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So, where's the scam?

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Freddyfruitba...
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PostPosted: 15:11 - 01 Dec 2021    Post subject: So, where's the scam? Reply with quote

I've just advertised an old piano on Facebook Marketplace - asking £20, just want rid basically. Almost immediately I had a message asking if it was still available - yes, I replied. At which point, the punter replies: "Ok I'll take but I'd like to come today but I'm currently busy with work, I'll send a GLS courier to your home to give you your cash and pick up the item."

This immediately struck me as being odd for several reasons, so I had a delve. The guy's name is unusual and very obviously African-sounding - along the lines of "Wadja Adjoua Nagraogo" (that's not the name); I had no problem with that except that the profile photo shows a very much white European, with absolutely no other info visible. I then try searching for "Wadja Adjoua Nagraogo" on FB, and get two hits - my prospective piano purchaser and some random dude in Kenya, with a large and fairly unlocked, innocuous profile.

So, yes it's obviously a scam (it's always a scam), but what the hell is the angle? It's just weird. Was he going to send a bunch of guys to take my piano and then say he'd forward the £20 later by Western Union? Makes no sense to me.
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Nobby the Bastard
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PostPosted: 15:26 - 01 Dec 2021    Post subject: Reply with quote

The piano isn't a Yamaha is it?
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Freddyfruitba...
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PostPosted: 15:51 - 01 Dec 2021    Post subject: Reply with quote

Nobby the Bastard wrote:
The piano isn't a Yamaha is it?

Nah, an old and very ordinary British-made one.
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A100man
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PostPosted: 16:18 - 01 Dec 2021    Post subject: Reply with quote

The gang arrives and you are dismembered with machetes stuffed into the top of the piano, shipped to Kenya and sold as 'bush-meat'...

..happens everyday apparently.
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Ste
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PostPosted: 16:27 - 01 Dec 2021    Post subject: Reply with quote

Payment would change from cash to bank transfer blah blah Bertie scam.

Wadja Adjoua Nagraogo sounds like the type of guy Marcus would enjoy speaking to?

Ask Wadja what the courier will be wearing when they come to collect the piano.
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Nobby the Bastard
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PostPosted: 16:50 - 01 Dec 2021    Post subject: Reply with quote

Will be asked to pay for the courier and he'll bank transfer the total costs to you
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Freddyfruitba...
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PostPosted: 16:52 - 01 Dec 2021    Post subject: Reply with quote

Ste wrote:
Payment would change from cash to bank transfer blah blah Bertie scam.

Normally I'd have assumed that, but for half a ton of piano worth £20 that will take 4 guys to shift? Doesn't add up
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stinkwheel
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PostPosted: 17:12 - 01 Dec 2021    Post subject: Reply with quote

There will turn out to be some sort of problem with him paying the courier. It'll turn out you could really help him out by him paypaling you the funds and you paying the courier with amazon gift cards. The courier will call you up once you've bought them and ask for the numbers off the back of them before he'll come.

Or I suppose if someone turns up at your house with £20 and wants to take it away, what's to lose?
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Easy-X
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PostPosted: 18:20 - 01 Dec 2021    Post subject: Reply with quote

Being forewarned you have the option of fucking the guy about if that would amuse you. When the scammers ring up (and I have the time) I play a little game of seeing how long I can keep them on the phone. Record so far is 45 mins and transferred 3 times Smile
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Freddyfruitba...
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PostPosted: 18:47 - 13 Dec 2021    Post subject: Reply with quote

Easy-X wrote:
Being forewarned you have the option of fucking the guy about if that would amuse you.

So, after the piano thing I got another one today (I think I'm going to give up on this newfangled Facebook malarkey and stick with eBay in future...)

I advertised something for sale at £13, cash on collection only. The following message comes in almost immediately: "Ok If it is in good condition I want to buy it and I am ready to add £20 to the amount of your item so that the item can be reserved for me in total £33"

Oh yes please Rolling Eyes I replied 'OK, when?' and chummy comes back with "Ok I take but I would like to come tomorrow but I am currently busy with work, I will send a LAPOSTE mailman to your home to give you your money in cash and collect the item"

So whatever the scam is, it's just the same as last time... again it's a very African-sounding name, but apparently (from his FB profile) the guy is a fellow BMW rider - somewhere in Europe judging by his reg plate:

https://i.imgur.com/BezyVOt.jpg?1

I'd love to wind this guy up and string him along a bit, but that's probably not a great idea since he can see my (real) FB profile. I need to create a dummy one for this stuff , don't I? Wink
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Easy-X
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PostPosted: 00:28 - 14 Dec 2021    Post subject: Reply with quote

The mistake with Facebook is advertising on the general Marketplace - all the idiots. Join a load of local groups (I think I'm on half a dozen) and sell there. (Facebook will really nag you to also add it to Marketplace, don't do it!)
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bugeye_bob
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PostPosted: 10:43 - 14 Dec 2021    Post subject: Reply with quote

Why not play along and give them a fake address, Local plod shop if you still have one anymore.
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Freddyfruitba...
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PostPosted: 12:55 - 14 Dec 2021    Post subject: Reply with quote

Easy-X wrote:
The mistake with Facebook is advertising on the general Marketplace - all the idiots. Join a load of local groups (I think I'm on half a dozen) and sell there

Interesting - will give that a go. Seems odd though; my other half has used Marketplace (successfully) for years and never experienced anything like this, whereas I've managed to attract con artists in two of my first three listings...

bugeye_bob wrote:
Why not play along and give them a fake address, Local plod shop if you still have one anymore.

Would love to but it really isn't worth the potential hassle: they have my FB account with my real name attached, so apart from fucking with my FB account, that opens me up to other possible shittery. So, no.
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Zen Dog
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PostPosted: 16:59 - 14 Dec 2021    Post subject: Reply with quote

So what happened with the piano in the end?
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Nobby the Bastard
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PostPosted: 17:05 - 14 Dec 2021    Post subject: Reply with quote

It fell on a marina.
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hellkat
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PostPosted: 17:19 - 14 Dec 2021    Post subject: Reply with quote

I've never been able to get on with Marketplace, I just can't work it out Laughing I was once shown a very nice sportster at a very reasonable price on there, but when left to my own devices I couldnt find it again. Brick Wall

Someone tried to get me to use it a few weeks ago to buy [some stupid computer part, I dunno] but it just looks like a load of scammers, and yet he reckoned that he bought stuff all the time straight out of local Marketplace, and it was always fine. Indeed he seemed to have little problem in respect of the computer part other than that it was too far away to go and get at the time we wanted it.

I just don't trust it, and OP's experience just makes me trust it less.

Mebbe I should buy/sell some small pointless thing and see what experience I have... Thinking
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Freddyfruitba...
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PostPosted: 18:49 - 14 Dec 2021    Post subject: Reply with quote

Zen Dog wrote:
So what happened with the piano in the end?

Oh some bloke (ie not the scammer) contacted me soon afterwards and agreed to the asking price. He was a retired piano tuner who occasionally buys up instruments like ours to do up and sell on. I was a bit concerned when he said he was coming to collect it on his own (I didn't know about the piano tuner thing then) - I was having visions of buggering up my back while trying to help him shift it out of the house - but it was a real eye opener! The guy singlehandedly flipped it up lengthways at 45 degrees, balanced on two wheels (ever seen a piano do a wheelie? No, nor me), then deftly flicked a pneumatic-tyred trolley underneath it with his foot before lowering the piano back down on to it, and trundling the it gently out the front door. I was well impressed!

Well, you asked...
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Last edited by Freddyfruitbat on 11:40 - 15 Dec 2021; edited 1 time in total
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Nobby the Bastard
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PostPosted: 19:12 - 14 Dec 2021    Post subject: Reply with quote

I'd have preferred it if it had taken out a marina.
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Zen Dog
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PostPosted: 22:01 - 14 Dec 2021    Post subject: Reply with quote

Freddyfruitbat wrote:
Zen Dog wrote:
So what happened with the piano in the end?

Oh some bloke (ie not the scammer) contacted me soon afterwards and agreed to the asking price. He was a retired piano tuner who occasionally buys up instruments like ours to do up and sell on. I was a bit concerned when he said he was coming to collect it on his own (I didn't know about the piano tuner thing then) - I was having visions of buggering up my back while trying to help him shift it out of the house - but it was a real eye opener! The guy singlehandedly flipped it up lengthways at 45 degrees, balanced on two wheels (ever seen a piano do a wheelie? No, no me), then deftly flicked a pneumatic-tyred trolley underneath it with his foot before lowering the piano back down on to it, and trundling the it gently out the front door. I was well impressed!

Well, you asked...


Bill Bailey was scarily accurate. Shocked https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tuJ-oUb3GX0

Hellkat wrote:
I've never been able to get on with Marketplace, I just can't work it out Laughing I was once shown a very nice sportster at a very reasonable price on there, but when left to my own devices I couldnt find it again. Brick Wall


It's shit, and (this being Facebook) that's deliberate. It works the same way as the feed, in that they've made the way it works under the hood deliberately vague and incomprehensible so that they can remove/add things as they wish with no-one complaining (because it doesn't make sense anyway). That said, I bought the VFR800 from there, so good deals are on there, and real. The only way I've reliably found to be able to go back to something is to bookmark it.
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My bike trip around S.E. Asia 2010/2011
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Easy-X
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PostPosted: 14:16 - 17 Dec 2021    Post subject: Reply with quote

Just to follow up on my earlier comment on local focused groups they do have the opposite problem to the Marketplace - their parochial nature can lead to in-fighting. If you can ignore the stupidity of petty tyrants it'll be fine Smile
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ThunderGuts
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PostPosted: 14:43 - 17 Dec 2021    Post subject: Reply with quote

Horses for courses I find. Inexpensive stuff, e.g. tatty furniture etc and freebies go on MarketPlace. Usually gets nibbles quickly. Never had any problems either. But I'd never sell electronics or high value items as I just see it as too much of a risk.
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