Scam alert. Don't use paypal friends to pay.

[RTSE70]

Beware recent scam activity related to parts wanted post.
I received a PM from a member that someone had the part that I'm looking for, with the following contact info and paypal ID. Member had recently joined and is now gone along with any record of his PM to me.
They requested, and I sent, payment with paypal friends to:
304-915-6869
Ms. Singer
Paypal ID: Jimmy Songer
JimsonTraveler
They asked for additional money, above the agreed price before they would ship. After I refused, didn't hear from them again.
Paypal will not help with fraud if the payment was send via friends (they do not get their 5% fee).
I will not be using paypal friends again.

[blown motor]

I learned the same lesson the same way. If you use friends to pay you have no recourse. If you don't then I think PayPal will cover all or part of your payment. I have since used PayPal and added a couple bucks to the payment to help cover the seller's PayPal fees.

[JH27N0B]

After getting an unexpected 1099-K from PayPal in 2021 that gave me fits trying to figure out how to deal with when wrestling with doing my taxes, which I already liken to getting a root canal, I vowed never to take a PayPal payment again except Friends and Family.
Along with current shipping problems, I'm not to eager to sell anything anymore except at a swap meet...cash only!  But there aren't many swap meets anymore either.
Which is a shame for me, I have a lot of clutter some very valuable I'd love to find a new home for.  Someday 10 or 15 years from now there will be a bunch of rare Mopar parts sitting at my curb on trash day since selling has become more trouble than it's worth to me.
Sorry to rant, but the payment problems, along with shipping issues now days make my blood pressure spike. I miss the good old days 10-15 years ago when I did regularly sell stuff on sites like eBay and had happy buyers and I was happy with the process too.  I should have unloaded more goodies when I still could!

[JH27N0B]

It's a sore subject for me for sure. For example eBay was such a blessing for me when I first signed up in 2001.  I got rid of a lot of stuff I'd had gathering dust that was too valuable to throw out, but no good venue to sell before eBay. And I also sold a number of parts on Mopar sites.
Now with the issue of figuring out paying taxes on selling things I have no receipts from buying 10, 20, sometimes even 50 years ago as a kid, high fees, scammers filing dishonest did not receive complaints and PayPal siding with them all the time, shipping problems, etc, the window for selling stuff online seems to be closed. I wish I'd sold more of my old stuff when I could but thought things would never change so much for the worse!
I sympathize for people who get scammed buying.  But on the other hand there have been many reports on forums repeatedly in recent years about scams involving responses to parts wanted ads.  You run an ad, you get a response "my friend Joe has that part you are looking for, contact him at "KrookedJoe@gmail.com", you do, "Joe" sends you a picture he stole off the web, asks for PayPal payment friends and family, you send the money, and soon find out you've been robbed.
If someone contacts you about a part you seek and claims his friend or some seller he knows of has one, and gives a email or phone contact for his friend, it's a scam. 100%.
If someone contacts you on a forum saying they have a part you need, and they recently joined the forum and only have a couple posts or none, 98% chance it's a scam.
Should be common sense?
But if someone who has been a member of a forum for years and has many posts, advertises a part and says payment friends and family only, 99.9% chance it's perfectly legit. Again should be common sense.

[71GranCoupe]

Unfortunately there is little you can do. One thing you might do is send a referral notice with facts of avoiding taxes to the IRS. You will never know if anything was done to the scammer, but worth a try.

Best thing to do is avoid any purchases with those who seem to pop up from nowhere. I have no problem with F&F with those who have been around for some time. Some sellers here take regular PP and if the price is fair, I will toss in a little extra to cover fees.

Sometimes lessons come with a cost, and your thread will help others avoid similar transactions.

[dodj]

Ya....I stopped using PayPal years ago when I realized it's not really my Pal...lol
I lump them in with UPS and Jim's Auto Parts as entities I will not deal with.

[ogre]

I think i would only use paypal but not the friends feature unless I knew the person. I have been burned like many on here, person sounds legit, and in my case got me to use VenMo to an account and that was the last I saw of my money. The amount of money floating around restoring old cars is just to great a lure for these criminals. I think one of 2 things will happen, some company like paypal will offer 100% coverage if you are a victim of a scammer but they will want some % of your transaction, and they cant do tax reporting which is the key. Otherwise I think it might be an interesting solution to treat this site like they do other country clubs, have members kick in a cash payment to the site (refundable when they leave), and the site would have to get a shipping contract to control shipping costs for all its members. You buy an item, the club issues the shipping label and pays the shipping cost, person ships item and a tracking number is generated and sent to buyer by the club or carrier. When buyer gets the tracking number, he pays the club the cost of the item and the shipping. When item is delivered (maybe signed for), the club issues payment to seller.  Yes a lot of work on the part of the club admins, but it would be trustworthy for all sides, cheaper on shipping, no tax forms, and generally more pleasant.  Would it be worth a % of each transaction? who knows but scamming will kill this for sure.

ogre

[cuda hunter]

copied from the sister thread on febo.

paypal,  helps directly fund HIAS who imports illegals into this country. Look it up. They are importing the ILLEGALS.


Elon was the largest share holder of 11%ish but Ebay purchased paypal back in, I think, 2002. 

So, no Elon does not own paypal.

Paypal is owned by it's shareholders, Of which, are Vanguard, Blackrock and State Street.  Look up those companies and see if you agree with who they are and what they fund. 

  Regardless, Any American who donates money to bring ILLEGAL ALIENS into this country should not be used or even in business. 

Here, this is where HIAS is helping illegals cross the darien gap to come to our great America. https://hias.org/tag/darien-gap/

And their financial statements and their explanation for the good they do.

https://hias.org/who/financial-statements-and-reports/



Here is all of the partnerships of HIAS.  Paypal is down on the right.  Look who else is on their.  Helping bring illegals to do what is happening in this country.  Ya know, bash white womens heads in, rape children, squat in your home that you paid for, steal goods, crap on our streets and of course, the terror word. 



This is not political.  This is the truth.  I'm simply pointing out where paypal sends your money that you give them.

[JH27N0B]

There you have it, by using friends and family, you are ensuring PayPal makes no money from the transaction to use for nefarious purposes!

[torredcuda]

News flash - scammers are all over the internet, unless it`s your first day on it you should know that.    I always use PayPal goods and services unless I know or can verify the sellers reputation, it saved me $1400 once. I also research the seller myself, checking profiles on FB and forums, asking around etc. and have done numerous transactions with no protection and no issues.

[torredcuda]

After getting an unexpected 1099-K from PayPal in 2021 that gave me fits trying to figure out how to deal with when wrestling with doing my taxes, which I already liken to getting a root canal, I vowed never to take a PayPal payment again except Friends and Family.
Along with current shipping problems, I'm not to eager to sell anything anymore except at a swap meet...cash only!  But there aren't many swap meets anymore either.
Which is a shame for me, I have a lot of clutter some very valuable I'd love to find a new home for.  Someday 10 or 15 years from now there will be a bunch of rare Mopar parts sitting at my curb on trash day since selling has become more trouble than it's worth to me.
Sorry to rant, but the payment problems, along with shipping issues now days make my blood pressure spike. I miss the good old days 10-15 years ago when I did regularly sell stuff on sites like eBay and had happy buyers and I was happy with the process too.  I should have unloaded more goodies when I still could!

Best bet for you is find someone local who will buy it all as a package deal that way at least you get something for it, it doesn`t get trashed and will get out to others that need the parts.

[BIGSHCLUNK]

I too was in a $1400 situation for friends and family. I actually offered $1500 to go the "other" way. Guess what happened next ???????????