Scam?! Legal action. HELP

[Charlh929]

So I was selling some furniture on gumtree and someone was interested. We were emailing back and forth, they were replying almost instantaneously, which I thought was a little off. The price was £200 for the furniture all agreed then I have an email saying; What i mean is that i will add the shipping agent charges to the payment i will be sending to your PayPal account. And you will send the £200 to the shipping agent as their pick up charges via western union as soon as you receive the payment confirmation from PayPal and PayPal will instruct you on how to send the money to the shipping agent through western union. I will appreciate your help. . . Hope you understand now?. So naturally I thought something was off. I hadn’t received any funds in my account and received an email saying.... Thank you for using PayPal.My name is Peter Mcvicker, I'm a PayPal representative in charge of your transaction with Suzanne G. Reginald.We have deducted the total amount of £420.00 GBP from the buyer account Suzanne G. Reginald and will be credited into your account as soon as we have received the Amazon Card Receipt details from you for security reasons only. We are still waiting for the Amazon Card Receipt details from you and we have not yet received any Amazon Card receipt as a proof that the £200.00 GBP excess payment for the pick up fee has been sent out to the bearer for the total amount to be credited into your account as part of our security measure to protect both the buyer and seller. You are require to send us the Amazon Card Receipt Information below for Verification: (It then give an email which wasn’t permitted here) . A clear picture of the Amazon Card Receipt & Amazon Card Back Code: . And a clear picture of the Amazon cash receipt and the activation receipt: . The Amazon Card must be £100 x 2 on each card: (Total Amount £200.00 GBP): You are hereby advised to send us the Amazon Card Receipt details as soon as possible so that your account can be credited immediately. Once Amazon Card Receipt is received and verified. You will receive a "CONFIRMATION EMAIL" from PayPal informing you that the Money has been credited,Do not share the Amazon Card Receipt Details with the buyer until your PayPal Account is fully Credited,This is a Security Measure to Protect you. I informed the buyer the sale was off as I thought it was a scam and they kept insisting I click on the email and contact PayPal to return their money back to them. I said the item was no longer for sale and that I knew something wasn’t right and I received an email saying this; We're contacting you concerning the money sent from Suzanne G. Reginald PayPal's account. It is important we know the status of the transaction between you and "Suzanne G. Reginald" otherwise "LEGAL ACTION" may be taken against you since you refused to provide the Amazon Shipping Card details to PayPal customer care center as the buyer Suzanne G. Reginald made transfer from PayPal into your PayPal account. We believed you entered agreement by requesting money through PayPal transfer payment, you have violated the Bank agreement and PayPal made us know that the transaction can not be reverse. However the buyer has already contacted us in other to make report about your non response,we are ensuring to make PayPal a safer place, therefore we need to set confidence on our users. We request for the Scanned Receipt and the Amazon Shipping Card details in less than 3 Hours and we will fund the money into your account or face the consequences of "LEGAL ACTION". This is in other to protect both the seller and buyer. We use proprietary technology and constantly innovate to help ensure your transactions are safe. In addition, PayPal has over 20,000 staffs worldwide dedicated to put a stop to online fraud. And we work with Internet Service Providers (ISP) worldwide to shut off fraudulent websites as soon as possible. NOTE: Failure to abide to this means your Name and Address will be forward to the law enforcement agency in your country to get you arrested, because you are practicing fraud and your bank account will be BLOCKED. Thanks for your co-operation. Please help. This has to be a scam right? I think I know deep down but whoever you are even if you suspect something a message threatening legal action, it’s still pretty scary!

[kernowlass · Accepted solution]

@Charlh929 

Been ongoing for about 15 years.

SCAM.

They encourage you to accept a 'direct' Paypal payment and may ask you to send the item internationally.
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 often 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 Moneygram or Western Union etc.
Also their is no seller protection on paypal for any type of motor vehicle or item that is collected by the buyer.

Delete any emails and ignore the scammers.

[Charlh929]

Thank you so much for your reply. I knew deep down it was a scam, but it’s nice to just have that piece of mind and get it confirmed. Thanks again!