The Steel Guitar Forum

I recently won a lap steel on eBay auction #2512812789 (now cancelled).
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=2512812789

I had been looking for one of these guitars off and on since 1985. I was excited to have won it. Well I got several emails from various people saying "be careful" and similar things.

It turned out that the picture used in my auction were taken from this auction.
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=2510419808

I contacted eBay about this. eBay called the seller. The seller told them that he had used a catalog picture. EBay passed this information along to me.

My seller contacted me with the shipping cost and I was skeptical but willing to move forward cautiously. My seller indicated that they were in Italy. This was peculiar because the IP address the email was sent from was in Romania!

I requested contact information from eBay (always do this!). The contact information was for someone in Quebec. The Quebec name and address did not match the information emailed to me by my seller. I called the phone number given in the contact information and discovered that the phone number was correct for the name given in the contact information. I spoke with a rather bewildered fellow that knew nothing about this guitar. I offered to send to him the details that I could.

I sent my payment of $1000 even (including shipping) via Escrow.com, asked for additional pictures, and asked for the serial number.

The seller wrote back "no escrow". My seller then sent me a picture that was also taken from Auction 2510419808 that showed serial number 207. This guitar had recently been sold by someone in the U.K.

In the end I created a text file containing a chronological list of all of the emails that had sent between the seller and myself. I included ALL of the header information from all of the emails. I pointed out that the originating IP addresses were in Romania, That the seller claimed to be in Italy, and that they were registered as being in Quebec.

So what can you do to avoid getting SCAMMED?
* Request seller information.
* Look at where the IP address of the seller is located.
* Check sellers feedback (this is not always enough).
* Use Escrow for major purchases. Ebay has some rules about using escrow: know them.
* Know that eBay only insures for $200 and that they charge $25 for you to file a claim: net guarantee $175.

BTW: I would be happy to take any African money that you care to send me. However I will not send any to Africa...


------------------
Regards
-- Eugene@FJ45.com

Thanks for the heads up Gene. Good advice.

6 out of 7 $$$ guitars I was interested in on Ebay in the last 2 weeks were frauds. I had to determine this myself because ebay won't help at all-they won't even take the auctions off most of the time. These are 100% confirmed frauds. The "sellers" are Cipaian Mihai Alin & Gangu Dan. There's several scams going on on ebay right now & they're getting more complex. The latest was I caught a guy who set up a fake escrow service so that he could accept internet "secured" payments. The only thing I can suggest is to only buy items that use Paypal with your credit card. My credit card through Paypal took a loss for me that ebay would'nt.
One of my tricks with these guys is asking for different photo angles & history of the instrument. They're pretty lame story tellers.
I'm pretty bummed on ebay. Until they have a formula that protects you from 0 feedback new foreign sellers that don't accept secured payments, I would'nt go there.

There's been a rash of frauds lately from a guy in Romania; it's been discussed ad nauseum on the Telecaster page. Basically, he uses pictures stolen from guitar stores' sites, claims to be in California, then Canada, etc. The descriptions are usually laughable.

Man , theres so much of this bull going on anymore (even on here) its kinda disgusting. Hey, maybe its not such a bad idea to support some of the vendors listed on this site when your lookin for a used steel or related things? Bob

Email the seller before bidding and ask, "If I win the auction, can I pick up the item in person and pay at that time?"

You can always change your mind later and request it be shipped.

Excellent advise from Joey. I too EMAIL the seller pre-bidding with a few questions concerning pickup, s/n's , anything I can think of just to get a reply. I do this on items of a few hundred or so, not that I bid on too many at that price anyway. If I don't get a reply, surely I don't bid.

I am curious as to where the sellers location was listed on the EBAY bid in question of this thread.

Although I will sell and ship anywhere, I will only purchase US and Canada.

I hate to hear of these things. But, where there's a way to deceive, some folks will exploit it and take advantage.

TP

Hi Eugene
I'm so sorry you were misled by that person, you can rest assured that that person won't be selling on e-bay again, and also be consoled by the fact that the REAL guitar has "Gone Home" back to the USA (Florida)and is in loving hands.
Basil Henriques www.waikiki-islanders.com