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Bike Selling Scam.
Blog Date - 24 September 2013
I've advertised my motorcycle. I placed a free advert in Gumtree and was most pleasantly surprised when within a few hours I recieved and enquiry via text message, as follows...
Is the bike on gumtree.co.uk still for sale? please reply me to david2bd@gmail.com
Now my very first alert is the phrase "please reply me to". Not the best of English but...but...but maybe the message was written in haste or my potential buyer may not speak English as their first language. I sent the reply, via email as follows...
Yes the gold Fazer is still for sale.
Thanks, Ren
The reply was not too long in coming and read thusly...
Thanks for your response.Am interested in buying. How long have you owned it?? what's your actual price for it and when last was it serviced?.
I really ought to have been more alert now. The email address is david2db@gmail.com and his name shows up as David Lucas. That is a regular UK name but still the language, punctuation and phrasing are poor. Never-the-less while I am something of a snob I'm not averse to selling motorcycles to those whose command of the English language is lacking. As long as their money is good I have no preference as to which culture, creed or caste my bike sells to.
So I sent a reply that read as follows...
I've owned the bike since February 2009. Purchased it with 7,000 miles on the clock.
Next oil change due at 45,000 miles if you're sticking to 3,000 mile oil changes.
Tappets checked at 29,000 miles
I can't move too much on the price as I need the money for house repairs. 1,100 is the most I'll drop to.
Cheers, Ren.
And all too swiftly the reply came...
Nice Hearing back from you..I'm quite satisfied with the condition and price. I will be paying the PayPal charges from my account and i will be paying directly into your PayPal account without any delay,and i hope you have a paypal account. If you have one already, just send me the address to send it to, which is the email address you use for it or you can send me a paypal money request, so once i receive the details i will go ahead with the payment through PayPal and then i will contact my shipping company after you get the payment. I will need your home address for it to be Picked Up by the Shipping Company..
Too Easy! My alarm bells were ringing but I must admit I was still happy to believe I'd sold the bike. Maybe it's all legit. Maybe he's one of those people that buy UK bikes and export them to Eastern Europe. Maybe David is some desperate Fazer collector in London with too much money but no gold and black 600 in his collection. All I need to do is send my paypal email address and my home address to him, I mean, what could possibly go wrong?
Maybe he sends the boys around to my home address to extract the Fazer from my shed? I'll get them to collect it from my mother's house. If it's legit they get the bike, if not they'll find an empty back yard. Yeah cool. I mean he can only pay IN to my paypal account with my email address, he can't take money out...surely.
Just as a matter of good practice I googled the email address "david2bd@gmail.com". The first things I saw were the words "Scammed". To cut a long story short the idea is you send "david2bd@gmail.com" you're paypal email address. He sends FAKE - F-A-K-E paypal emails confirming that you've recieved the value of the motor AND a little more to cover shipping and various transaction/transfer fees. Now either the bike is taken and you realise there's no funds in your paypal account, or they say they've overpaid and you need to send them money back.
The moral of the story? If it seems too good to be true...it probably is.
Reader's Comments
John De ville said :-
Ive heard about this before Ren. Gumtree is rife with dodgy stuff and scammers, its well documented.
01/01/2000 00:00:00 UTC
liam said :-
yup just got the very same scam chasing my BMW
01/01/2000 00:00:00 UTC
Ren - The Ed said :-
I'm glad it's not just me then!
01/01/2000 00:00:00 UTC
loic said :-
thank a lots for that ! same guy text me and wrote the exact message with same email ! good thing I google that email address thank you
01/01/2000 00:00:00 UTC
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