Is this a scam?


I would appreciate some help with this, which has happened to me in the last few days.  I listed an item on a site, not Audiogon but another one, and got an offer within a few days.  The offer was lower than asking price, but reasonable, so I accepted.  All of this happened with an exchange of emails.  The buyer wanted to send me a deposit which was about 1/4th of the total sales price, and that amounted to a few thousand dollars.  He said he would send the rest when the item was shipped.  I thought this was a little strange, but agreed to it -- today I received his deposit via Paypal Friends and Family.  Somehow I wish now that the money transfer hadn't happened.  But the good news is, I have not yet sent him the items.

The guy has very little purchase history on the site that was used to contact me.

He says he has a Freight Forwarder and and will have someone pick up the items.  All of this seems suspicious to me.  I fear that perhaps I have been paid with a stolen credit card number, for example.  Of maybe there is another angle here that I cannot perceive.  Has anyone else been through a process like this?  I think he is a scammer but don't know for sure.

Ag insider logo xs@2xscottwsmith

Showing 7 responses by scottwsmith

To answer a previous question, I am pretty new to USAM and don't if they will or can provide much help on this -- anybody know?

The answer was from Paypal was to just refund the deposit.  If he went to his bank to claim he had not received the item, Paypal would support me by informing the bank that in fact his money had returned.

I have asked him to call me, still not sure that it is illegitimate.  But guess what, no call yet!  Thanks to everyone who tried to help.

And, if I refund the deposit, I am sending back funds out of my paypal account.  That's not the same as how I was paid -- it's directly linked to my bank account.  I called Paypal and it did seem to kind of stump them too.

The funny thing is, he has already sent me part of the money, it seems to be the reverse of the typical scan.  I am the seller, not the buyer.