It started normal enough, buyer makes an offer to my store for a Rolex GMT Master:

Then I get a message from a buyer, who wanted to pay via certified check. Unusual that someone would prefer this method of payment vs a more buyer-secure method such as a credit card. But some collectors are set in their ways and want to pay the old fashioned way:

I respond by providing my mailing address (which is neither my home or physical address - security, security):

Several days later, I receive a personal check. Not a certified check (as he had mentioned), not a cashier's check (as I had wanted). And no return address on the envelope.



Note, at this point I wanted to cash the check and send the watch, because at the time I was redirecting my inventory way from Rolex to more Omegas. $7.5K in my hands, why not cash it? So verry tempting. But in the end self-discipline prevailed:

One week later, crickets! No one in his right mind leaves a personal check for $7500 laying around in someone else's possession. Clearly this is some sort of scam. I send him another message:

With which he responds with:

Nothing yet, you rat b@$+@rd. Scam avoided. Moral lesson: never take personal checks

 

Case of sell the buyer?

 

At check number 1026, the account probably hasn't been open very long.

 

A scam that has been presented to me many times at my company is they wish to pay by credit card and have their shipping service pick up the item. ETF/WT is always the safest, if you can operate that way.

 

Maybe a quick recap of the precautions would be helpful...

Dont use your home address
Only accept verifiable payments
Don't jump at the money, pause and reflect before acting
Be alert for warning signs (no return address, etc)

What else can we add to the list?

 

I’ve been in banking (Canada) for just shy of 20 years, the first seven of which were spent in our retail division.

My advice to everyone here on the forum is: do not, under any circumstances, accept a certified cheque as payment from an individual or business unfamiliar to you - especially if it is drawn on a bank from a country other than the one you live in.

Too many opportunities to falsify the instrument. Way too difficult to confirm the validity.

If it’s a foreign cheque, it can take months for the cheque to come back as altered or counterfeit because countries have terrible systems of communication between one another and many countries’ banking systems are incredibly slow to respond to inquiries and investigations.

It’s just not worth it. PayPal or wire payment. For large transactions, ideally wire payment.

 

@R3D9, I've been curious about the questions I get from bank personnel when I send a wire. I understand they are expected to, and that transactions over 10k are reported, but what is the rationale behind the questions? If I steeply answer "a piece of artwork" when they ask why I'm sending a large sum to a foreign country, do they reporty answer?

 

Let's take a second to recognize the Nigerian princes who can't share their fortunes with us because a few bad apples ruin it for the rest of them.

 

They’re looking to understand if the transaction is reasonable based upon what they know about you. If what you say you’re paying for makes sense based upon who you are and your history with them it wouldn’t be something you would need to be concerned about.

 

This is correct that all wires are recorded and flow through a common pipe.

 

I don't quite understand the scam yet. If a check clears then the payment is received, no?

 

I'm not concerned really about them getting reported, I was always just curious about how the questioning ties to the transfer. If the answers didn't jive with what they know of me, does that trigger a next step? Do they flag it as suspicious or something?

 

The scam is that the check is not supposed to clear.

In no situation would the "buyer" leave me with a "$7500 check" and no watch. He would either insist on the watch be sent to him, or instruct me to return/destroy his check.

 

Yep, they are looking for things that seem out of place. If everything lines up you are good. I had a wire canceled to Russia once based on I don't know what. Was able to complete it a week later, bank had to clear something up.

 

Well, he did not insist to ship the watch. Assuming the buyer was legit, from his viewpoint, he was waiting for the check to clear, which he knows may take some time (a few weeks). He was waiting for an eventual response from you in the likes "checked cleared, shipping tomorrow".

 

I don't understand the scam either.....why not deposit and wait and see if it clears and then ship? I have done that in the past with the buyer fully in agreement.