| There is a growing car shipping scam on the internet which has been
targeting sellers of cars, boats, motorbikes
and other single high value
items, even horses ! We first came across this in January when we
were approached by a car dealer in Australia who had been
directed to a
website purporting to be on of 1st Move International's car shipping sites.
Car Shipping Scam: The hook
Fraudsters had copied aspects of our site and were advising
potential victims that they would buy their vehicle
and ship it via their
approved shippers, pointing the victim to this so called shipping site
which they had published themselves.
Once the seller had been "hooked" the fraudster then sends a cheque to
the seller for the cost of the vehicle
and, very kindly, includes in this
payment the costs for shipping the vehicle overseas.
Car Shipping Scam: The Con.
Say the car is being sold for £ 4000.00 and the shipping costs are
£1000.00, you, the seller, get a nice little
cheque for £ 5000.00 which
you duly bank. The bank may even advise you that the funds are in your
account,
cleared and safe.
Car Shipping Scam: The Sting.
Within a few days you will be asked to send a slice of this money to
the shipping agent in order to pay for the shipping. ( the shipping costs
of £1000.00)
You are requested to send this money by Western Union or Moneygram which you do as you have
been paid..
This transfer is untraceable and cashed immediately.
Meanwhile your bank tells you 10 days later that the original cheque has
bounced and promptly takes the
money out of your account.
You have been conned For £ 1000.00 !
or dollars, yen, euros whatever, this scam is worldwide.
NEVER SEND MONEY BY WESTERN UNION, LEGITIMATE COMPANIES HAVE BANK
ACCOUNTS. BANK ACCOUNTS ARE TRACEABLE. |
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Latest Scam
Warning:
Criminal gangs target car buyers through online car traders
and auction sites.
Beware of individuals or websites offering to sell you a car
below market price.
These scammers advertise great deals on car trading websites
and will ask you to
send money before they ship your car. They will tell you the
car is with their shipping agent and point you to a website
which claims to securely hold your cash while they ship the
car to you. They will even direct you to, what looks like, a
reputable car shipping website, or money escrow site, but
one they have simply copied from the web and changed the
contact numbers to their partners in crime.
Copying a website is a very simple cut and paste job and
some of these criminal
websites can look very, very convincing. However, they are
simply copies of
genuine websites with the contact details changed. Phone
numbers listed are to untraceable mobiles and emails sent to
you via bulk email accounts. If an email comes simply from
an email account or an internet service provider be very
suspicious.
Genuine companies will email you through their website:
example:
jim@autoshippers.co.uk is good,
autoshippers@hotmail.com is
a con.
Always check your email headers by looking at the properties
of the email sender.
Tip: simply right click any email address, look at
properties and you can usually
see exactly where the email has come from.
We currently
receive over 10 emails a day from victims of this fraud,
this is now
big business and easy money for fraudsters. It has also been
the subject of a BBC investigation. You can see the news
report on the
BBC News: Car Shipping Scam...
See the report
here.
See also IC3
warning on
auction fraud here:
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- Don't get
caught............ Good advice.
Be cautious of overcomplicated transactions involving shipping agents,
business partners, middle men and so on, all designed to leave you
seriously out of pocket, and the crooks with your cash.
- As with all online transactions please check the credentials of who are
you are dealing with.
If it sounds to good to be true, then it normally
is. Please also be aware that anyone can just copy and paste a
website, change a few contact details and they are in business.
Always check out the website URL and contact the real site owners if
you are suspicious.
- If you receive an email from someone check
that the email is coming from a reputable website.
If it is coming from just an email account and not a genuine company
be very, very suspicious.
-
UK shipping companies, or Freight Forwarders, belong to the British
International Freight Association (BIFA).
You can check their site here:
www.bifa.org. Better still why not call
the shipping agent personally and check them out.
They do a good job and
will be happy to help and advise on all things shipping. If you get that
itchy feeling in the back of your neck and say Hmmmm. Then walk away.
-
NEVER SEND
MONEY BY WESTERN UNION, LEGITIMATE COMPANIES AND
HONEST FOLK HAVE BANK ACCOUNTS. BANK ACCOUNTS ARE TRACEABLE.
Spread
the word, pass
this message on:
If you have a website which would benefit from this information
then please feel free to copy all or any of this information. I am the
author. It is copyright free.
This article has been written by Jim Limerick, managing director of
1st Move
International
This article is copyright free and can be used by
any parties, provided acknowledgement is made to the author
and a link back to
www.autoshippers.co.uk is placed on the your web page. Thank You.
1st Move International Ltd.
International House
Chittening Estate
Avonmouth
Bristol BS11 OYB
Tel 0117 9828123
Fax: 0117 9822229
Email jim@shipit.co.uk
Our associated, and genuine, websites are
www.shipit.co.uk
www.autoshippers.co.uk
www.moveme.co.uk
www.autocarshippers.com
And finally a note to the scammers.
DO NOT COPY OUR WEBSITES.
We take copyright infringement as a serious matter, we know you don't,
so we wont threaten you with any legal stuff if you copy our website.
HOWEVER.. we report all fake copies of our website to the
Internet Crime
Center, IC3. The Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3) is a
partnership between the
Federal Bureau
of Investigation (FBI), the
National White
Collar Crime Center (NW3C), and the
Bureau
of Justice Assistance (BJA).
We also report fake copies of our sites to
the relevant police authorities in your country, including
http://www.met.police.uk/fraudalert/ and will contact
your web hosting company with details of your site.
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