buyer beware

[John.Gallegos415]

I have never had any problems with transactions on this forum. Everyone here is wonderful.
However, I just want to give a heads up so no one else is scammed.
On a recommendation of a forum member (pm me for name if interested), I contacted an individual for MK4 parts; specifically black powder coated side pipes ($450), and a week later, front splash guards and assembled side louvers ($150). The individual Randy Bigelow at Velomart83@gmail.com asked me to send the side pipe payment to his trusted friends account since his paypal commercial account was temporarily disabled. The Zelle account info he gave me was Janet Therlonge at flowerdemarcus844@gmail.com. Payment confirmed received. A week later when he told me he had the rest of the items I needed and asked me to send the additional $150 to his PayPal Friends and Family. The account is Randy Bigelow @RandyBigelow121. I have never used paypal for payment and apparently paypal locked his account because I added the item description in the note field. Once I researched this, I let him know that all he needed to do was call paypal and let them know I chose the "wrong account" and they would unlock it with no fee. The commercial fee would be less than $5 to process the transaction. Payment to him confirmed.

I asked him to shipped the side pipes and that I would wait for his paypal to get sorted out before he needed to ship the remaining items.

He insisted on another $150 to ship the items this time to another paypal account under Edmund Stover at Solomstover@gmail.com. A short time later he said not to use the stover account and wanted to provide another account. Now I am very uncomfortable with this whole transaction and refused any additional payments.

It has been over 6 weeks and I have not heard from him any longer and of course I have not received any items.

Not sure if this will get posted but I feel it is important information.

John G

[mrmustang]

I have never had any problems with transactions on this forum. Everyone here is wonderful.
However, I just want to give a heads up so no one else is scammed.
On a recommendation of a forum member (pm me for name if interested), I contacted an individual for MK4 parts; specifically black powder coated side pipes ($450), and a week later, front splash guards and assembled side louvers ($150). The individual Randy Bigelow at Velomart83@gmail.com asked me to send the side pipe payment to his trusted friends account since his paypal commercial account was temporarily disabled. The Zelle account info he gave me was Janet Therlonge at flowerdemarcus844@gmail.com. Payment confirmed received. A week later when he told me he had the rest of the items I needed and asked me to send the additional $150 to his PayPal Friends and Family. The account is Randy Bigelow @RandyBigelow121. I have never used paypal for payment and apparently paypal locked his account because I added the item description in the note field. Once I researched this, I let him know that all he needed to do was call paypal and let them know I chose the "wrong account" and they would unlock it with no fee. The commercial fee would be less than $5 to process the transaction. Payment to him confirmed.

I asked him to shipped the side pipes and that I would wait for his paypal to get sorted out before he needed to ship the remaining items.

He insisted on another $150 to ship the items this time to another paypal account under Edmund Stover at Solomstover@gmail.com. A short time later he said not to use the stover account and wanted to provide another account. Now I am very uncomfortable with this whole transaction and refused any additional payments.

It has been over 6 weeks and I have not heard from him any longer and of course I have not received any items.

Not sure if this will get posted but I feel it is important information.

John G

John,

Sadly you fell for the simplest of scams here on the web. Sorry to read it, but it is indeed a warning for everyone else. As for who gave you the information, you are best to send it to a moderator or admin here, as that persons account may have been compromised, again by a scam of their own, or worse, is a scammer.

Bill S.

[LSX]

Was worried about that. When I posted I wanted to buy a brake fluid assembly and mount I got a couple of legitimate offers from reputable builders but got several DMs from new people with minimal posts.

Use Caution on here people! They are among us...

[gbranham]

Have to agree with Bill on this one; that was an obvious scam from the onset, and you should've been alarmed when the seller asked you to send payment to 'a trusted friend'. Sorry you fell victim to this.

Greg

[TXeverydayDad]

Sorry to hear this John.

Since Zelle was used, reach out to your bank to report this as well.

[Jeff Kleiner]

Yep, "I have a friend who has what you want" and sending payment to a third party guarantees that it's a scam.

Sorry that you were a victim.

Jeff

[rickyracer]

It's a real shame that we have scammers among us. I am very apprehensive to buy online these days allthough a large amount of purchases are made online with individuals that you do not know. It is so unfair to the legit sellers who are just trying to get rid of unused parts that could help honest buyers with their build. Way too many scams out there. I have been scammed a few times ( not here ) so I have developed a real hatred towards the scum bags.

[gbranham]

I only sell and buy from tenured forum members with an extensive post history. Hasn't burned me yet. Sorry to the newbies who are legit that may have a product I want or need, or to a newbie who wants something I have available, but I'm not transacting with you. You have to earn my trust through seat time and extensive participation in this forum. If I need a product I can't get here on the forum from a known member, it's not worth the risk of buying at a discount; I'll buy at retail prices. It's buying down risk. And as a seller, if I trust who I'm selling to, I send them the product, then ask them to pay me once they receive it. Jesse (Blitzboy) can attest to this. I sent him $1000 worth of Coyote goodies, but asked him to withhold payment until he was satisfied with the product. That certainly puts the buyer at ease. Call me crazy for doing it, but again, it hasn't burned me yet, and I like to think people trust me for it.

Greg

[egchewy79]

FYI, I've been scammed before (not on here) but some of the scammers are very sophisticated. One sent me a link to a shipping site that had actual working links within it. Now if you did a deeper dive, some of the links from that site didn't work and some of the text was jibberish. But again, asking for cashapp/zelle to a third party and sometimes they'll ask for additional money for shipping/taxes/tariffs.

[jengum]

There are also very professional looking websites that are indeed scams in the making. If something looks wonky and their prices are too good to be true check their "about us" for a physical mailing address and look it up on google or map quest to see if it looks legit. Also check their payment methods. If they don't accept major credit cards as a form of payment and only list Paypal, Venmo or Zelle as payment options RUN.

[J R Jones]

I am not diminishing the reality of the OP's mentioned scam, but it can go both ways. I do not sell much here, more (local) volume on Craigslist. There are scam buyers that attempt to get something for nothing.
The money never shows up on Pay Pal. Having avoided sending something for nothing, there is still the inconvenience of packaging and getting a shipping quote. I am 19 miles from UPS. I have tried to avoid the wasted effort with an accurate estimate, and the bonehead demanded "actual; shipping". As you have noticed, shipping cost is up.
jim

[John.Gallegos415]

I must admit I let my guard down as I felt a bit "protected" by this site and the fact that he sent me some pics of the parts I requested first. I did file a fraud claim with Zelle and with Card company. I doubt anything will happen except raised awareness. My friend keeps telling me to only send the amount of money I am willing to loose to those that I do not know. Great advise.

[Skuzzy]

A little paranoia combined with a dose of cynicism goes a long way to protecting yourself from scammers.

I got burned once, many, many years ago, and it led me into network security where I found hundreds of people who had lost their entire life savings to scammers. Teaching people how to avoid it and to configure computers to make them more protected became a passion of mine.

[SCracer]

i can confirm the velomart address is one you should be aware of, and not do any business with, but i was given this email address velomart93@gmail.com and the name at that email is Mick Clint.

I posted a couple of ads for parts that i would like for my car, and similar to the experience of John.Gallegos415 above, i received a DM message from another forum member that suggested you can contact my associate at +1 870-276-8296 He currently has it available for sale.

i made the call and the person i spoke with gave me the email address i listed above, and he identified himself Mick Clint. this Mick guy said he had the parr i was looking for and gave me a price for it. when i asked for a picture of what i was buying, and that he would send a picture of the specific part i was looking for. But the picture he sent me was the wrong part number, it was close, but not the exact part i was looking for. when i let him know that the pictured part he sent me was not the part i wanted he assured me that he had it and would send the part i was looking for and wanted me to send my payment. at that point, because he didn't really know the difference in the part i wanted (i was looking for the FFR Koni rear shocks for a solid axel car, but he sent a pic of the Koni front shocks). he asked me again to send payment and again said he had the right part in his garage and would ship exactly what i wanted. well, i just didn't have any confidence that he had the shocks i wanted, so i never sent payment, but he was very diligent about following up to see if i wanted to buy them.

In retrospect here are the warning signs i should have paid more attention to:
1. the initial contact from the forum member was a DM, and not a reply to my post.
2. the Forum member's user name had just registered that day!
3. the Forum member did not have any other posts or history of activity on the forum.
4. the Forum member was not the person i would be dealing with but someone he knew, his associate.
5. the person i contacted went directly to asking for payment without first talking about the part, he quickly told me he had the part i waned and would ship it quickly.
6. the person i contacted obviously didn't know the differences in the parts i was asking about (not a FFR guy!)
7. the person i contacted didn't want to send me a picture of what i was buying and when he did, it was the wrong part
8. the person i contacted always assured me he had the part i wanted
9. the person i contacted always accepted my price offer! he just wanted me to send the payment quickly.

i will definitely be more careful going forward! and i won't buy anything from someone that doesn't have any forum activity history! That is a huge red flag!

i trust the FFR Brethren! We know who we are, and we know the difference between front shocks and rear shocks, and the different spring rates of each! it's the little details that makes this group of guys so incredibly great to be amongst!

be careful...

Drive on!

[SCracer]

so i was just contacted by Forum member Strum (his first post!) and he didn't reply to my WTB post, and he has no other activity on this forum, and he is referencing someone called TRADE POINT i should contact that has the part i'm looking for and listed this email tradepoint424@gmail.com.

the form of the email is almost exactly like the previous time i was contacted, but the names and email address are different.

i have no doubt this is the same person, or group, that tried to scam me before!

Buyer beware!

[David Hodgkins]

so i was just contacted by Forum member Strum (his first post!) and he didn't reply to my WTB post, and he has no other activity on this forum, and he is referencing someone called TRADE POINT i should contact that has the part i'm looking for and listed this email tradepoint424@gmail.com.

the form of the email is almost exactly like the previous time i was contacted, but the names and email address are different.

i have no doubt this is the same person, or group, that tried to scam me before!

Buyer beware!

Strum is banned. Let's make a point to call out this particular MO of contacting folks and redirecting like this example as ban-able offences.

:)

[John.Gallegos415]

I was just contacted by newly registered entry chocolatelover about the same set of black powercoated side pipes for the MK4. He said to contact his friend Doug at tradewithme145@aol.com for a great deal. Ha Ha. No thanks scammer boy. Beware also of this username and email address for any cobra parts.

[David Hodgkins]

"Choco" was banned and I also banned the member they put in the referral field.

Thanks for the heads up!

:)

[Tooth]

Sorry to hear. I got burned once on fb market place, fortunately wasn't for much $$. With paypal you should be able to get it refunded. Bit of a process, but paypal is the only app type one that's really "safe".

[tnt_motorsports]

I was just contacted by newly registered entry chocolatelover about the same set of black powercoated side pipes for the MK4. He said to contact his friend Doug at tradewithme145@aol.com for a great deal. Ha Ha. No thanks scammer boy. Beware also of this username and email address for any cobra parts.

I had the same issue, so I reported the private message. David did his thing as noted and the situation appears resolved.

I think this is a good approach to protection us all a little better. It is good to post here as well for visibility, but I wanted to wait and see what reporting the post proved.

[Skuzzy]

Sorry to hear. I got burned once on fb market place, fortunately wasn't for much $$. With paypal you should be able to get it refunded. Bit of a process, but paypal is the only app type one that's really "safe".

Paypal has been hacked more than Lizzie Borden's parents. If you use Paypal, do yourself a favor and use a fixed limit card. Never think any of any site who takes credit cards over the Internet as being "safe". The legitimate services never intend to have a database compromised, but it happens. Many times those services are not aware they have been compromised.

Hackers are as big a problem as scammers. If not worse. Once a hacker gets a database, they sit on it for months before selling it or using it. Then when you wake up one day and your account has been maxed or drained, in the case of a debit card, you have no idea when or where you might have been compromised.