Craigslist scam

[thoffman]

So I get this email back for a item I'm sellin on Craigslist, and I can think of it the credit card commercial with the Russian like sounding guy named "Peggy".
AREN'T YOU GLAD YOU CAN BUY/SELL HERE WITH PEOPLE YOU <font size="-2">(Kinda')</font> know!

Thanks for your response and am sorry for late reply just because i
have a dead in my family .i will like to buy the items from you and so
please kindly withdrawn the adverts from craigslist site now i don't
mind adding an extra $40 for you to take the advert down from Craig so
that i can be rest assured that am in hand of the item. and i will be
paying you via bank certified check from the company account am
working with,and the payment will be deliver to you via Currier
service (FEDEX) And i will like you to get back to me with the
following information to facilitate the mailing out the check to
you.... kindly get back to me with the..

FULL NAME TO WRITE ON THE CHECK........
HOME ADDRESS............
CITY.............
STATE........
ZIP CODE....
CELL PHONE#......

I will make arrangements for the pick up as soon as you have your
money I am completely satisfied with the advert and the payment will
be delivered within 2-3 working days.** I use a hearing impaired phone
# and will receive your calls via email ** N.B UPS and FEDEX does not
deliver to a P.O box addresses.Thank you.

Mrs Kristen Stewart

<u>Hell yes, I'll get right on it for the 40 bucks.</u>

 

[aschumacher]

Wow Tom ! $40 on top of ur selling price. Sounds a little weird...a 'certified check' from Nigeria could be an interesting thing to see...could be a real collectors item after it bounces.

 

[thoffman]

Boy, the b---$--- that goes along with craigslist!

 

[wshytle]

You'd think those crooked foreigners would at least learn proper enough english. It's a shame we have to endure such BS. I wonder if any of them ever get caught.

 

[pbell]

This one is not about the "certified check", they are not going to send one. They want your information: Name, Address, Phone numbers etc., the information is worth a whole lot more to them than the "extra $40" they say they are going to send. Now I did win a lottery and as soon as I send the $150-$200 taxes/duty/delivery fee or what ever they called it, that is being held at the DHL/UPS/Fed X center, they are going to send it to me.........or maybe it was the phone call (from Jamaica) from the "Mega-Bucks Corp" about the money they were holding for me..........both true
stories.

 

[thoffman]

Actually this was different. I had a tractor on Craigslist <u>AND</u> the local paper . One guy was on his way from +/- 50 miles away to <u>look</u> at the tractor when a guy calls and wants directions to my house to bring his trailer and wants to buy. The local guys wants it, pays me for it, and I call the other guy who is on his way to look at it to tell him it's sold. He calls me a FN A hole along with a MFN CSR. Now I'm REALLY pissed. He say's he is town right now so I tell him to come on over and we can "discuss" this further. He tell me what a great guy I am and says "I know where you live!!"
I've been in a few scrapes before, but never in the tractor hobby.

 

[bnolte]

Tom,
I recently sold a car on CL. I posted it Saturday night and had 2 fishy responses within 5 minutes. I waited until the next morning to go through the dozen or so responses for a 12 year old Accord with almost 290,000 on the clock. The way I handled it was not to post a phone number, and called the most promising response, who said he was coming as soon as he finished breakfast. While I was waiting for him I sent an email to the others stating that there had been a number of responses, had someone coming to look at it, but would get back to them if it didn't pan out.

The guy I called came with his tow truck and cash, drove away happily with his car and title, and I walked back in the house with a small stack of hundred dollar bills, and emailed the news that it had been sold, and edited my CL post to indicate the sale and left it up for a day before deleting it.

Here's a Craiglist Classic I received a day after I withdrew my posting:

Hi there, Thank you for getting back to me.Can you assure me that is in good state and that i will not be disappointed with it? I'm ready to pay your asking price and to be honest, i want to buy this for my Dad as his birthday gift.

I a marine biologist that works on the sea at the moment. phone calls making and visiting of website are restricted but i squeezed out time to check this advert and send you an email regarding it so my only quickest payment option is PayPal as i can send money via PayPal anytime. Since I'm requesting this transaction to be done via PayPal, i will be responsible for all the pay pal fee/charges on this transaction and if you don't have an account with paypal,its pretty easy, safe and secured to open one. Just log on to www.paypal.com. I hope we can make the purchase as fast as possible? I have a mover that will come for it once payment clears . i will like to see more pics i look forward to hear back from you
soon.

details that i needed are below

Your PayPal e-Mail Address :
Full name:
Firm Price:

God bless you bless you .

 

[jchamberlin]

Bruce,

I think you handled the transaction in a thoughtful and respectful manner.

 

[wshytle]

I had a guy sort of make a fool of me just this week. I've been selling a snapper mower for a friend on cl. After getting it running, which required three carb cleanings, I posted it at a very fair price. I got zero response so I lowered the price and got a couple of "run-around" replies that never showed. A third person offered a little less than my asking price and I refused. A week went by with no response (after top posting too) so I emailed the last guy with the offer and he said yes. He came by yesterday with the cash and picked up the mower. About 4 hours later he calls saying he doesn't need the mower after all and would like his money back. I told him I couldn't believe my ears and that I'd leave the decision to my friend since I hadn't actually gotten the money to her yet. She told me to go ahead and give him the money and buy it back. Our deal was to halve the money so that meant me giving back my half as well.

After sleeping on it I think I might just call him and tell him to forget it. If he doesn't want the mower it's up to him to sell it now. I spent a few hours working on the snapper and three weeks trying to sell the darn thing. Just dealing with cl is a job. I've never had anything like this happen before. This is a grown man too. I might would expect this type of behavior from a highschool student. I hate to go back on MY word after telling him to bring it back but I feel somewhat justified here. I was so happy to finally get rid of the mower and tell my friend it was sold at a decent price then this happens.

Would I be a fool to simply buy the mower back from a done deal? I know 9 out of ten people would have told him to "take a hike". I was hoping my friend would say that but she's a fine christian woman that, unlike me, always looks on the bright side. My problem is I see no bright side here at all.

 

[mfrade]

Tell him there is a "re-stocking fee"... say about 10 or 20 %...

 

[jchamberlin]

Wayne
I've worked in retail before, what you're describing is called "Buyer's Remorse." A store can put an item back on the shelf if it is returned in good condition (although I've been forced by my boss to take back "returns" that were obviously purchased with the sole intention of using them for one night only): no harm, no foul. The retailer wants a happy customer and anticipates some people are going to "game the system." It is considered poor form, and a rookie mistake, to actually enforce return policies.

The strategy works well in most cases. Because the customer knows they're basically lying, and your acceptance of their lie cements the relationship --they "owe" you in a way, and you get to act magnanimous and gracious in the face of their sniveling sneakiness: you're the saint, they're the sinner. You're looking at the big picture, the larger context of human relations, and treating others as would hope to be treated, etc. I suspect this is the way your friend views the transaction.

I have never found it easy to execute this strategy. Its not easy being a saint, it takes a lot of praying for forgiveness for what you REALLY want to do to the guy.

The other way of looking at it is that, "you pays your money, and you takes your chances." Really, you're not obligated to take his return, you have no return policy, you're not a retailer, you don't need a relationship with him, etc. The worst he can do to you is report to Craig's List that he had a bad experience, so it appears as a "black mark" on an otherwise spotless record.

The trouble with this strategy is that it makes you the bad guy, which really isn't fair, but there it is, you have to deal with it. You spend as much effort justifying your actions to yourself and others as the "saint" spends in prayer.

Either way the situation presents an opportunity for personal growth. As difficult as it may be, I encourage you to make the best of it, and take the "saintly" approach. Extend the warm hand of welcome to the sinner as a sinner who has made some mistakes yourself and who has made some purchases in the past that you regretted. Give him the chance you never had; then get on your knees and pray you can sell that mower to another sucker!

 

[jbaker]

Wayne, you are not a retailer so I would take ALL SALES FINAL approach. Maybe he just needed to cut his grass and is done now or maybe he did something to it.

I new a guy who had a bad motor in his drill went and bought a new drill swapped motors and returned the new drill with bad motor,, got his money back and a new motor in his drill.

 

[wshytle]

Thanks guys for all of the input. I've gotten the same opinions from some friends here. After thinking on it last night I called the fellow this am and told him he had really put me in a spot. I also said I didn't want to do the transaction today as we'd planned and I wanted to think on it for a couple of days. He is a nice guy...born and bred NC as I am. We talked for a good 30 minutes on current affairs and have a lot in common. I even told him that if he was a democrat I'd tell him to go suck an egg and we laughed. He has four children and some grandkids and is only a couple of years older than me (same age bracket). He did mention he hadn't removed the mower from the trailer because his mothers mower was fixed and used. He also said he planned to give me $50 with the mower for my trouble. He was also very apologetic and there was never any hard words or attitudes shown.

I finally stuck to my plans and told him I'd call him the first of the week with my answer. JC was right that I'll never have a relationship with this person after he leaves for the last time.

It's time to go get on a cub. Lots to do...

 

[jbaker]

Wayne you both seem like nice NC guys go ahead and take it back

hows the saying go "no good deed goes unreturned" not sure if its right but it sounds good

 

[digger]

No good deed goes unpunished

 

[aschumacher]

People watching C.L. for some of Kraigs stuff, never can tell what you will find.
Recent story in N.Y. City...2 men killed and robbed a man of his I-Phone...a few days later it was seen on C.L. for $400...a few hours later the theives were visited by the police dept.
Maybe Kraigs thief(s) will be as dumb as these guys.

 

[jbaker]

I am watching Rockford, Il CL's

 

[wshytle]

Well, it's time for things to start going "unpunished". My "new friend" brought the snapper back yesterday. He insisted I keep $50 of the money and I by no means wanted to hurt his feelings.

Everything went well so now I have to start over selling the darn thing.

Anybody need a snapper rider?

 

[jchamberlin]

Wayne: Your reward will be rich in heaven

(provided you get there

). You are headed in the right direction: "Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy."

Seriously, even though it is a very odd case, I hope you're able to "flip" the tractor in short order.

By-the-way, are you splitting the $50 "restocking gift" with the person who owns the tractor?

 

[wshytle]

Jeremiah-

Yep, everything is split 50/50. I have arranged the selling of several things that would have otherwise been given/thrown away.

I could tell some stories (but probably won't).