petery
New member
I pass on this e-mail received from the Boats and Outboards site
"
We received the following email from a customer who highlights a cunning fraud. Watch out especially for cheques from AFRICA, often for significantly more than the asking price, even when they are cleared!!
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"I recently received an enquiry from someone whose written English was rather poor. I was not surprised as I have had several overseas enquiries however this person calling himself Benson claimed to be a broker who had a customer for my engines. He said he would instruct his buyer to send me a cheque for £8500 (asking price is £5500 for both engines) & requesting that I paid the balance to his UK shipping agent on collection of the engines once the cheque had cleared. This seemed rather odd & a large amount for payment of shipping & duties but I thought as long as the cheque is cleared I'm in the driving seat. This is where our banking system starts to let us down as it can take some foreign banks (usually west African) up to six weeks to return unpaid cheques or drafts but if you ring your bank they will tell you that the money is cleared & will show on your statement as cleared funds however when the cheque or draft is returned the bank will debit your account for the full! amount so you loose your goods & you pay the fraudster for taking them away.
Perhaps you could post a note on your site to warn other users who may not be as lucky as I have been."
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Most such frauds come from Africa. Whilst we do not give out your email address, and we have an email fraud blocking system in place, we cannot stop everything. So do beware.
Regards
Phil
Phil@BoatsAndOutboards.co.uk
"
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"
We received the following email from a customer who highlights a cunning fraud. Watch out especially for cheques from AFRICA, often for significantly more than the asking price, even when they are cleared!!
===================================================
"I recently received an enquiry from someone whose written English was rather poor. I was not surprised as I have had several overseas enquiries however this person calling himself Benson claimed to be a broker who had a customer for my engines. He said he would instruct his buyer to send me a cheque for £8500 (asking price is £5500 for both engines) & requesting that I paid the balance to his UK shipping agent on collection of the engines once the cheque had cleared. This seemed rather odd & a large amount for payment of shipping & duties but I thought as long as the cheque is cleared I'm in the driving seat. This is where our banking system starts to let us down as it can take some foreign banks (usually west African) up to six weeks to return unpaid cheques or drafts but if you ring your bank they will tell you that the money is cleared & will show on your statement as cleared funds however when the cheque or draft is returned the bank will debit your account for the full! amount so you loose your goods & you pay the fraudster for taking them away.
Perhaps you could post a note on your site to warn other users who may not be as lucky as I have been."
====================================================
Most such frauds come from Africa. Whilst we do not give out your email address, and we have an email fraud blocking system in place, we cannot stop everything. So do beware.
Regards
Phil
Phil@BoatsAndOutboards.co.uk
"
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