Got Scammed

Question

After receiving a mostly destroyed computer set, I attempted to contact Ebay by searching "Ebay customer service". Unfortunately for me, the number was for to a scammer who gleeped me out of a $200 Ebay gift card. Nobody is happy being scammed, and certainly not me, but I have questions as to how these guys access Ebay sales records that verified my purchase and why Ebay hadn't picked up through search engines?

Can I challenge the use of the gift card as I have the original card and receipt for it. It is being used fraukulently.

eburtonlab · Answer

If you searched for an eBay customer service number on Google, you may have found an ad instead of a legitimate search result.

Scammers put up fake pages with eBay logos and their own phone numbers, and then take out ads on Google so that their links appear when users search for eBay customer service or similar keywords. When users report the fake pages, Google will eventually take them down, but scammers just put up new pages with new links using new numbers. The scam operations are quite sophisticated. Once contacted, the scammers will ask for gift cards or else ask users to install remote access software so that the scammers can connect to the users' computers to obtain financial information and make transactions.

Scammers use whatever account info you provide to either access your account or else simply go along with whatever details you provide to "verify".

If you found a phone number to call by searching using Google, see here to report the scam ad:

https://community.ebay.com/t5/Ask-a-Mentor/Customer-Service-Scam/m-p/32871580/highlight/true#M188689

eBay does not have a public phone number for customer service. The only way to contact eBay is by going to ebay.com and requesting a call back through the Help & Contact page, or through an eBay social media account.

Use the "Contact us" link on the Help & Contact page and follow the prompts for your issue and you should eventually wind up on a page with a chat option. Choose that, and the last option that appears in the chat window -- use the "See more" option -- should be "Contact an Agent" to request a call-back if you are in North America.

https://community.ebay.com/t5/Selling/How-do-I-contact-Customer-Support/m-p/32016431#M1783851

If using the "Contact us" link takes you directly to the chat assistant window, you may have to enter some context dependent cues to get to the call back link.

Or you can contact eBay via social media:

https://twitter.com/askebay

https://www.facebook.com/eBay/

Unfortunately, gift cards are like cash, which is why scammers specifically ask for them, and once the money is spent there is little recourse at that point.

https://pages.ebay.com/giftcard/faqs.html