And yet another eBay scam

[G B.]

I bid in auction #4526597475 for an original '63 FI air cleaner. I didn't even come close to winning the auction. However, within one hour after the auction ended, I got a "Second Chance" offer from "micsparts@aol.com" to buy the air cleaner for the amount of my bid. The e-mail said to accept the Second Chance offer, I should reply to the sender for instructions on paying.

This Second Chance offer wasn't sent by the real air cleaner seller. I know because I contacted the real seller through eBay.

I don't know how the scammer expected to collect money from me, but it would probably involve wiring cash somewhere overseas. Not only was his offer too good to be true, it was full of the usual misspelled words as well.

[Michael H.]

Re: And yet another eBay scam

Jerry,

I see the seller AND the buyer are both from New Jersey. Probably his neighbor helpin out with the bidding. Buyer from Piscataway, NJ.

[Jack H.]

Re: And yet another eBay scam

Interesting AND disappointing.... Quite a few sellers legitimately use eBay's Second Chance system when they have multiples of the same item for sale. The system originated due to buyer/seller input to eBay that the system only provided two alternatives for selling multiples:

(1) Use a fixed fee, Buy-It-Now, listing
(2) Run a conventional Dutch Auction

The problem with #1 is seller has to know exactly what the item is worth and if he's mis-judged (low), he left 'money on the table'.... The #2 approach, Dutch Auction, is SO freakin' complicated in its rules that virtually no buyers understand how it works and tend to shy away from participating in Dutch Auctions.

The solution eBay devised was the Second Chance system and it works rather well for handling those situations where seller has more than one of a given item and he wants to maximize his market value capture. I see maybe a 50-70% participation from bidders when I have multiples of an item and I extend second chance offers.

[William C.]

Re: And yet another eBay scam

I agree with Jack, the second chance offer is an excellent tool to let the market set the price for items you have more than one of and when you don't know the current value.

[G B.]

How do he know that?

I think the scammer sent Second Chance offers to all the bidders. I contacted two others who received the same bogus e-mail.

What I can't figure out is how the scammer got all the e-mail addresses for the bidders. He didn't contact me through eBay; his e-mail appeared to come straight from AOL. Normally eBay will release contact info only to the winner and seller in an auction. I didn't win the auction, and he damn sure isn't the seller, so.... ?

[William C.]

Re: How do he know that?

Question you might run past the vaunted eBay "Safe Haven" people.

[John M.]

Re: And yet another eBay scam

Jerry,
DON'T RESPOND TO HIM! I have had several of these lately and it is nothing but a new way of Phishing for your Ebay login info and PayPal account info.
If the second chance came from anyone except the original lister, it is probably bogus, and the link to accept the second chance does not really go to Ebay. If you have already responded to the link, I would suggest that you change your password.

Regards, John McGraw

[Dale S.]

Re: And yet another eBay scam

E-bay is in trouble. The Lionel train sellers have dropped the post-war Lionel for sale ads from over 12K at any time 2 years ago to 5K or less most of the time. They have resorted to posting a listing 2,3,or 4 times to make it look better. It is better for the seller as he gets more exposure. Our train club has discussed this many times, especially their lack of security and amout of fraud. Dale

[Harold #43147]

Ebay

I buy and sell through EBay and I never use Email for payment or to recieve payments I tell sellers to post there totals on the item and that is where I pay it from. I do the same for second chance offers I have had people bail out on what they bid (maybe the Wife found out) and I will send it through ebay for 2nd chance. I get email from some companys saying they are EBAY and if I don't respond to them through Email they will cancel my account. Ebay warns use that they will never ask for account info through email. Ebay will contact you when you log in to your account. I forword these Emails to there security dept.

[G B.]

I don't think they're in trouble as a business

I do think they've evolved into a routine that includes some auction scams and fewer real auctions.

The number of auctions for "Corvette" items is down from last year too. I don't know the root cause of that change. Maybe there's less stuff remaining to be pulled out of attics. Maybe the number of computer users in this country has leveled off. Maybe the economy is better or worse than last year. I just dunno.

I do know that there are fewer new bidders (with zero feedback) participating in my auctions than ever before. I seldom get any early bids these days; everyone waits until the last 24 hours. I don't get many questions from bidders anymore either. I always include my phone number in my auctions, yet I seldom get calls with auction questions. This really surprises me because some of my recent auctions have been for whole Corvettes. I actually get real bids for tens of thousands of dollars without so much as a phone call beforehand. I know these bids are real because they've honored them when they won. Go figure.

[Dale S.]

Re: I don't think they're in trouble as a business

I think they are making money, higher fee's, charges for pictures, picture enlargement, adding photo's, high lighting, sale's fee's for 100K french fries,etc. What I meant was they have security problems big time. It looks like most scammmers are targeting e-bay. I have ebay winners that win and wont pay and have done it over and over. If you give them neg. feedback they ruin your feed back with neg.and there is no recourse. A lot of train guys are going to there own web site. Dale

[G B.]

A copycat scammer

This morning I received another scam "Second Chance" offer for the same FI air cleaner. This crook said to reply to vdf4ever@yahoo.com in order to accept the bogus offer. While I am curiius to see how the scammer will ask me to send the money, I'm going to pass.

[Harry Sadlock]

Re: A copycat scammer

Jerry, why not forward the note to the Ebay folks at:

eBay Customer Support E-mail Address(es): rswebhelp@ebay.com

They probably will not tell you if they find the guy, but they will look for him.

Harry

[Dick W.]

Re: A copycat scammer

You will get instructions to go to Western Union, purchase a money order, deduct the cost of the M/O from the amount due, and send it to England if it follows the normal scam

[G B.]

Less than satisfying

I reported the first scam to eBay and to the real seller. The seller wrote back, and he seemed to appreciate my e-mail.

The canned responses from eBay were less than satisfying. All they sent were form letters warning me to be careful. I would have preferred to get a digital photo of the scammer in handcuffs or leg irons.