So a scammer wants to send Beth and I money...

[Rkolter]

Beth and I are selling some floor halogen lamps on Craig's List (if you don't know about it, it's just a place to sell, buy, and trade things).

They aren't anything special - the thirty dollar variety. We're asking ten bucks each. We have three.

I got this email:

Subject: Interested in your posting
To: <some group yahoo address book listing>

Hello,

Am presently in Dublin and am so much interested in buying your posted advert for sale,please keep the furniture in good condition if still available for purchase and ready for shipment because am really interested and ready to buy it now.i will send the name and address where to ship the furniture because i just bought a condo and i will need some furniture .change of ownership of the furniture after payment as been made to you ,please let me know the condition and also send any available pics and kindly withdraw all advert on net cos i don't want any other person to get it before me,what is total cost price.hope to hear from you as soon as possible.

thanks
Mr Jack

Ok, no sane person would want our "furniture" if they're looking to move here from Dublin. Note it was sent to a group address book entry, and that it's VERY form letter-like.

So, I replied:

Hello, glad to hear you will be coming to the US.

Unfortunately, we aren't shipping the furniture anywhere - it's strictly on a 'you pay, you haul' basis. For the cost of shipping, you could buy (at least the furniture we are selling) new.

Thanks for your interest though

To which he responds:

Hello,
Thanks so much for the mail,i want you to
understand that am so much intrested in buying the
furniture.please still hold it for me and dont sell it
out because am and looking forward to have it shipped
soon to new house in state.regarding the payment,i
will contact my associate in the state
to issue out payment to you as soon as possible so
that you can reserve the iterms and ready for
shippment as soon as you receive the money.then,you
could send your your full name, address and phone
number for you to receive the payment beacuse i'm not
present in the state right now,on business trips and i
want my new house to arrange before i return back to
the state.await to hear from you.


Best regards
Mr Jack

This time it was to me directly. He still talks about "the furniture" and seems distressed I might sell it and has an "associate" who will be able to send me a payment. He wants the furniture for his house now, not a condo.

I'm not sure about the rest of the world, but I'm pretty sure Dublin speaks english; this guy writes the way the nigerian scammers write - like it was their third or fourth language and it should be easy to dupe the "dumb foreigner".

I should say, as the owner of my own little sole proprietorship, I've had people try this stunt on me before. I'm pretty good at catching when someone is trying to dupe me. I have no doubt if I agreed, his associate would send a large check, upon which time I'd get an appology and be asked to send most of it to him, and keep a little for myself. The check of course, would eventually bounce.

I'm really conflicted about what to do. On one hand, I should just say, "The jig's up - go away." On the other hand, I would love to demand proof of sincerity since I'm holding the furniture and all - a fifty dollar money order in US funds.

[Ian Moulding]

I guess it depends on how much time you have and how greedy this guy is. Most scammers disappear as soon as you mention getting that down payment from them, but a few try to stick it out to get a big payoff from potential suckers. The problem is, doing this would require spending time with the scammer. That's rarely a rewarding experience, even if it's just over the internet.

[[AOD]]

I don't think you should play with scammers. They are known, when agitated, to give electric shocks, which are nasty things. I learned this from Steve Irwin.

You should shoo away that scammer! Shoo it away with a large newspaper, or a broom.

@~AOD

[Netpoet]

I wouldn't even bother, really. Just tell em to go away.

[McDuffies]

Yeah, it's not exactly safe to play around with them. They're still criminals, regardless of how ridiculous their scams look.

Heh, isn't it grating how much times in one mail that guy repeats the same thing? "Please hold it for me, i am very interested, hold it, im interested, blah blah blah"

Or maybe Mr.Jack is Mr.Bob in disguise?

[Rkolter]

I'm not holding anything of Mr. Bob's, even if he says please.

[Mr.Bob]

Foine! Oi'll jist git me furniture elsewhere, boyo. An' yer can forget aboyt me Lucky Chharms too.

[YarpsDat]

... send Beth and me ...

And an idea:
Tell them that you had an uncle in Dublin, but he died this summer and left you very valuable antiques, but now you need help getting them to US...

[Noise Monkey]

I'd send Mr. Jack an email apologizing profusely because your furniture caught fire after some rowdy drunken baseball fans accidently lit your place on fire in their celebration.

[Kisai]

Personally, because I like to be my own detective, I'd wait for the fake money order, take it to a bank and ask them if it's fake, and when it is, tell the idiot that you only take credit cards.

[MixedMyth]

This reminds me of the P-P-Powerbook.

[Rkolter]

So, I decided on my response:

Oh come on. If you're going to scam someone go for someone who has something expensive.

I mean, it's three used halogen floor lamps. You're telling me that you're moving from another country, and you're willing to have an associate bring money to me, and ship these lamps out, instead of getting new ones at sears, for less than the lamps and shipping cost combined?

You don't even call them lamps, you call them "furniture" which fits, since your original message was devoid of any specific content and mailed to a group listing and not me personally.

I'm sorry, I'm not willing to cash the overinflated check that would appear, swollow the cock and bull story about it being an accident or the closure of an account or any other more current reason-du-jour. Nor would I send you the difference. I'd wait until it fully cleared like a responsible person, and when it did not, I'd just charge you with fraud. And we'd both have an annoying month or so on our hands.

Not interested. Have a nice day though!

Please don't write back.

Funny thing is, I sold the lamps to a nice lady who could really use them and she's picking them up tonight.

[Noise Monkey]

And somewhere, there's an Irish man named Jack who has below average verbal skills who is crying himself to sleep.

In the dark.

[Toxic]

I'd check the IP address the email was sent from, to see if this person actually lives where they claim. If they don't ... that's not a good sign.

[Grabmygoblin]

This reminds me of the P-P-Powerbook.

reminds me of the 419 Eater.

[McDuffies]

Tsk, Rkolter, that was a very boring response.

[Ti-Phil]

At least you didn't replied :

"I found where you live and have the knowledge to make lots of things blow. Another answer from you and we'll see the explosion from Ohio."

[Rkolter]

At least you didn't replied :

"I found where you live and have the knowledge to make lots of things blow. Another answer from you and we'll see the explosion from Ohio."

That's a truely brilliant insult. I'm gonna save that for next time.

[Mr.Bob]

You should have sent him a H-H-Halogen lamp. It would have been so awesome if it was the same guy.

[Dr Legostar]

aww... i was hoping ryan would track this out to the point of further hilarity, oh well.