My experience on being cheated by a Nigerian buyer

camunsif

Hello,

I just want to share my experience with others, honestly after this I'll never do business with Nigerian anymore.

last week I made an auction for my used cellphone. First 4 days nothing happened but on the fifth days I got 36 bids and ending with $151. After that the buyer contact me and tell me to send an invoice. Few hours later I got 2 Emails from paypal regarding the payment from the buyer and they want me to ship the item as soon as possible. I'm really excited and shipped the item next day.

After 3 days I still not received the payment, I contacted paypal and they said there is no such transaction in my account and they never send the 2 emails. After that I forward the emails to paypal and the result is that emails is a scam!

Please be carefull with them and if possible don't deal with them!

hilo-wholesale

yup.....me too....he buy a 4 blackberry bold from me...but when i check my paypal there is no money in my paypal....after that i send him an email like this ....

' hey scamer...do you think im a stupid newbie at ebay....ass****....lol...'

camunsif

maybe this time will be a lesson for me

fudjj

Yeah, unfortunately you've been caught up in a very common one, this scam has been around for quite a while now and they target items like mobile phones.

It's shame that these type of lessons have to cost us so much, but I found that when I was first starting out many, many, many moons ago, that the most expensive lessons were the ones I learnt from best!

Book it down to experience, put it behind, and move forward. If in doubt with any future transaction, just yell out and well take a look at it for you and try to point you in the safe direction.

planes

I put a notebook computer up on Craigslist and within two hours I got 5 emails from scammers wanting me to ship it overseas and they would pay me an extra 150$ for my trouble.

dinasour230

So basically what you guys are saying is don't ship it out until the paypal money is there.

raiderjake

yes never ship it out till they pay you, and always ship to there paypal address

fudjj

Yep, ignore any proof of payment advice the buyer send to you, got to your paypal account and check to make sure the funds are there first and foremost.

Also never follow a payment advice link that a buyer sends you to check payment is received. Always go to your paypal account by entering the address into the browser.

Of course never selling anything to Nigeria also helps a lot lol

sales-man

Sup dude, i saw your headlines and had to make my own opinion known to the rest of you all who might talk from a li view of things.

I m a Nigerian trader and i've been using Salehoo pretty well for over 4 years with my own ups and downs like any online business user. What i'm saying is that i've been burnt by a few dodgy looking Chinese products the moment they arrived at my door (different from the pics and info they told me), but that doesnt mean the whole of China is corrupt and i moved on, learnt my lessons and have had tremendously successful dealings with other Chinese manufacturers.

So because you had your fair share of bad experiences does not make 1 COUNTRY MORE NOTORIOUS than the others, there are alot of good Nigerian businessmen out there so dont let a few guys screw it up 4 d rest of us.

That was targeted especially at people like the guy above who said never selling to Nigeria helps. A bit myopic but that's ur choice.

Solution: Collect the money before the product or work out some initial payment/balance arrangement, and if it's too good to be true IT PROBABLY IS. Dont let greed get the better of you. It takes 2 to tango

Happy trading

fudjj

Sup dude, i saw your headlines and had to make my own opinion known to the rest of you all who might talk from a li view of things.
I m a Nigerian trader and i've been using Salehoo pretty well for over 4 years with my own ups and downs like any online business user. What i'm saying is that i've been burnt by a few dodgy looking Chinese products the moment they arrived at my door (different from the pics and info they told me), but that doesnt mean the whole of China is corrupt and i moved on, learnt my lessons and have had tremendously successful dealings with other Chinese manufacturers.
So because you had your fair share of bad experiences does not make 1 COUNTRY MORE NOTORIOUS than the others, there are alot of good Nigerian businessmen out there so dont let a few guys screw it up 4 d rest of us.
That was targeted especially at people like the guy above who said never selling to Nigeria helps. A bit myopic but that's ur choice.
Solution: Collect the money before the product or work out some initial payment/balance arrangement, and if it's too good to be true IT PROBABLY IS. Dont let greed get the better of you. It takes 2 to tango
Happy trading

The guy above never meant to insinuate that all Nigerian business people are scammers, however there is no denying that Nigeria as a country is well known for producing a large range of scams, that is simply a fact. It may well not seem to be reality from your own local perspective, but it is from the rest of the world.

In fact scams from both China and Nigeria are so common that they are now called Chinese Scams and Nigerian Scams. It's a sad fact that your country does have that type of reputation, however it remains a fact non the less.

Now we all hear that you government is working with other international governments throughout the world to try and curb what is going on there, and that's great news because one day they may well be able to get on top of it and restore a reputation more befitting your country, however there is unfortunately some distance to travel before that will be reality in my opinion.

Again, no offence intended for any individual. I would give the same advice to anyone wanting to buy a genuine branded product from China, doesn't mean I am anti Chinese, it just means that I am trying to save the members money with nothing more some good solid advice!

lgosyne

I almost got scammed as well, and the shipment address was west nigeria. I was lucky that I didn't ship my items, but some one was trying to scam me as well. They wanted me to ship my most expensive jewelry. Fortunately I had gotten a few sales from paypal and knew that the paypal letter I was sent was wrong.

If they say they'll pay you extra money, that's your first red flag. They are appealing to your greed.

Unfortunately in this business, you have to be very aware of scammers.

I have been scammed both by a Chinese wholesaler and then by these guys. I agree I can't write off all suppliers or Nigerian traders, but it has made me wary about trading in general.

Always try your best to be protected and be aware that this can happen to the best of us.

Lakshmi

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agsmith3434

I personally have sold items on ebay and craigslist. All cell phones (Blackberries and treos) . I have been contacted by several Nigerians claiming to have purchased and paid for the item through paypal. Don't be a jackass and let them fool you!

1st - If the email isn't from _____@PayPal.com, then it isn't from PayPal - they almost got me with that, but then I looked at the from address. I was born at night, but not last night ;)

2nd - You can check your PayPal account to see if you've been paid. If you don't see a transaction, then you haven't been paid. these emails are only screen prints and re-creations of paypal payments.

3rd - If they use the word 'cos' in a sentence and have a plain name like John, like 'This is Jon Smith and I ordered the payment, so please ship promptly cos I am leaving the country soon and need the phone. Thanks.'

I'm Black, so I clearly am not against Nigerians, as I've dated a couple of very beautiful Nigerian women, but that has nothing to do with online business and transactions. DON'T DO BUSINESS WITH NIGERIANS ON THE INTERNET. Even my ex-girlfriends will tell me that. They are known to do shady business on the internet, plain and simple. Below is an actual email one Nigerian sent me:

from ben smith

date Fri, Nov 9, 2007 at 9 PM

subject INTERESTED IN YOUR ITEM ON CRAIGSLIST

mailed-by hotmail.com

Hello, I just place a look on your ITEM and i am interested in immediate purchase of this ITEM ,but before i proceed on this transaction i will like to ask some question as follow.1.Do you accept a(Money Order/Cashier's Check) as a mode of payment.2.What is the final asking prize you can go at last?.3.,Will you let our shipping company to come to your house for the pick up of the ITEM? cos we don't want you to worry yourself about the shipping of the ITEM .4.You are to send your NAME,ADDRESS,TEL # to mail out the payment today.5.Will you be able to send the excess fund back to the shipping company same day you receive and cash the (Money Order/Cashier's Check) for the arrangement of the ITEM for them to pick it up from your house down to my client REGARDS

picnsave

I have received an email from paypal; sendmail@paypal.com on behalf of xyz@hotmail.com.

Please one of you experts tell me if this request is legit. is this how the genuine paypal request appears.

I feel sorry for any of you who had to learn the hard way.

TIA

fudjj

You mean you have received something stating that it is from PayPal being sent on behalf of another person?

Quite bizarre, what does the email request and is this a person you know?

picnsave

No I do not know this supplier. I was ordering samples from him online. The samples cost US$ 20 and the shipping cost was US$ 85 to i decided to use my own shipping agent who is much cheaper.

Then I receive this message from Paypal sendmail@paypal.com asking me to pay the US$ 105 on behalf of xyz@hotmail.com, so I got suspicious and did not send the money.

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