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Fun With Would-Be Scammer

2K views 6 replies 7 participants last post by  flyjkol 
#1 ·
Thought you guys might enjoy this.

A few weeks back I was selling a couple of Lamson spools. In response to an ad on the steelheadsite.com, I got a note from "Michael," who professed to be an autodealer in Germany, expressing interest in the spools. I'd been warned about this clumsy scam (I hope I didn't need the warning) which runs as follows: buyer expresses interest in items, offers to pay for them by means of a 3rd party (typically a "business" in the U.S.) owing the buyer money in excess of the price of the items; 3rd party is supposed to send entire amount (in this case 8k!) to seller, and seller is supposed to send balance back to buyer (along with items). Eventually--though we never got that far--3rd party asks for seller's bank account #, routing info. etc., so that money can be transferred directly to seller's account. :whoa: Anyway, I thought I'd see just how far I could go before this clown would give up--pretty far it turns out. I especially enjoyed his offer to pay $500 for $250 worth of spools, and ignoring my attempts to send them to him for free. My psuedonym is "Ron."


Customer Service <autodealer@uymail.com> wrote:
GOOD DAY,
MY NAME IS MICHAEL FROM GERMANY, I'M AN AUTOMOBILE DEALER THAT DUE WITH AUTOMOBILE, I HAVE STORES IN EUROPE AND ASIA.
I AM EXTREMELY INTERESTED IN PURCHASING YOUR Lamson Litespeed spools, THAT YOU POST ONLINE, PLEASE KINDLY REPLY ME BACK WITH THE PRICE OF THE Lamson Litespeed spools.
BEST REGARDS,
MICHAEL

From: Ronald Ashkar
Date: Wed, 23 Jun 2004 11:58:42 -0700 (PDT)
To: Customer Service
Subject: Re: Lamson Litespeed spools
Dear Michael,

$120 for 4.0, 100 for 3.5
-Ron

Customer Service <autodealer@uymail.com> wrote:
Dear Ron,
Please let me know the prices of the two including the shipment to Germany and also my client is responsible for the payment.

Dear Michael,
$245 for both reels sent to Germany and insured.

-Ron

Dear Ronald,
Thanks for your response.
Please like i stated on my last email that my client is responsible for the payment of the transaction with the money is owning me via cashier check , so i am buying the both reels for $500 best offer and my client is owning me $8,000, so please let me know if you can help me by cashing the funds and send the balance to my business agency after clearance, so please kindly provide me your full name, address and cell phone with your home phone, so that i can forward to my client and business agency, and also please provide all this transaction to my client by printing it out and fax to him on fax #(832) 550-2176, so that he can confirm and make the payment in-time.
Best Regards,
Michael.
From: Ronald Ashkar
Date: Thu, 24 Jun 2004 11:00:54 -0700 (PDT)
To: Customer Service
Subject: Re: Lamson Litespeed spools
Dear Michael,

It turns out that I have a business partner to whom I owe money, and he owes money to a third party, so maybe I can get your client to transfer the money to the third party via the cashier's check. Then too I could send the reel spools before any money is exchanged to make sure you're satisfied with them. Does that sound okay to you?
Very best regards,
Ronald

Dear Ronald,
I am purcashing from you not your debtor, so please let me know if you can send my agency the balance, and also i would like you to ship the reels to me in Germany, i'll provide my address after the transaction. So please let me know if you accept, and provide me with your full name, address, cell phone, so that i can forward to my client and agency.
Thanks,
Michael

Dear Michael,

Hey that's not fair. If you get to have your client pay me then I should get to have my debtor--or actually, my debtor's debtor--receive the money. On the other hand, I could just sell the spools to my debtor--or rather, to my debtors' debtor, sorry--and then he could sell them to you. Or a third option: I sell the spools to my debtor, my debtor takes the cashier's check, sends me the $500 and you the balance, then sends the spools to you, and I give him his original $500 back. But I do insist on being able to work through my debtor--or rather, my debtor's debtor, sorry again!--if you're going to insist on working through your client. My interest, to be honest, is not so much in the spools or the money, but seeing whether we can make this marvelously complex transaction work. I feel that if an American and a German can make _this_ work, especially given our recent disagreement about Iraq (did you know they flyfish there, by the way?), then anything's possible. I'm tempted just to give you the spools free of charge. Can I have your address? I may just send them as a goodwill gesture.

Yours,
Ron

Ronald,
Please try to understand i am buy this from you not your client, so please let me know if you are interested in selling it for me, and also you can send the money to your dentor after the transaction.
-Michael.
Dear Michael,

I've got the spools all boxed up, so just tell me where to send them. Do you drink a lot of beer in Germany? I hear it's better than American beer, but I guess you'd have to sample both to find out. Have you sampled American beer? How's fishing been? I have to tell you that I've really been enjoying our trans-Atlantic banter.

Your friend,

Ronald

Ronald,
Please try to understand i am buy this from you not your client, so please let me know if you are interested in selling it for me.

Dear Michael,

I've contacted my debtor--I mean my debtor's debtor, sorry, that's the last time, I promise--and he says he'll be happy to accept money so long as it is wired to his bank account. But I am a little worried, for this reason: I am confident that my debtor is an honest man (he's a Methodist minister and I owe him for I-O-U's I left in the Church offering tray), but my debtor's debtor worries me a little. I'm afraid, Michael, that he might just take the whole $8,000 of yours and not return the balance of $7,500. The reason I say that is that he just seemed very eager to do this for me and gave me his bank account information before I even asked for it. He is very wealthy, so I can't imagine that he needs the money; on the other hand, he might have gotten wealthy by underhanded means. I know that you and I have just met, but I'm worried that he could take advantage of a foreigner--especially someone who is as trusting as you. Are you sure that I can't just send you the spools for free?

-Ron
 
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#3 ·
I wonder how many folk the scamsters catch, I was trying to sell a car and chersished number plate and both times but under different names I had the third party try on. I did not have your patience to bother replying, I wish I had,excellent thread.
 
#7 ·
debarb said:
My interest, to be honest, is not so much in the spools or the money, but seeing whether we can make this marvelously complex transaction work. I feel that if an American and a German can make _this_ work, especially given our recent disagreement about Iraq (did you know they flyfish there, by the way?), then anything's possible. I'm tempted just to give you the spools free of charge. Can I have your address? I may just send them as a goodwill gesture.
*tear* that was beautiful...:hihi:
 
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