A few weeks ago, my husband was contacted by phone from someone saying they represented Direct TV and told that they had a partnership deal with EBay to lower Direct TV costs. This is a very sophisticated scam. The callers were able to access our Direct TV account, change channels, and had a lot of account information making it appear very legitimate. They said the promotion was with eBAY and payable in EBAY cards. Anyway, he fell for it and bought about $500 in EBAY cards, and gave them the numbers.
Very quickly he realized he'd been scammed. I immediately contacted EBAY to cancel the cards. They were able to cancel one of three. I also went to the ATT customer message board to explore whether this was a common scam. Apparently it is. Both AT&T and EBAY have known about it for over a year, but have done NOTHING to warn customers.
I complained to EBAY that, since they have known about this scam for quite awhile, they ought to have posted warnings on the gift card packaging, at the POS, or both ie "Do not to give out the EBAY card number to anyone - because that indicates a likely fraud. " I complained to ATT that they also have a duty to warn customers.
In any event, Ebay made $360 off us. I wonder how much more they have made while conveniently ignoring their duty to warn customers?
I have reported the fraud to the FTC and my congressional rep. Please do the same if you have been scammed via ATT/EBAY.
