eBay con artist caught out?

Purity

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On Saturday I was really chuffed to be the owner of a decent Hameg scope for £58 off eBay.

I paid for the item straight away via paypal, and recieved a message from the seller on ebay on Sunday to say the item was packed up and ready to be given to the courier, and this would be followed up with a tracking number etc. Sure enough on Monday I get the tracking details etc from the seller via another message on eBay and all seems good and encouraging.

So yesterday (Tuesday) I get a message from the seller out of the blue to tell me that he has sent me the wrong scope, as he had two for sale! He will arrange for pickup when it arrives with me.

So me being a suspicious kind of character, alarm bells start to ring, even though the seller has 100% feedback and I can see he sold another scope on the same day - so it all looks honest

So I respond to his message saying that I understand that these things can happen BUT:

1) How does he know the owner of my scope will return it?
2) Can he give me the username of the person that bought the other scope so I can check this out?

So I get a response from him saying he will refund my postage (which has now happened), and I should return the wrong scope. He will ask the other buyer to do the same. Once both scopes are back he will re-ship the correct one to me at his expense. But no mention of the other buyers username. He also mentions that if he doesn't get the scope back from the other buyer he will refund me. Again alarm bells are ringing.

I respond saying of course I will return the item but I'd still like to have the details of the other person.

So he responds saying thanks for this, and the username of the other buyer. All seems legit.

So I look at the sale of the other scope and can see that the details he has given me do not match the buyer of the other item. There feedback scores are completely different! So I check his feedback and can find a match for the username he gave me but it was for a power supply he has sold, not a scope.

So I want to make sure I haven't got this wrong so I ask him whether the details I was looking at for the other scope was the item that he sold to the other buyer, and he confirmed it was.

So I've now responded saying that the details he gave me do not match the sale of the other item, and that I will be contacting eBay customer services for their advice on this because clearly things do not seem quite right.

My gut feeling was that this guy was not happy with the price he sold the scope for and deliberately sent me the wrong item, and it seems I may have been right?

What do you guys think and how should I proceed with this?

Unfortunately I cannot refuse the item delivery because it has been delivered to work in my absence today, so someone else has signed for it
Purity2014-07-23 19:16:33
 

shrunkenmaster

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Tell him you're going to list the scope he sent you on eBay, then he can buy it back and pay shipping.

Or keep the scope he's already sent you and walk away from it.
 

Ronnie Dent

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If it had not reached a price he liked I doubt he would go to all that bother sending you the wrong one etc.

Similar happened to me can't remember what it was but I got it for 99p, he told me it went on fire and was in the skip lol! end of story
 

Purity

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Ronnie Dent said:
If it had not reached a price he liked I doubt he would go to all that bother sending you the wrong one etc.

Similar happened to me can't remember what it was but I got it for 99p, he told me it went on fire and was in the skip lol! end of story

I know. That's what doesn't make sense, But the fact that he has now given me a completely different username for the other scope has made me more suspicious. As yet I've not had any reply to my message to him about this. I might leave it a couple of days and see what happens
 

Ronnie Dent

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Yeah this is why I hate Ebay! full of nutters and scammers, would rather bin some stuff than list on Ebay! but I guess at the end of the day we all need it!

Hope it pans out for you mate, maybe post here the location of the seller maybe one of us can pop in for you?

Ronnie
 

Purity

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Alpha1 said:
It does sound strange. I wouldn't ship it back without eBay customer services being involved.

Yes, I don't think I can ship it back as it is now, without eBay advising me to do so, because he might then turn around and say the item was delivered and signed for even though I've returned it etc

It's a very strange situation. Unfortunately as eBay is so full of scammers, it's very easy to start thinking like this when things go wrong.

I guess the other option, as already stated, is that I keep the scope. But the one he has sent me is inferior to the one I purchased, lower in cost, and I cannot find any information on it to know if it is suitable or not for my needs.

Just to be 100% sure I've messaged the person that he gave me the details of to see if they will confirm whether they bought the other scope or not. It certainly looks as if they didn't to me

Purity2014-07-23 20:36:04
 
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