To think I’ve been an idiot (scammed)

[PurpleThistles84]

My daughters birthday is next month and she asked for a Nintendo switch lite. Being a family of seven money is quite tight so when I came across one for sale via fb market place for £100 I was delighted. Made contact, the gentleman seemed genuine, he was selling it for his grandson, was postage only because of the coronavirus. I paid by bank transfer over a week ago, he said he would let me know when it was posted.

I have heard nothing and today his Facebook profile has disappeared so I know I’ve been scammed and there is nothing I can do about it is there. I also know I’ve only myself to blame, I should have insisted on PayPal payment at least but he said he had never used it and being ‘Elderly’ I accepted that.

I do feel quite upset however, with all this coronavirus stuff going on, I guess I thought people would be being kind to each other, but there you go.

Have you spoken to your bank?

Switches are a bit hard to come by atm. Especially for a low price.

File a police report though. It Is fraud and I'm sure you wont be the only one he scammed.

Sorry to hear about this op. Hope you get the money back x

Yes speak to your bank and to facebook, don't know if they can do anything about it.

Yeah you've been scammed. Probably nothing that can be done either.

Considering they start at £200 new and secondhand seems to be £150 upwards, why did you think you'd get one for £100? It was a pretty obvious scam, I saw someone on FB looking for a normal switch for £100 when they go for almost £400 new and someone who was clearly a scammer was offering one for £100. I reported the guy but she was still trying to buy it.

If something sounds too good to be true, it will be.

You could look into charge back via your bank.

www.moneysavingexpert.com/shopping/visa-mastercard-chargeback/

Awww sorry op but I definitely think you have been scammed so sorry it can easily happen everyone’s guard comes down at times.

Did you actually speak to him?? He may not even be a older gentleman the whole profile could be fake.

I’m sorry. It feels terrible doesn’t it? Not only are you a victim of crime but you beat yourself up about it too..
Learn and move on, without getting over cynical about human nature

@Mammyof22020 chargeback is for card payments, not bank transfers.

What an unhelpful post @Truthpact ! Hope it made you feel better.

OP do try your bank, you never know they may be able to help.

I hope DD still has a good birthday

Sorry OP, some people are arseholes. I'm not sure what you can do, hopefully someone more knowledgeable will be along soon; but what a knob the 'seller' is.

Contact police, bank and Facebook. It's unlikely this is the first time they've done this and you've got bank details that they may be able to use to trace it. Good luck.

@understandme

It took me 2 mins to find those prices. Why didn't the op Google this stuff? If you're short on money, why gamble £100 on something that isn't likely true?

Scammers exist because people fall for them. Be smarter and you won't fall for it. There's plenty of information out there on how to identify scammers. Doing that would have saved op her money. So yeah it is helpful, if she listens.

I do feel quite upset however, with all this coronavirus stuff going on, I guess I thought people would be being kind to each other, but there you go.

Sadly the opposite is true. Scammers see situations like the one we are in now as an opportunity.

I am just going to chalk it up to stupidity and move on. It was too good to be true yes but it wasn’t brand new which was another reason I thought it was genuine. I didn’t speak to him no but I did check out his fb profile and searched him through google, I found his high school with his name and year of birth which all matched as well as a golf club he played at in the past.

Enough info on him to file a police report OP, and possibly find his address to go to small claims.

Call your bank about a charge back too.

If you have his fb ect, you could shame him. Post screenshots of what he sent you and name and shame on your fb. Though I guess he could say it was someone else pretending to be him.

When buying an expensive item second hand always check the going rate for them so this sort of thing doesn’t happen.

You would never get a second hand switch for anywhere near £100.

And this sort of situation is a reason to be more vigilant because people are much easier to prey on.

The bank fraud dept will hopefully be able to give the police details they can use to trace the twats that ripped you off. This is a fairly low level scam and there's a good chance the people who did it aren't that smart at covering their tracks.

Enough info on him to file a police report OP

It's likely that the scammers either created a FB account using some random person's details or used a hacked account. Almost certainly, the only real piece of information is the bank account number and unless the scammers are rank amateurs that will lead to a dead end as well.
No harm in reporting it but I suspect the chances of anything coming of it are remote.

@Truthpact I'm not interested in how long it took you, your post was unhelpful and that remains the same.

And this sort of situation is a reason to be more vigilant because people are much easier to prey on.

Not only that but more people are desperate to get money if they are worried about their jobs so they are resorting to scamming unfortunately. Its a time to be extra vigilant and always use either credit card or PayPal. More likely to get your money back then.

Lovely bit of victim blaming there, Truepact.

That's shit OP.
Switches seem to be really hard to get hold of at the moment.
Is credit an option for you? Very had some on deals not long ago

Truth I've seen you victim blame on a few threads before. Is that how you get your kicks?

Please report it to the relevant authorities. Victims feeling ashamed and staying quiet just helps the scammers.

And it doesn't matter how clever you think you are, there's a scammer who's cleverer. Anyone can be a victim of fraud.