Ebay Garda auction, real or fake

What you guys think, too good to be true ?

http://stores.ebay.ie/titanium334

Alanstrainor

A thread was started about this seller earlier today in "bargain alerts", SCAM

:pac::pac::pac:

didn't see that, thanks.

milltown

His feedback is worth a read if you want a laugh though

Bondvillain

Alanstrainor wrote: »

A thread was started about this seller earlier today in "bargain alerts", SCAM

:pac::pac::pac:

Someone appears to have locked that thread instead of moving it though. Pity. There seems to be a lot of people falling for it. Locking the thread makes it look like the information contained in it was incorrect.

Why wasn't it moved or merged?

Found this:

Posted by : Tom Doyle in (Internet & Computers) 16th Mar, 2008

Garda Auction on eBay… scam


A close relative rang me today. “You can get plasma TV’s for €60 on eBay”, she said. Continuing the conversation, she went on to say that it was in fact a Garda auction and they were selling off goods that were never reclaimed.

All though it sounded too good to be true, I’d hate to think that I could miss out on a deal like this!
So I ventured off on my merry was to eBay.ie to see what I could find. I searched for “Garda” first just to see what came up and unsuprisingly there were no results. So I thought I’d be better off searching for “Plasma” since that’s what I was told they were selling. The search for plasma gave me the results that I was expecting, “GAR DA AUCTlON PHILIPS 50″ PLASMA TV 8O%OFF RETAlL PRlCE“. Since they had clearly spelt “Garda” wrong, it was obvious that this was definitely a scam.
Looking a little deeper, you could see that the seller had over 180 positive comments - however, they were all made today and generally by the same person, who had spect € with them.

I really feel sorry for those people that have purchased something from them since they have in fact purchased 80% off the retail price of whatever the item sells for in the next Garda Auction and not a TV at all.
This person had many other items for sale such as Sony PS3 for €64, Sony Vaio for €64… God, wouldn’t it be great if they were eh?

But anything that is this good, you know it can’t be true!

jor el

I'm sorry, but anyone who thinks they're buying a PS3 for 50 euro is an idiot. Even a small amount of cop on would be enough to avoid being scammed by what is a very obvious con job. That seller's feedback is mostly from a single account too, obvious shill.

Bondvillain

His feedback looked to be all from one account at the time you looked because at that stage he was resorting to damage limitation - Engaging in dozens of low priced shill sales to an alias which left multiple positives in an attempt to bury the bad feedback he'd received from vigilantes.

Prior to that, his feedback stood up to cursory scrutiny (120 positive feedback from over 100 different ebayers , with a 100% rating, registered since January) , and it was only upon closely looking at his feedback that one could see the flaws - his feedback as a seller was simply three shill purchases from himself under the alias of two other ids yesterday morning, and his buying FB was, with the benefit of hindsight, built from low cost items purchased to manufacture a quick reputation.

It worked. He shifted almost 600 non-items for €62.00 inc p&p.

It may be true that experienced ebayers, or simply the savvy amongst us would have spotted this as a scam from a mile off (and did) , and that that these people were all idiots (although gullible or greedy would probably be more accurate descriptions) , but that's due to the way society has seemingly progressed. People want something for nothing. Bargains, steals, snap-em-up-quick. Ebay is Valhalla to them.

Even if they ARE idiots, it shouldn't mean that criminals should be given free reign to exploit them, Ebay has a reputation to repair after recent debaclés. They cannot simply shrug their shoulders and say "Meh, they were idiots. What can you do?"

They have to ensure that these scammers aren't given an audience in the same way that the Stevens Green Shopping centre have to ensure that a Three Card Monte desk doesn't open up beside the Laptop Shop - Reputation and respect for it's paying customers.

zuroph

i dont understand how these people get the money out of their account, surely its all instantly traceable then?

Bondvillain

It is extremely difficult, but there are ways around it - And, no I'm not posting them here

zuroph

PM? lol

faceman

The store no longer exists.

jor el

Bondvillain wrote: »

It may be true that experienced ebayers, or simply the savvy amongst us would have spotted this as a scam from a mile off (and did) , and that that these people were all idiots (although gullible or greedy would probably be more accurate descriptions) , but that's due to the way society has seemingly progressed. People want something for nothing. Bargains, steals, snap-em-up-quick. Ebay is Valhalla to them.

The scammers will stop trying to scam, when people stop being greedy and thick. I saw how many purchases there were on a lot of those items, dozens on each one, 100s of people (a lot of whom were new registrants) actually believed this. Everyone is familiar with the expressions "A fool and his money are easily parted" and "If it looks too good to be true, it is" and yet, they fall for this. Maybe idiots need to be protected in some way, but stupid ignorant greedy people have no one to blame but themselves.

And yes, I agree that the scammers themselves should be shot stopped, as they are the scum of the earth, and shouldn't be given free reign, but the buyers need to accept their part in the scam too. Without people being so stupid, the scam dies.

All those items that were in that guys shop, had €10 postal charges. Now nobody, not even an idiot, could possibly believe that it costs only €10 to deliver a 50" Plasma TV. That alone should have had alarms bells ringing, even for an Internet/eBay novice.

i dont understand how these people get the money out of their account, surely its all instantly traceable then?

Of course it's traceable, but the auction was selling information, and this was stated in it. Therefore, nothing technically wrong with it, it just had a misleading title. The money sent to the seller is therefore his to withdraw from his Paypal account, which I'm guessing he did just as the first negative comments were coming in. eBay close the auctions because of being misleading, but they won't help anyone recover their funds. It would probably take a private civil court suit to get anywhere.

His shill account, gheto74, is still active. I see at least two other shill accounts in his feedback too, that are still active. Nothing gets by eBay eh?

jor el

Mr.S wrote: »

is it still a scam if it says your only going to receive info? i mean granted its at the bottom and very small, but its still there.

I would say it is a scam, yes, and the guy is a con artist. However, he's not _really_ doing anything wrong, as such, as it does state in the auction that you are buying information. Now, it's very misleading, and as such eBay remove the auctions because it's not altogether clear what you're bidding on. But I don't think either they, or Paypal, can do much to get your money back if you have paid.