up on your account balance, as it goes through the verification process, this is when you would get the confidence to write, your check out to the UK people, then when its probably too late, your bank will call you into the back room and question you on the fake check. and then both the bank and the uk guy get their money, and leave you with none. I believe there was a story on dateline or one of those channels about this scam.

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Who falls for these things? Why would someone send you more $$ than necessary? C'mon guys. I get these all the time that come from people keying off my OSO classifieds. One guy sent me a check. the bank name, address & phone # were all legit but the check wasn't. I opened a new acct just to deposit it in so they would never get my other acct #'s several days later it was returned as illegit.

Re: Scam Concerns
 

There is also a scam out there involving an inheritance promise. Your uncle or who ever, left you this large sum of money,, its in a warehouse, some where, and they brought the money in cash and died it all black, as to avoid tax penaties. The scammers put you in touch with a company that sells special chemicals to get the black dye off of the money, these chemicals are very expensive,,and when you use them and they dont work,, they just tell you that you did not use enough,, and charge you all over again. I saw on the news recently where a doctor, lost a fortune on this scam. Funny thing is, when I was watching it seemed like a familiar situation, being in the custom processing chemical business, we had a guy approach us with many questions about how to remove a special black dye, from this paper he had, it seemed wierd at the time,, but we accepted the challenge, and went through a few processes to get the die off of the paper,, wouldnt you know it,, just a small amount of chlorine bleach, and water solution got all of this ink off,, when we showed the guy he became infurriated, and repeatedly insisted that our chemicals were too strong,, andd destroyed, the ink under the paper?? Guess he still believed he really had money under the dye, we tryed again, and same results,, of course he only gave us 1inch by 3 inch slivers of paper.. Next day we keep recieveing these Irate calls from foreign numbers, (possibly the Scammers), hehe I guess this guy decided to look for a less expensive option to get the dye off, of his "supposed" money, got to hand it to him, lol he reallyy pissed off the scammers,, or we did,, I was getting these calls constantly,some arabic sounding guy speaking another language just pissed, and of course,, the next day 30 or so FBI agents storm in, and take us away for questioning,those guys are really intimidating, but when they found out we were just as clueless about what we were removing the ink from, as the guy who asked us,, to do so,, and that we were doing it more out of curiosity and not even for a charge,,we were off the hook. Im sure our legit business history kept us out of too much trouble as well, but I can only Imagine the laugh those fbi guys had, when they realized what was happening. I really did not piece it together, untill I saw the special on the news.

Re: Scam Concerns
 

:D :D :D


How does anyone fall for these scams honestly...???

Re: Scam Concerns
 

I'm sorry but anyone greedy enough to fall for these scams deserves what they get. It is their own greed that clouds their judgement.

I hope there is a special place in Hell for liars and theives! :mad:

Re: Scam Concerns
 

Same thing on a Bertram we were selling....

The guy even called and asked for pics etc.... before sending a Cashier's Check (drawn from BofA). Took it over to BofA for there fraud dept. to see.... They kept it!

It still amazes me that there are obviously still enough people out there that release their boat(s) w/out the check first clearing!

P.S. Gino still has the best banking story ever!!! :eek:

Re: Scam Concerns
 

I do believe I agree with you clay.
I also cant help but notice by your recent posts that a good friend or some one close to you has done you wrong recently? Am I close? If so, just remember they will get theirs, karma, my friend karma. keep your head up :drink:

Re: Scam Concerns
 

Total scam, we had someone try it on us. The check looked official. We called the US company it was drawn on and they had no record of the check. BTW- even if it is a cashiers check, you are still not guaranteed funds. If the bank finds it to be fraud they can pull the funds back out of your account.

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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kIdkauBZX1k

:evilb: :evilb: :evilb:

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Like they always say---if it is too good too be true it probably is. This is happening every day with e-bay and people are still falling for it. Run as far away as you can. If you can't touch the guy who is buying your boat, don't get near the deal...

Re: Scam Concerns
 

See if you can torment them a bit. Tell them you don't believe they are real and ask them to send you a pic of them with a bucket on their head waving a british flag in each hand and wearing a white t shirt with d.i.c.k. written on it in black magic marker. Thats good for a start. Next go to the marinas in the area and ask if they have any trashed boats to be destroyed , find one and get the buyer to get the shipping company to come and pick it up freight collect. The scammer will think he is getting your boat for free and will pay the freight to get it for that cost alone. Hope he likes paying for the ss minnow shipped to nigeria. :evilb:

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Here is a follow up on the original post. The receiver of the certified check called the lending institution printed on the check. He gave them the routing number and they told him that the check was counterfeit. YTD that particular lending institution claimed they are approaching 2 million in fraudulent checks usually involving internet trading. I had no idea this was such a problem.