Thought a 145.022-69 SW was incoming, got burned instead....

I'll try to make this short as I'm not here for a pity party or to go boo hoo, but just a precautionary tale to other members. I was hesitant to share but hopefully someone else is able to be spared the same mistake I made.

- EDIT - If you're curious and don't want to read it all, scroll down to the photos and the descriptions. You'll get the gist.

Scrolling through FB Marketplace a little over a week ago, I came across what looked like a vintage Speedmaster 145.022-69 with a Straight Writing case back. Clicked on the listing and saw that it was exactly that. The watch was also offered with what appeared to be an 1175 bracelet with one No. 47 end link, one replacement end link and box and papers! Looked at all the photos, dial looked as it might be a -76 or -78 service dial but the crystal was so scratched up I couldn't be certain. Looked over the other photos, thought I'd give it a chance, and reached out to the seller for photos of the papers information side. Everything looked to check out.

Next was a phone call because the price was a little bit on the "too good side" so I wanted to verify a bit more. Seller seemed honest, told me the story that it was his Grandfather's watch with no real sentimental value to him, that he wasn't really a watch guy, thought the watch was too big on his wrist, and that is why he wanted to sell it. I explained that it was a pretty uncommon watch and he would certainly be able to get more than what he was asking for, but he alluded to some financial troubles and not being able to wait for the right price. He said that if I was able to pay the asking price, he'd happily send it to me. I explained that I would much rather do the deal face to face but since he was towards the east coast and I am on the west coast, I said I'd be open to proof of possession photos and to split the payments to get things going. We agreed to split it into two payments, one to send and one when the package reached my region's shipping hub. There was a bunch more proof of possession photos that were sent over but I won't bore y'all with that. I used everything I had learned here on OF and could think of to cover my bases.

With my concerns pretty much all calmed I decided to go through with the deal and issued the payment. Seller shipped the package that day and provided tracking. So I was pumped, so far so good. Package arrived at my hub and I sent the second half of the payment as agreed. Within a few hours of the package arriving, I get a frantically phrased text from the seller noting that they are afraid they may have sent a different watch as they were sending out a few watches from sales last week.

Ding, ding, ding! Here comes doubt from the back of my mind saying "I told you! You should have listened to your gut and me!" But the seller was very communicative so far, had a good explanation of everything and the were so agreeable on the phone, it could work out.

Woke up this morning to notification the package was out for delivery. Don't get me wrong, I'm skeptical as hell but as some of you my have experienced before, I could be about to receive a grail watch of mine. Sure I'm definitely unsure it would work out in my favor, but the optimist in me was pretty jazzed all morning! Package arrived, I quickly opened it and well, the euphoria pretty much immediately fell off a cliff.

What had paid for...(I cropped the image due to the seller wrote my info on a piece of paper as part of proof of possession)

Yes, the 6 o'clock end link not genuine but the one at 12 o'clock I confirmed from a photo was a No. 47 end link.



What arrived....


Yep, all that effort, discussion, proof of ownership/possession, and a lovely $13.99 "George" brand watch available for purchase from Walmart showed up. (I had to google the watch brand) How f***in fantastic!

Contacted the seller right away for a refund as they had been pretty responsive through the whole deal. They got back to me quickly and sure enough tried to give me a run around on why they can't pay me back yet.

Financially, so far I'm fine. I used a credit card to pay for it through a P2P payment app. Contacted my credit card servicer immediately after the run around text was received and filed a claim of false advertisement goods. They're looking into it and the matter should be squared away.

Moral of the story, LISTEN TO YOUR GUT. And if you've got any doubts during a deal, no matter how much you want the watch, it's probably best to ease back and walk away.

A bit more than I expected to write, but if you've made it this far, thanks for reading and hope you have a great weekend!

You can file a police report.

Thanks @Dan S, I have contemplated filing one. Wanted to give myself a bit to cool down from it all, and see if I'm still leaning that way. Only challenge I could think of though is that I forgot to save the image of the serial number and since the listing has now been deleted on FB Marketplace I can't get it back.

Sounds like a nightmare. I feel for you, hope it all works out and the guy gets what's coming to him.

Sorry to hear this. I hope you get your money back. I wonder who else is waiting for the same watch to arrive in the mail.

I don't know if the serial number of the watch that you never received is even relevant. I think you have plenty of evidence of fraud. Whether or not the police will bother pursuing it, I don't know.

Appreciate it and so far it's working out. Who know's if they ever will, I just hope sharing my story will help someone else avoid the same mistake.
Agreed, the other people that may fall victim to this is exactly why I decided to explain more detail about this so that hopefully no other OF members have this hassle to deal with .

Oh my mistake, I thought for some reason I would need that.

I had thought the same thing but I also have heard of people being scammed for house goods, like sub $100 purchases. So if there are people willing to scam over that I'd think that no watch is off limits.
Oh I had no disillusions about FB marketplace going into it. Being that I found this on the marketplace I was already aware that this could be potentially sketchy but had after talking with the seller and receiving the proof of ownership / possession I was much more confident this would be a legit dealing. I should have trusted my gut more and just walked away.

I knew you were getting scammed the second I read the split payment…..no seller of anything expensive ships without full payment. Scammers are happy with half a scam. Sellers aren’t happy with half a sale.

Thank you for sharing your story @OneTwo. It may save someone else from making the same mistake. I hope that you are able to recover your funds.

Sad story. Out of curiosity, did you do a Google image search on the FS pics he had posted on FB?

The main flag for me would have been that 'he needed money' yet was readily willing to sell for a lot less than the actual value. That kind of defeats the purpose of selling things to get money. I would think a seller would take the info "you know, it's worth more than you are asking" and immediately research and relist for a higher amount.

Scammers often try to find an asking price that seems like a bargain, but isn't too good to be true.

If I may ask, what was the price?

It’s great that your sharing your experience but please share the username that the seller was/is using on market place so no one here even begins the journey.

This! This is when I should have listened to my gut and just walked away. I thought the same thing @STANDY going into the conversation but the way it unfolded it was pretty organic and I stupidly let my guard down a bit on this. And I agree @kaplan. Thinking back on it now the splitting of payments doesn't make sense. Truly I knew better and naively put my doubt aside, which I shouldn't have.