Reply to "EBAY SCAM ALERT!!!!!!"

FINAL UPDATE

The auction is no longer in the eBay system. This is not normal for an auction that ended just hours earlier. However, it is normal for an auction that was canceled by eBay. While their policy does not provide for any feedback to me on the fraud report I sent to them, I hopefully feel eBay did get this auction voided. Hopefully prior to the buyer sending any payment.

LESSONS LEARNED

An off-list email to me asked:

.....Did it ever occur to you that this person might be a subscriber? [ to the list) That might be how he knows which bids are meant to sabotage his efforts......

I doubt it.

With bidding up around $500k, it really didn't take a genius to know something was up.

If he hadn't managed to close the auction early, my snipe bid (at three seconds before closing) with an unused-on-his-auction eBay account (I have several) would have trumped everything, even with him having canceled all our earlier high bidding.

We did play our hand too soon, but at least we played.

For any future scam like this, we should get the word out, but withhold the high-bid technique and instead rely on snipe bids to thwart the scammer's success.

I did spend considerable live-person telephone time with eBay and they do have full information on the true owner/seller of this car. I stressed the urgency of having their Fraud department act on this auction, as it was already closed. Hopefully they will take action fast enough so that notification to the winning bidder is made prior to him actually paying for the scam-car. I highly suspect the seller will attempt to arrange a prompt payment outside of proper eBay methods, which would make an after-the-fact refund by eBay a doubtful scenario.

Larry