Double Hmmm. I appreciate those that have had good transactions with MogulPal. This may not be a case of a stolen e-bay account - that is difficult to do. Second Chance offers are a known potential source of fraud however (see below).
When questioning whether Dan's transaction was with MogulPal, or a scammer posing as him with a bogus second chance offer, I would ask how Dan contacted MogulPal after he sent payment. If it was off-Ebay, to an e-mail address, then is the e-mail address the same as MogulPal used during the auction? If not, what is the address? What is the e-mail address the Second Chance offer e-mail came from?
The way Second Chance fraud works is scammers go down the list of bidders in a high dollar auction that does not reach reserve, and send bogus second chance offers to the bidders. The e-mails are HTML format, taken from legitimate Ebay second chance forms, so they look authentic, and are easy to modify. Then they just change the text, and voila, it's like printing money. The scammer knows people want the item, and they know the price the person is willing to pay, so they offer that. The problem for the scammer arises in the return e-mail address. However this can be masked or altered if you know how to do it. Also, if the seller choses to hide their e-mail address during correspondence during the auction, or no questions are asked by the buyer, then it easier for the scammer to use any e-mail address to correspond on payment. Either way, you have to check the e-mail addresses carefully. It's not foolproof, but it will catch a lot of the attempts. In such a case, they can use any paypal account for payment also, because it's not linked to the ebay ID. If they do this, it's rare, but it can happen, and if so, they often then try to run out the clock on the 30 days for card transaction cancellation, by stalling on the shipment as well. Some card companies give 60 days (i.e. 'Gold' cards), so check with your card issuer.
The location is an issue that can be used to check also - I.e. If the auction is listed one place, but the funds go somewhere else. If getting a second chance offer, get the sellers name and address, and phone too, and check this with ebay. They won't tell you the info, but you can use the Live Support option to talk to an agent via IM (Instant Message), and compare the info you got with what Ebay has on file. If they don't match, beware.
I would have to do a test with another CR member on a low dollar auction to know for sure, but I think Ebay will also post a message in your 'My Ebay' account, and/or make an entry in a 'Second Chance Offers' or 'Winning' screen in you My Ebay account, so you know the offer is valid. Again - I'm not sure on this.
This may be why Ebay refuses to help Dan, and classes this an 'off Ebay' transaction. This is the problem with Western Union - Any scammer can go in there with fake ID and fake documents, address, etc, and get the cash under any name. Then it's nearly impossible to track them down later. However crooks are stupid, so it's worth trying to follow it up, as they often use their real names, addresses, bank accounts, etc. Sometimes the authorities take a dim view of high dollar amounts, and go after them. Also, you can use the e-mail address they used to correspond, and/or the ISP's used to send the bogus second chance offer, and send that to the FBI Internet Fruad unit. Often the ISP will give up the info on the account without a court order, and the scammer can be found that way. It's worth a try.
Bill Roberts Jacksonville, OR
-----Original Message----- From: classicrendezvous-bounces@bikelist.org [mailto:classicrendezvous-bounces@bikelist.org]On Behalf Of C. Andrews Sent: Wednesday, September 21, 2005 8:56 AM To: classicrendezvous@bikelist.org Subject: [CR]re: ebay scammers
Dan further wrote, in part:
dealt with Mogulpal several months ago- bid on his Gios, didn't win it as it never reached reserve. Contacted Mogulpal thru E-Bay after the auction about a "second chance" purchase option. MogulPal sent me bogus e-mails appearing to be from E-Bay notifying me I'd won the bike & asked me to send money by Western Union, as his Paypal acct was down. In reviewing Mogulpal's
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Hm. Dan, this kind of scam has been going on on ebay for at least a year that I know of, and probably longer. Scammers have sent second-chance offers to people who've bid on my stuff too. There is absolutely nothing an honest seller can do about it. Ebay doesn't seem to care either.
So, buyer-beware is the order of the day. If you get any kind of second-chance offer on a high-dollar item on ebay, you have to check it thoroughly before responding. Usually it's easy to tell the legitimate from the illegitimate offers.
Again, I repeat, mogulpal is a totally honest guy, and a good seller. His auctions have been scammed by someone. The scammers find high-dollar items, then try to con potential buyers.
Moral of the story is that ebay is a wild and wooly place, safe for the sceptical among us only.
Charles Andrews SoCal
"What concerns me is not the way things are, but rather the way people think things are."
- Epictitus