• Scam Alert. Members are reminded to NOT send money to buy anything. Don't buy things remote and have it shipped - go get it yourself, pay in person, and take your equipment with you. Scammers have burned people on this forum. Urgency, secrecy, excuses, selling for friend, newish members, FUD, are RED FLAGS. A video conference call is not adequate assurance. Face to face interactions are required. Please report suspicions to the forum admins. Stay Safe - anyone can get scammed.
  • Several Regions have held meetups already, but others are being planned or are evaluating the interest. The Calgary Area Meetup is set for Saturday July 12th at 10am. The signup thread is here! Arbutus has also explored interest in a Fraser Valley meetup but it seems members either missed his thread or had other plans. Let him know if you are interested in a meetup later in the year by posting here! Slowpoke is trying to pull together an Ottawa area meetup later this summer. No date has been selected yet, so let him know if you are interested here! We are not aware of any other meetups being planned this year. If you are interested in doing something in your area, let everyone know and make it happen! Meetups are a great way to make new machining friends and get hands on help in your area. Don’t be shy, sign up and come, or plan your own meetup!

Facebook scams - is it even OK to contact a potential scam? Looking for a car lift.

M

Mike R

Ultra Member
Premium Member
What I'm really wondering is if I contact a seller that I think has a high chance of being a scam, what am I giving up other than my time if I don't give any money over? Is there something else they're collecting about me that I need to know about?

I've been perusing the Facebook marketplace a bunch, and looking for items to add to my garage. Latest has been a car lift and such stuff. Waffling between 2 post and 4 post neither of which really fit my garage and I saw these "mid-rise scissor lifts". Might be the right interim solution for me (2-5 year plan).

Here's where Facebook scam comes in. I see an add for $500, and another, $600. Sure enough a google search of the PN listed turns up multiple other Facebook listings with the exact same wording in Australia, Newfoundland, etc. So those are definite scams.
Next are ones listed at $700, different brand - further searching shows it should probably closer to $3000 or more, but this one is worded different, enough to pique my interest. (Edit: after typing this I found at least one giveaway in the add that its a copy from elsewhere - "$700 plus VAT". Nobody around here refers to taxes as VAT.)

After that its all "new" units with tax and shipping not included in the advertised price...

I should just get protective of my time and buy what I want from a reputable source, but I'm just too dammed cheap....
 
I do this all the time on scam ads posted here. If I'm wasting their time then they have less time to scam someone else. Plus I have evidence for FB when I report them.

I did it recently on a car posted locally. That one turned out awesome as the FB seller was trying to resell a car he bought the day before for $1400, ran it through a car wash and was now asking $2800. Original seller saw it and posted on Reddit. I contacted the seller, asked all kinds of pointy questions about work claimed to be done, looking for receipts. Turned out the second seller gave it back to the original owner money was refunded. Second seller's Facebook marketplace profile seemed to disappear after that.
 
Don't even bother replying. Half the time the scam adds are just fishing attempts to find legit facebook profiles that they can clone. By replying, you're giving them a name and profile pic they can start from. If you don't have your profile locked down and viewable only to your friends/selected friends (you should), you're giving them MUCH more.
 
Thanks, just locked down FB quite a bit more than it was. I'll just not waste my time on scam "sellers" then, and I'll have to keep my scam radar on high alert.

I don't really care if someone buys and flips something I'm selling for 2x the price, shame on me for not knowing the market value if they can pull it off. Often I'm being lazy when selling lower value items and just want it gone, so if they have the patience to deal with people, more power to them. However, if they are misrepresenting it (i.e. claiming work done that was not, etc.) - that's a different matter and puts them back in scammer territory.
 
Mike R said:
Thanks, just locked down FB quite a bit more than it was. I'll just not waste my time on scam "sellers" then, and I'll have to keep my scam radar on high alert.

I don't really care if someone buys and flips something I'm selling for 2x the price, shame on me for not knowing the market value if they can pull it off. Often I'm being lazy when selling lower value items and just want it gone, so if they have the patience to deal with people, more power to them. However, if they are misrepresenting it (i.e. claiming work done that was not, etc.) - that's a different matter and puts them back in scammer territory.
Click to expand...
The car situation was the latter; claiming work done which was not 🙂
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top