[jrebman]

I have never seen this before and thought it may be a new thing for agon, so aside from ignoring this, I wonder if there is anything else I should do?

TO: Mindset
Hello,
I like to notify you that my interest in the purcahse of your item is very splendid,I'm
purchasing it on behalf of my client who is in the United kingdom...I want you to
get back to me with your final asking price and botherless about the shipping cos
my client manager will be resposible for the shipping and payment will be made via
money order as stated in your ads. i need you to write back quickly as i would like
this to be completed in the next days.
Charles.
============================
FROM: Charlielovage007 (a member)
RE:  Cain - cain Abby cherry finish, excellent cond.

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How shocking!

Does anybody know if there are any official channels for reporting scammers on agon?

Thanks,

Jim

[RichardS]

I've received several similar offers on a DAC I'm selling. One guy actually sent me a bank check FedEx from Japan for $8,000 (I was only asking $1750 for the DAC). He wanted me to deposit it and send the rest to his shipping company (I guess shipping prices are soaring) who would pick up the item. When I insisted on a postal MO, and that I'd pay and take responsibility for shipping, he seems to have lost interest. They seem to all have registered very recently.
I'd send a letter to Audiogon, though not sure what they'll do (I sent one to Audio Asylum too). Head-fi is doing something interesting to combat these scammers. They won't allow posts on their for sale forums unless you have 100+ forum posts.

[Daygloworange]

Someone actually sent you a check for $8000.00 dollars? What's to prevent you from depositing it, and you scamming him?

What's the scam? How does it work?

Cheers

[Levi]

If you deposit the $8K check, the bank will credit you that money.  3-5 business days later, the check will bounce and the bank will take all the credited money back + bounced check fees. 

Now, if you sent the rest say $6K, then you got scammed for $6K + bank fees.  The scammer also got a free merchandise.

Someone actually sent you a check for $8000.00 dollars? What's to prevent you from depositing it, and you scamming him?

What's the scam? How does it work?

Cheers

[JG2]

Actually a 'Bank Check', 'Certified Check', or a 'Money Order' can be deemed  as good by the bank and deposited in your account. It can take as long as 4-6 weeks in extreme cases for it to come back to you as a fraud.

The real scheme isn't what's being sold............(they could care less about what you're selling)..........and they most often don't want what you have for sale............ sending the 'extra' money back to the buyer, usually via Western Union, is the REAL scam!

Be careful............The "Bank Check" used to be the gold standard for transactions but with the quality of printers today, anyone can make a document that even the bank can't tell is fake.

[David Ellis]

Someone actually sent you a check for $8000.00 dollars? What's to prevent you from depositing it, and you scamming him?

The check is counterfeit.

Dave

[TjMV3]

These clowns are probably the same scammers that have infested audioasylum.com. for years, now.

I remember a few years ago when I was selling a Parasound amplifier,  one of these scammers responded with this obviously pre-written "standard" scammer e-mail.  Most of them read fairly similar and they have a few versions of the same letter.  Thing was,  the idiot scammer forgot to proof-read that particular version and the letter stated he was interested in my "loudspeakers"

It's bad enough enough they're a bunch of low-life,  slimey,  scamming thieves;   but the fact they're lazy and stupid...........makes it even more laughable.

[David Ellis]

This happens frequently in online car sales too.

I had a friend selling his BMW M5.  Within the first month of his autotrader listing, he received 5 printed checks from overseas that were all counterfeit.

Dave

[nathanm]

In defense of these so-called "scammers" I can say that I'm a used online hi-fi purveyor myself.  It's a perfectly legitimate business you know!  People who are too lazy to browse the internet themselves hire me to surf Audiogon and buy audio equipment for thousands more than the asking price using broken english.  It's a fantastic line of work and I make a good living doing it.  It works out great too because many of my clients also do not have enough free time to actually listen to the stuff I buy for them and they end up selling it at a massive loss, the sale of which I also facilitate.  Also, many of the e-mails my clients send me about what they might be interested in are full of correct grammar and spelling.  This does not look right when dealing with people on Audiogon, so I make sure to rewrite some of the more coherent parts.

[James Romeyn]

In defense of these so-called "scammers" I can say that I'm a used online hi-fi purveyor myself.  It's a perfectly legitimate business you know!  People who are too lazy to browse the internet themselves hire me to surf Audiogon and buy audio equipment for thousands more than the asking price using broken english.  It's a fantastic line of work and I make a good living doing it.  It works out great too because many of my clients also do not have enough free time to actually listen to the stuff I buy for them and they end up selling it at a massive loss, the sale of which I also facilitate.  Also, many of the e-mails my clients send me about what they might be interested in are full of correct grammar and spelling.  This does not look right when dealing with people on Audiogon, so I make sure to rewrite some of the more coherent parts.

Nathan you are so nuts.  Also I'm slow, it took me to the end to figure this crazy post out 

I reported an obvious scammer (seller) on Agon, wrote several emails, not one reply (I included proof of the scam, not worth repeating except that seller provided me a number represented as a Sunfire SN that was made up from thin air....btw, the first Sunfire numbers, when inverted, are the year it was made)

BEWARE of this one: Don't ever ever bring a stranger's check to a bank even your own, to cash it.  SF Chron report: guy does just that in SF BofA.  It was stolen/forged (guy was an idiot but that's another story)  He was arrested, stood in handcuffs at the entrance for 45 mins, charged, SPENT $8500 DEFENDING HIMSELF, tossed more money away sueing BofA for false arrest.  The bank laughed him out of court.  It is always a federal felony to be involved in any type of bank fraud whether you know of the fraud or don't know.  There is no such thing as an innocent in an attempted bank fraud. 

Your MUST only attempt to deposit the check at your own bank.  In that case, they catch it before you walk out the door w/ cash (what the above guy was attempting to to do protect himself).