Spotting Scammers online

[abbby]

Been seeing quite a number of people being scammed online.. do be careful when dealing with others online, few tips to share, please add on if you have more tips to help others spot scammers.

* NEVER BUY WITHOUT SEEING
Always ask to visit the premise to see the items for sale, self collection cash and carry would be the most ideal situation. I think most people fall for scammers promising to deliver and without buyer even seeing the item

* DEALING WITH FACEBOOK SELLERS
Facebook seems to have a lot of fake profile scammers, click on their profiles you will only see a few recent pictures and not an account set up many years ago. Some accounts don't even have photos

* DEALING WITH CAROUSELL SELLERS
Ensure you check on their reviews from other users, be extra careful with NEW accounts with no reviews

* SCAMMERS LIKE TO SELL HIGH TICKET ITEMS
Like electronics, cameras, PS5, so that they can scam you for more money. When it's too cheap to be true, it probably is

* THEY WILL INSIST ON PAYNOW AND PAYMENT IMMEDIATELY
This is a red flag. Instead, request to MEET to buy

* THEY WILL INSIST TO DELIVER TO YOU UPON PAYMENT
Again, request to MEET to buy. Never pay for something you cannot see.

If you are being scammed, please make a police report with their PAYNOW number, profiles, bank accounts, phone numbers, this will help the police to nab the scammers.

Hope this helps...please feel free to add on so we can help others.

[Lisafuller]

Ironically, another red flag is when sellers ask for cash payment as following the transaction, there is no evidence of it ever having taken place.

[x9200]

If somebody is that naive to fall to the scammers' tricks failing anything from that list above this means no list is going to help her or him.

1) Never buy anything without protection (paypal, proven protection of the platform, cc at the bare minimum).
2) Avoid buying anything from someone with low score (e.g. <99% for Ebay) or low No of transaction records (<10). Combined with p. (1) it is still waste of your time.
(3) Never buy anything if it is much cheaper than of the other sellers unless you have strong reasons to trust the seller or you are sure p. (1) works well.
(4) Do extensive seller/service provider profiling if the only protection is cc.

No (1) is the must for anything paid at the time of the sell.

[Lisafuller]

If somebody is that naive to fall to the scammers' tricks failing anything from that list above this means no list is going to help her or him.

1) Never buy anything without protection (paypal, proven protection of the platform, cc at the bare minimum).
2) Avoid buying anything from someone with low score (e.g. <99% for Ebay) or low No of transaction records (<10). Combined with p. (1) it is still waste of your time.
(3) Never buy anything if it is much cheaper than of the other sellers unless you have strong reasons to trust the seller or you are sure p. (1) works well.
(4) Do extensive seller/service provider profiling if the only protection is cc.

No (1) is the must for anything paid at the time of the sell.

What I wonder is how any new business ever gets off the ground, since most customers will be wary of their lack of history.

[x9200]

If somebody is that naive to fall to the scammers' tricks failing anything from that list above this means no list is going to help her or him.

1) Never buy anything without protection (paypal, proven protection of the platform, cc at the bare minimum).
2) Avoid buying anything from someone with low score (e.g. <99% for Ebay) or low No of transaction records (<10). Combined with p. (1) it is still waste of your time.
(3) Never buy anything if it is much cheaper than of the other sellers unless you have strong reasons to trust the seller or you are sure p. (1) works well.
(4) Do extensive seller/service provider profiling if the only protection is cc.

No (1) is the must for anything paid at the time of the sell.

What I wonder is how any new business ever gets off the ground, since most customers will be wary of their lack of history.

1) If some protection exists the main risk is the waste of time. So they should offer some form of protection or at least an option to pay and collect goods personally.
2) If the price is low there are always people willing to take the risk. This, or if the goods are in high demand. Greed or desire to own some objects makes many people blind. No list is going to help them neither.

[Lisafuller]

If somebody is that naive to fall to the scammers' tricks failing anything from that list above this means no list is going to help her or him.

1) Never buy anything without protection (paypal, proven protection of the platform, cc at the bare minimum).
2) Avoid buying anything from someone with low score (e.g. <99% for Ebay) or low No of transaction records (<10). Combined with p. (1) it is still waste of your time.
(3) Never buy anything if it is much cheaper than of the other sellers unless you have strong reasons to trust the seller or you are sure p. (1) works well.
(4) Do extensive seller/service provider profiling if the only protection is cc.

No (1) is the must for anything paid at the time of the sell.

What I wonder is how any new business ever gets off the ground, since most customers will be wary of their lack of history.

1) If some protection exists the main risk is the waste of time. So they should offer some form of protection or at least an option to pay and collect goods personally.
2) If the price is low there are always people willing to take the risk. This, or if the goods are in high demand. Greed or desire to own some objects makes many people blind. No list is going to help them neither.

I think one way is that they market themselves on platforms that don't reveal transaction histories or sale volumes. Buyers, particularly Singaporeans, are very easily influenced, and would definitely be more likely to purchase an item that has been more successful than one that has not. Taking away these indicators levels the field in a way. Products will have to rely on their own merit.

[x9200]

BTW, I have currently a case involving a local seller from Lazada. Based on this one and a few cases in past for both my wife and myself, I can only conclude, avoid local sellers like a plague. They are not any better (possibly worse) than Chinese ones but Lazada gives them extra protection and makes the process of returning defective or otherwise "not as described" goods more difficult. With one exception only all the local sellers I had to deal with regarding the return always acted the way to either reject it under very lousy reasons or make the process as lengthy as possible. Often both. That's at least my experience. Any less expensive things (<SGD200) I rather buy from overseas sellers.

[Lisafuller]

BTW, I have currently a case involving a local seller from Lazada. Based on this one and a few cases in past for both my wife and myself, I can only conclude, avoid local sellers like a plague. They are not any better (possibly worse) than Chinese ones but Lazada gives them extra protection and makes the process of returning defective or otherwise "not as described" goods more difficult. With one exception only all the local sellers I had to deal with regarding the return always acted the way to either reject it under very lousy reasons or make the process as lengthy as possible. Often both. That's at least my experience. Any less expensive things (<SGD200) I rather buy from overseas sellers.

Really? What sort of protection or privileges are they afforded? I always think it's best to go for local sellers because the delivery is quicker and they are easier to communicate with if anything goes wrong.

[x9200]

For the overseas ones you need to document/describe what is wrong, Lazada accepts it (usually very quickly) and arranges the pickup. After the goods reach Lazada's warehouse, you get the money back. Lazda sometimes examines what they receive what makes the process a bit longer (max few days).

For local sellers I encountered once no return button at all and had to talk to live chat just to initiate the process, but what is or used to be typical is like this: You submit the return request and the seller has a few days to responds. If you are lucky, you just wait till that time is over (because it almost never happens the seller accepts the return without wasting your time) and than the return was automatically accepted.
If the seller rejected the return, the dispute was escalated to Lazada and they decided (they were reasonable most of time). This was in past. What is now, I am not sure, the seller already rejected my request for really lame reason (and waiting to the last possible moment to do this, again wasting my time), but I had an option to submit the request again. Still waiting for the respond. He has some more time to further delay the whole process. I will post later an update.

And for many local sellers the delivery is not quicker at all and there is not really a good way to contest it. They sell goods they have no stock and they often wait for the stock to arrive from China. What they do, they quickly mark the status as "packed" so you can not cancel the order easily. And you wait, and wait and wait and after a week or two Lazada cancels the order (time-out), or the seller eventually delivers it. Happened to me few good times.
My wife ordered some office chairs. The seller had the no stock problem but he was so desperate to sell, he sent to my wife some cheap shitty gadget so he could tick the box "delivered" (preventing the time-out) and complete the process probably delivering it later (giving him some credit here). Imagine you ordered chairs and you receive a key chain. He was furious when it was reported to Lazada. No, thank you, no local sellers.

Where buying form local sellers is still a better option is for the goods with local warranty. I mean, manufacturer's warranty, not the sellers warranty. The later is a lottery for obvious reasons.