selling via PayPal

[yakoby]

Hello all , 

I sold some staff I had online and when I got to the payment stage the buyer sent me the message bellow: 
"I had a little problem with the courier agent they said that they can only come for pick up after they receive their pick upfee through bank transfer but due to me being offshore and having issues with my bank i'm unable to send it at the moment. I added the £400 they charged for the pick up so you will receive the total sum of £850.
You'll please help send £400 to them via bank transfer now and here is the details needed for the transfer below"

After I received the email above I received the following from a paypal address: 

" Ke** Aid* sent you payment of £850.00 GBP through PayPal

Transaction ID: 72W56358RF799193C

Status : Pending  98% complete  (AWAITING COURIER PAYMENT)

Terms and Conditions
The transaction is subjected as MERCHANDISE, so we reserve the right to make this transaction secure. The fund has been deducted from the buyer's account and it cannot be reversed due to the policy of this transaction. It will not be available in your PayPal account history until we process it due to our Merchandise Policy. 

Hence, the £850.00 GBP will not be available until we can confirm that you transferred the courier fee successfully. Therefore, you need to send the sum of £400.00 GBP to the courier via Bank Transfer. This measure is done to secure transactions, also to make PayPal a safer way for buying and selling.

 send all questions regarding this transaction to us and a representative will attend to you immediately.

What do I need to do?

You are to transfer the sum of £400.00 GBP via Bank Transfer to the details below.

Once the transfer has been successful kindly send the Transfer Receipt or a Screenshot of the transfer page so that we can credit your account instantly"

It look so weird to me and really look like a scam. 

Can anyone help pls?

[kernowlass]

@yakoby 

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 ie bank transfer or moneygram eg 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.

They also 'sometimes' threaten legal action...have a laugh at that one and ignore it as its rubbish.

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 Bank Transfer or 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.