I don't THINK I'm about to be scammed . . .

hotpot

It all sounds a bit convoluted to me, Is there a Nigerian Prince standing in the wings to pounce! I don't understand it so I wouldn't get involved, mate or no mate.

Teetonetal

 Maybe seller has backed out and the buyer can't be arsed to reclaim 20 gbp.

ICBM

Chalky said:

And like all good marks, we are now into "Well I can't figure out the scam so it can't be one" territory 

Maybe I'm just paranoid, but I'm in the "I can't figure out why someone you don't know would send you £20 for nothing so it *must* be a scam, even though we can't work out exactly how" camp. If it wasn't necessary to put some sort of liability on you, there would be no need for the £20 - even if the seller is the one being scammed.

stickyfiddle

The seller is likely the one getting scammed. OP is the middle man used entirely to break the chain of custody so the buyer can make a PayPal claim. The £20 is presumably just to make OP keen to help, and it's a small amount to pay to get an otherwise free bass. 

Its also possible that that the Buyer will also be selling the bass to someone else at the same time, and conveniently request our middle man to send it to an additional third party, at which point the buyer (actually the chap in the U.K. who contacted the OP in the first place) will tell Paul to send to him but actually give yet another address to a mate who will keep the bass and OP then gets implicated as having sent the bass to the wrong place, or something. 

OR it's all above board and genuinely someone in Russia who wants the bass. God knows I've considered all sorts to get stuff delivered to me out here.

goldtop

It could be a compromised PP account (Russia + dark web = details sold for very little $$$). Maybe there's some SNAFU stopping the 'buyer' from completing the payment to the seller.

However, in the 'unlikely to be a scam' column of factors is this: we're talking about £266. So much effort for so little reward.

I'd be on the phone to the Scottish guy asking a few deeper questions.

Actually, scratch that. For £20, I'd refund and say "no thanks"

Bidley

stickyfiddle said:

OR it's all above board and genuinely someone in Russia who wants the bass. God knows I've considered all sorts to get stuff delivered to me out here.

Do you buy something before you figure that small detail out, or after?

The fact he's bought a bass in another country, without bothering to sort any kind of postage out until after he's bought it raises alarm bells for me.

paul_c2

I think it was a scam whereby the seller is scammed and the eventual buyer/receiver of the bass profits out of it/does the scamming BUT that the seller has smelt a rat and shut it down. For the buyer, the £20 is their only cost once the scam is complete, they've been caught and have tried to destroy all the evidence, in doing so they've forgotten about the £20.

That, or its full of drugs.

ICBM

goldtop said:

However, in the 'unlikely to be a scam' column of factors is this: we're talking about £266. So much effort for so little reward.

Not really - most of the known scammers here do fairly low-value scams, possibly in the belief that the police won't be interested.

It's not much effort either - if it's as simple as finding a Russian band online, pretending to be one of them, pretending to be the friend of him, picking a random guitar repairer he found on the net as the patsy, pretending to be the guitar repairer and walking away with a free bass, that's not much work at all. If it's a more complicated Fingland-type scam there may even be someone else involved who has now lost £266.

Until proven otherwise I'm definitely in the Scam camp.

TTony

ICBM said:

 I'm definitely in the Scam camp.

Is that where all the wannabe scammers go to learn their craft ??

paul_c2

ETA: The scam relies on the seller accepting a Paypal payment, but the item not being sent by him via a tracked courier. Given that he's sold 6 other guitars, he's probably wise to this common scam tactic.

I've had jokers try to arrange couriers for stuff listed as "collection only" and I've immediately refunded when they sent Paypal payments, even though I suspect they were genuine. I even had one poor sod send me cash in an envelope through the post, then arrange for his mate to collect it and package it up weeks later.

WezV

goldtop said:

However, in the 'unlikely to be a scam' column of factors is this: we're talking about £266. So much effort for so little reward.

Or put it another way, a weeks wages for many people

Paul_C

I've messaged the owner of the bass (via eBay) so we can have a chat about it - I've got no problem bailing out if he'd rather cancel the deal.

Jimbro66

goldtop said:

However, in the 'unlikely to be a scam' column of factors is this: we're talking about £266. So much effort for so little reward.

Yes, particularly when one of the eight basses sold by that particular seller on the same date went for £1,810!

As someone said much earlier in this thread, Paul messaging the seller through Ebay to ask what is going on (if there's no other contact info) is perhaps the first step?

I think if sinister Rusians wanted PayPal account information they'd probably find a much more efficient way to get it en-masse than asking individuals. And we don't know whether the Ebay purchaser was the Russian or his mate in Scotland. Do Russians have direct access to Ebay?

My money is on the Russian (if he exists) finding that the cost of shipping, import duty, etc virtually doubles the cost of the instrument and then requesting a refund from the seller, but who knows? At least this makes more gripping reading than Brexit threads

Paul_C

Update: Seller has replied saying he tried to call but had the wrong number - he reckons I've done repairs for him before and seems happy to drop it round.

Iamnobody

Paul_C said:

Update: Seller has replied saying he tried to call but had the wrong number - he reckons I've done repairs for him before and seems happy to drop it round.

If he has accepted a PayPal payment for the guitar he is one step away from being fucked over for £266. 

Have you you advised him of this?

Paul_C

We'll have a chat when he pops round, if he's happy then off it goes.

Emp_Fab

Paul_C said:

...on behalf of a friend of his who is Russian.

SCAM !!!

Is that racist ?

;-)

mellowsun

Paul_C said:

Update: Seller has replied saying he tried to call but had the wrong number - he reckons I've done repairs for him before and seems happy to drop it round.

All part of the scam. He's not a real seller (check his history as others have mentioned). They now have your phone number along with you personal data via your PayPal account. 

Refund the £20 and back out now. Close your PayPal account and create a new one.

seriously, stop now. They want to use a legitimate business as some kind of front.

 Imagine if the phone call was 'hi, can I drop off a parcel at your business and we use your business as a shipping origin address to send the package on to Russia?'

but suddenly the words 'guitar', 'friend' and 'ebay' are mentioned and it becomes all ok?

Nikko

TTony said:

ICBM said:

 I'm definitely in the Scam camp.

Is that where all the wannabe scammers go to learn their craft ??

This one time, at scam camp, I stuck a bass in my pus...

Chalky

When a very savvy friend was scammed, she wouldn't believe my explanation. So she went to the police armed with all the info she had and caused a ruckus until a detective gave it some attention. He sat with her and patiently went through all the stuff she'd printed out and slowly showed how every 'fact' had come from the scammer. He asked why she thought any of it was still true.