eportuk - this is a scam, isn't it?

After getting 15 negatives, they have now changed their username and made all feedback private :nono:
 
They've also withdrawn anything they have for sale as you're not allowed to sell with private feedback.
 
Al de Man said:
With all that negative in such quick succession, I reckon eBay will close the account within 24 hours.
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10 days too late, I reported my strong suspicions to Ebay several times and just got copy n paste responses.

I don't start threads like these on a whim.... and its shame I was right but it was all very suss.
 
puddleduck said:
10 days too late, I reported my strong suspicions to Ebay several times and just got copy n paste responses.

I don't start threads like these on a whim.... and its shame I was right but it was all very suss.
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Did any other forum users other than shimbo get caught out?

It's a long shot but did he yield any useful information to help trace him in registering his TP account?
 
When he popped up, I reported the post to Admins and advised it might be worth keeping a copy of IP logs ets.

I really hate scammers!!
 
There's a phone number earlier in the thread, which is definitely a Burnley/Nelson phone number??
 
As noted above the account has been closed and all bookmarks just come up as "This Listing Is Unavailable" I am disappointed that I didn't hear anything off ebay other than an automated receipt on the two times that I reported this matter. You would have at least thought that they would let anyone reporting these people know that they were closing their account and why. I've no idea if ebay have any liability in this matter. Losing £400 is bad enough but some have lost over 10x that amount. It can't be right that ebay can just shut and forget.

shimbo
 
shimbo said:
It can't be right that ebay can just shut and forget.

shimbo
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No it cannot be right, but its how it is with "above the law" e-bay, I fail to understand why anybody still uses them, they are beyond useless and no less culpable than the villains that populate their website.
 
shimbo said:
As noted above the account has been closed and all bookmarks just come up as "This Listing Is Unavailable" I am disappointed that I didn't hear anything off ebay other than an automated receipt on the two times that I reported this matter. You would have at least thought that they would let anyone reporting these people know that they were closing their account and why. I've no idea if ebay have any liability in this matter. Losing £400 is bad enough but some have lost over 10x that amount. It can't be right that ebay can just shut and forget.

shimbo
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Ebay have a habit of destroying the evidence - I have a copy of all the completed listing if you need them.

I can still see SAMSUNG GX-20 DIGITAL SLR CAMERA + SAMSUNG 18-55MM LENS

eg:


SAMSUNG GX-20 DIGITAL SLR CAMERA + SAMSUNG 18-55MM LENS
UK Version - 2 Year Warranty - Brand New & Sealed
View similar active items | Sell one like this
This seller accepts PayPal
30 Bids
Sold £442.77 +£8.00 19-Mar 1
 
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puddleduck said:
When he popped up, I reported the post to Admins and advised it might be worth keeping a copy of IP logs ets.

I really hate scammers!!
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Well done in spotting that Puddleduck, could have potentially saved several forum members who saw this first lots of cash.

Best of luck to all of those who did spend money with this seller as well in getting their money back.
 
Thanks Puddleduck, but I already saved the page as webpage complete in Firefox.
I'll wait see what tomorrow brings.

It was the line:
UK Version - 2 Year Warranty - Brand New & Sealed
that made me think this was a genuine dealer, plus all the blurb about "Square Trade Warranties" "Ebay Powerseller" etc.

I did think about trying to go through Paypal, but me being honest thought that would involve him in costs that he didn't want to pay and had stated so quite clearly. I tried a few years ago claiming £130 off Paypal for a DAT Recorder that was only fit for the bin, but they wriggled out of paying due to technicalities.

I've had a PM from another member on here who has paid out £1300 for a camera from eportuk and not received it.

shim
 
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He has changed his ebay name now to stanfordsbank and is shown as no longer a registered user !
 
Just had a quick flick through that thread,

This is a bit worrying

Ebay, police and bank are not interested!

I listed something a couple of weeks ago, I put in the listing I wouldn't take paypal then allow collection as I would have no proof of delivery if a paypal dispute was started by the buyer, when I came home in the evening the listing was pulled by ebay for refusing to accept paypal , this guy did the same and they allowed him to sell 200K worth of goods.:cuckoo:

the whole thing stinks to high heaven
 
Last feedback before doing a runner:

"thank you 4 everything, ebay are liable. am off to st lucia now. sun sea n ho's"
 
You can't view it now because he has made his feedback private but someone on that thread said this is a reply he left to one of the negs he received

"thank you 4 everything, ebay are liable. am off to st lucia now. sun sea n ho's"

Judging by some of the replies he left on here it seems likely that it's correct
 
There is a chap on that thread who reckons he lost £13k!
 
puddleduck said:
There is a chap on that thread who reckons he lost £13k!
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Noooooooooo

£13K ... wtf :shrug:


For 10% of that someone can trace that individual and bring him back in a wooden box (alive) :p
 
Hi all,

Well I've been scammed as well. Paid £3.3K for a Sony EX1 last Tuesday (16th). The guy seemed legal due to the many high value items he sold over the last few months, as well as being on ebay for a year and good feedback for high value items.

I assumed the bank transfer thing was due to him not wanting to pay PayPal fees on these high price items. He was carefull to say "bank transfer prefered" He did not actually say he would not take paypal, or ebay would have pulled the listing. You now have to accept Paypal for all ebay items. When i e-mailed him asking about Paypal payment he still replied "bank transfer prefered" All rather embarassing since I've been on ebay for 7 years and over 3000 Feedback.

I paid with Paypal since there was no way i was doing Bank Transfer. Tonight i filed a paypal claim. From experience they usually class the first report as a "dispute" which you can escalate to a claim. Tonight it went straight to a claim as they said "seller was unable to respond" as i entered it.

From experience i know if you send Paypal money to an e-mail address they don't have an account for, they send an e-mail to that address telling the person they have funds and should open on account to recieve it. My guess is that they did not have a proper Paypal account (they would have needed one at the start) because they would not get past the fraud checks. So all the money paid with paypal should be sitting with Paypal ready to be refunded.

For the record, Paypal recently changed the rules so protection is unlimited, no limit on price, no £15 admin fee. If Paypal fails for some reason your credit card protection should also kick in an refund yor money, but that can take a while. I feel sorry for the people who paid with Bank transfer, they are pretty much screwed. Chances are it was not even a OK account.

Cheers
Les
 
A little tip.

If anyone wants his address just do a WHOIS check on eportuk.com.

From what I remember of the street, I think it's a residential address ;)
 
Marcel said:
A little tip.

If anyone wants his address just do a WHOIS check on eportuk.com.

From what I remember of the street, I think it's a residential address ;)
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Given that this information is available in the public domain, I can't see a problem with publishing the address since this is the current response...

WHOIS information for eportuk.com :

[Querying whois.internic.net]
[Redirected to whois.tucows.com]
[Querying whois.tucows.com]
[whois.tucows.com]
IP Address: 199.238.166.245
Maximum Daily connection limit reached. Lookup refused.

I can't imagine why that may be...:suspect:



BTW, if anyone's interested, the German site yields
31 beaconsfield street
haslingden, lancashire BB4 5TD
UK

This is all available in the public domain remember.
 
If i'd lost 13k he could expect a large shadow to block out the sun in St Lucia:bat:
 
Another victim bites the dust - I'm down 2300 for a nikon d700 and 24-70 which has failed to materialise, surprise surprise. Ebay won't even allow me to open a dispute yet, odd given the guy's not even a registered user any more. You'd think, at the very least, they might have wanted to send me an e-mail at some point in the proceedings suggesting things might not be entirely kosher.
 
wack61 said:
If i'd lost 13k he could expect a large shadow to block out the sun in St Lucia
Click to expand...
:thinking:
nuclear-explosion.jpg


?

Or were you thinking something more proportional.
 
Yeah the e-mail thing is unusual, normally when a listing is removed they send an e-mail saying so and advising you not to pay if you havn't already. Strange that hasn't happened in this case.
 
The scam this gang committed is know as 'short-firm' fraud, where they build a reputation by selling high quality items at a discount, then when people trust them (i.e. powerseller status) they go for the sting. In eportuk's case he listed £400k's worth of items in a short space of time.

The estimated amount they stole was ranging from £120k - £400k.

Even after the first reports of fraud ebay did nothing and he carried on selling items.

Individual losses range from a few hundred pounds to £13,000.

One thing you have to take into account, cameras like the D700 were available for for £1500 or less when the pound was strong, so people might have believed that either these were genuine or imported (which is what he claimed when speaking on the phone).

He is not alone in this scam, there is a gang and it also isn't the first time he has done it. eBay received complaints about this seller back in sept 2008, but clearly the listing fees they were receiving got the better of them.
 
It seems that this thread being a such an early google hit is attracting a lot of scammed bidders, so hopefully a combined effort will increase the chances of a satisfactory outcome compared to dozens of individuals.
 
Al de Man said:
It seems that this thread being a such an early google hit is attracting a lot of scammed bidders, so hopefully a combined effort will increase the chances of a satisfactory outcome compared to dozens of individuals.
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Yes, a lot of people still don't realize they have been scammed or don't know what to do because eBay are no use at all and just send automated replies to your emails. At least this way if people search for eportuk they are likely to find one of the threads. I have posted details of this scam on two other forums linking to the ebay thread and group for scam victims.
 
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