Online Car Scam

There are quite a few scams on carzone at the moment. I have replied to a few of them and am getting the same or almost similar email to the OP. The best thing is to report as many of them to carzone and see will they do something about it.
 
After reding through the whole topic, I must say thank you to Louise for posting her experience as, im sure not everybody is aware of the scam. I had a look myself at carzone just to see the extent of the issue and after doing a search for all used cars priced at €5000 from a private seller, it brough up quite a few cars that should be nowhere near the €5000 selling price.

This is just a theory but maybe the real people behind the scam are the motor check crowd? Anybody agree with me cause I think most people would not go through with the full transcation but dont mind paying €35 for a check to be done, all those €35 can add up, especially with the current recession. BTW thats just my theory :)
 
Thanks Cash_Cow for spoting that scam! My wife Sonya owned that Audi A3 and we sold it for its proper value a number of weeks ago.

I had placed it on cbg.ie in July. I received a few emails from a prospective buyer who requested proof of ownership. I didn't see anything particularly wrong with this so I emailed a scan of the vehicle reg cert. Since then, this person has used the photos and details of the car, along with the reg cert in order to propagate this scam. This, by the way is the same person that Louise (the original post) was dealing with, as the emails sent by them were the exact same.

The Gardai are currently investigating this, but unfortunately a number of people have already lost money. I can't understand why anyone would believe that a car worth 14-15k could be on sale for 4-5K! Please warn people that they should see a car and check it out before transferring any money!
 
Beware also of sellers with Irish names who communicated by email in broken English.
 
Hi All
I think this is another scam on car buyers guide for a Merc E 200. Below is his response to some of my queries.

Sorry for the delay. The price is € 10,500 and the car is in perfect condition, has no mechanical problems, no scratches or dents, no accidents.. All services have been made at a Mercedes-Benz Service in time. The car was mostly garage kept. Now I will try to answer all frequently asked questions:
1. Genuine reason for sale, brought a house in London and need the money to go towards renovations. Right now, I have the car in a shipping company 's custody.
2. The car is held on a clear title with no money owing.
3. The front tires is new, the rear is probably 90%
4. More photos are available
5. Regarding the payment I am aware of the buyer's protection and specially I will use an CarsBuyerGuide.ie and SafeTrader Third Party which will hold the payment until the buyer will receive the product.
I will wait for your email to let me know if you are interested in knowing more details about the purchase and please reply asap and let me know your full name and where are you located (your full shipping address) to calculate shipping cost.

Thanks. Nelson

The piece below is also part of another mail he sent me.

I am a SafeTrader and CBG.ie member and I want to make the deal thru them cause I have a € 15,000 insurance policy with them. They will act like a THIRD PARTY and we will be both 100% protected. The money will be HOLD by them into their escrow account and I will give you a few days to test the car and to see that nothing is wrong with it. I made few deals in this way and it worked very well.

This is how it works :
1.The Seller will open the transaction; 2.The buyer has to make the payment to Financial Department and they will deposit the money into their escrow account;
3.The Seller will receive the confirmation that the payment is done; 4.The seller will ship the item to the buyer and he has 3 days to test check it;
5.The buyer will contact SafeTrader to tell them if he is satisfied or not; 6. SafeTrader will release the money to the seller (in case the buyer is satisfied) and to the buyer (in case that he is not satisfied).

If you are realy interested and have the money available for this purchase reply me your full name and ur full shipping address for i can forward all our info to SafeTrader. I'm a serious man and I prefer to deal only with a serious buyer. If you consider yourself one please e-mail me and let me know if u want to move forward this deal. I hope you agree with me, because I think this it is the best way to protect both (seller and buyer).


Does this sound like a scam to you guys?

Thanks MFK
 
Sorry meant to say I sent an e mail to cbg.ie about this correspondence and they have not replied which is very disappointing.

The car value sounds too good to be true.
 
cudden said:
Thanks Cash_Cow for spoting that scam! My wife Sonya owned that Audi A3 and we sold it for its proper value a number of weeks ago.

I had placed it on cbg.ie in July. I received a few emails from a prospective buyer who requested proof of ownership. I didn't see anything particularly wrong with this so I emailed a scan of the vehicle reg cert. Since then, this person has used the photos and details of the car, along with the reg cert in order to propagate this scam. This, by the way is the same person that Louise (the original post) was dealing with, as the emails sent by them were the exact same.

The Gardai are currently investigating this, but unfortunately a number of people have already lost money. I can't understand why anyone would believe that a car worth 14-15k could be on sale for 4-5K! Please warn people that they should see a car and check it out before transferring any money!
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Very interesting and thanks for posting. So, that's how they are getting the registration certificates. I really dont think car buyers guide is doing enough
 
Thanks for replies, it is always nice to have your suspicions confirmed;)
 
Hi ,
Just found same scam still going on carzone and autotrader cars in Question Audi A3 5k and get this one an Audi tt 1.8i blue 5.5k this one is from a guy called alexander.
Same speel as before.
New member john
 
I don't think you can blame Carzone because they are being targetted by scammers. Any Person-to-Person service runs this risk and people just need to be careful when transacting.

I've bought and sold cars a few times over the last few years and have saved money by cutting out the Dealers.
 
starlite68 said:
i think carzone is fast going downhill.
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Yes and they are darn rite expensive too for advertising since autotrader bought them over. Used to be able to advetise your car for €30 and it stayed there until the car was sold. Now since Autotrader bought it costs €40 and an extra €40 every 4 weeks until the car is sold!!
 
Car Mad said:
Yes and they are darn rite expensive too for advertising since autotrader bought them over. Used to be able to advetise your car for €30 and it stayed there until the car was sold. Now since Autotrader bought it costs €40 and an extra €40 every 4 weeks until the car is sold!!
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Yes, have to agree with that. There must be an opening for a competitor to step in here.
 
G123 said:
I don't think you can blame Carzone because they are being targetted by scammers. Any Person-to-Person service runs this risk and people just need to be careful when transacting.
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Can't agree with this. Of course you can blame them, it's the same as Ebay or any other reputable website where people can advertise goods for sale. Carzone should have better checks in place to ensure this type of scam cannot take place on their website.
 
Ceist Beag said:
Can't agree with this. Of course you can blame them, it's the same as Ebay or any other reputable website where people can advertise goods for sale. Carzone should have better checks in place to ensure this type of scam cannot take place on their website.
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But logically, how? They certainly have a duty to remove any scams that they are made aware of and ban the person who placed the ad.

Nothing stopping them coming back the next day with a new identity.
 
I'm sure there are plenty of checks they could put in place. They don't even have a simple warning on the website even though there appear to be numerous scams (that they were made aware of) already. As I said other sites can protect themselves against this type of thing so surely they can as well?
 
G123 said:
They certainly have a duty to remove any scams that they are made aware of and ban the person who placed the ad.
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i dont think they have even bothered to do that in most cases...seem to be just interested in getting money!
 
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