Scam?

mray79
Contributor
Contributor

Someone is claiming to have bought a piece of furniture from us. Claims we have to get a USPS money order for $500 to send to a moving company in Maryland for Paypal to release our funds to us. This is the first time we have used Craigslist and Paypal to sell anything.  Our Paypal account show no pending funds to be released to us or any activity other than something we bought a couple of years ago. This sounds like a scam to us. 

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kernowlass
Esteemed Advisor
Esteemed Advisor

@mray79 

 

SCAM.

They encourage you to accept a 'direct' Paypal payment.
No funds or activity of the transaction shows in your Paypal account and any emails 'may' go into your junk/spam folders.

They don't quibble on cost and may also say they can't view the item as they are disabled or working abroad etc etc but they will arrange a shipping agent to collect it.

You will get/got a "fake" email that looks as though it is from paypal.....it isn't because they don't actually have a Paypal account and have no intention of paying you.
It will say the buyer has paid ...you won't have been paid.

The 'fake' paypal email will tell you that the buyer has paid for the item + shipping costs but you must send those shipping costs to the courier/ shipping agent via anther payment processor than Paypal OR via providing some vouchers or tokens before the funds are released to you.
They are not interested in the item, they just want that couriers/shipping funds and you will never see money in your paypal balance.

Paypal NEVER tell you to send an item before the payment is showing in your paypal account.
Paypal NEVER expect you to use a rival money transfer service eg Moneygram or Western Union etc.
Also their is no seller protection on paypal for any type of item that is collected by the buyer.

Delete any emails and ignore the scammers.


Advice is voluntary.
Kudos / Solution appreciated.
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