-----Original Message-----
From: C. Hatton Humphrey [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Sent: Wednesday, March 17, 2004 7:39 AM
To: CF-Community
Subject: Brokenhearted but Relieved (long)
Well, I almost screwed myself over *big time*. I've been hunting for a
laptop and with my limited funding ($700 as of right now) I've been looking
more on eBay and other auction sites. Well, I found a listing that blew me
away... Alienware M51 with a 3 GHz processor, 512 Mb ram, 60 GB hd,
DVD+RW/CD+RW, extra battery, etc.
I'll run through the whole story and you tell me where you see the red flags
coming up. I was too blinded at the time to see them and my wife knocked
some sense into me before I had sent my money off into oblivion.
I emailed the seller because he had the listing restricted to "Approved
bidders only". Kind of odd for a seller who had 0 feedback and had created
his account six days ago, but I went ahead and sent off the email. He
indicated that he needed cash to, "pay off a supplier" and was willing to
accept my offer ($700). He also indicated that he was a "Colonel" stationed
in Hamburg, Germany. He wanted me to pay via Western Union and when I
suggested Pay Pal because the fees were cheaper he insisted on using Western
Union. Shortly thereafter I received an email from "Safe Harbor" which
indicated that it was an eBay company and that they would cover 90% of the
auction.
Now understand, I never placed a bid on the item on eBay, the auction ended
before I had a chance to. I poked around on the eBay site and found some
vague references to Safe Harbor. My wife, bless her heart, was trying to
pull the rose-colored glasses off my eyes and finally got through to the
thinking part of my brain.
I looked at the headers for the email from "Safe Harbor" and the truth
started to rear it's ugly head. There was no mention of eBay at all in the
email headers, in fact the message appears to have originated from
[EMAIL PROTECTED] Looking at the eBay site, the "Square Trade" which
the seller indicated that he was a part of and what little I could find on
Safe Harbor all indicated NOT to use Western Union and to report anyone that
specified they would ONLY accept Western Union to eBay immediately.
So, I sent off the message to their Fraud department last night and will let
them take over from there. Now I'm crying for two different reasons - one
because I didn't get the killer laptop second for joy because I almost got
suckered into giving my money to some kid in Germany.
Live and learn, I guess!
Hatton
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