Credit card fraud, the postal service's magic trick and your customer with the silly name. It's not a Murakami novel, it's selling on eBay
Summary: morning_rain shared concerns about a package stuck at a USPS facility. They suspect it involves a fraud operation linked to a shipping address in an industrial park that hosts forwarding services with poor reviews. Other participants, including gone.c-33, suggested not acting unless a dispute arises, with caldreamer recommending filing a missing package claim. Some clarified that freight forwarders often cause such tracking issues without necessarily indicating fraud. Suggestions included waiting or claiming the $100 insurance if necessary.
There's a lot of random nonsense going on with one of my orders. I would greatly appreciate any advice or insight. I sold something and unknowingly shipped it to an address associated with a large scale fraud operation. I think USPS refuses to deliver it because they know the address is problematic. It's that, or some other unknown issue. I have no idea what I should do here.
On August 31st, a buyer purchased one of my items. The following day, I packaged the item and shipped it to the buyer via USPS.
I live in Pennsylvania, the buyer is in Portland, Oregon. The package made its way to a USPS facility in Portland over the course of four days. Unfortunately, the tracking stopped updating at that point.
The latest tracking update has been "Arrived at USPS facility" for two weeks now. That's all the info I have. No direct confirmation of a problem, but there obviously is one.
Weird details that get progressively worse:
After the buyer paid, they messaged me saying "I just bought it. If someone says that my address is wrong, don't believe it." I didn't think this was suspicious or even unreasonably assertive, addresses get mixed up all the time.
I showed them the name and address I had on the label and asked if it was correct. They said yes, and cheerfully thanked me. I said "No problem", and that was that.
The name on label was obviously fake (gibberish), but the address was real so I thought nothing of it. People can typically get away with using whatever name they want on a USPS label, the mailman isn't going to knock on the door and ask for "John Donut" or "jkhgjkhjkjklj". Besides, the buyer's account had made hundreds of successful purchases over the past couple of months.
On September 18th, I got one of those shipping label cost adjustment emails from eBay. Apparently, the package in question weighed in at a healthy 0.16 ounces, so I got some of my money back. This is obviously untrue and impossible. I have no idea what this is supposed to mean, but it made me look at this item's order page and realize it was somehow still in transit.
On September 19th (today), I once again looked up the buyer's address on google maps to make sure it was a real place. Yes, it's a real commercial building, situated in an industrial park. This building is home to multiple shipping forwarding services. Forwarding services are legitimate businesses, nothing inherently wrong with that.
I noticed that the buyer's address had a remarkably terrible google reviews rating. Usually, you'd expect that it's just people complaining about how the service is too slow. That's not the case here.
Dozens of people have written reviews warning others about the business. Some claimed that their online shopping accounts were compromised, and their credit card was used to purchase and deliver very expensive items to this nondescript building. Others say the address was used for bait and switch returns.
I then went to regular google and searched for my buyer's address. Reddit threads full of sellers and buyers claiming this address is being used to commit crimes. Apparently, it's been going on for years, with a myriad of schemes affecting users across various shopping websites. There's at least three old eBay forum posts mentioning this address.
This is a well-documented operation. Multiple people have reported fraudulent orders involving items in the same category and price range as the item I sold.
There's a good chance I'm caught up in something bad. My Chinese buyer might be using this seedy forwarding service to receive expensive goods purchased with stolen credit cards. USPS might have finally caught on to this after years of complaints, and are refusing to deliver the package. There's NO hard evidence suggesting my buyer has done something wrong, it's just a guess based on a mountain of concerning anecdotes. With that in mind, what am I supposed to do? Yesterday I was thinking "Great, the postal service screwed up again, I'm about to send an expensive refund and get a negative feedback I can't dispute". Today I'm imagining "It was paid for with stolen funds".
I can't share the address or account because it's a privacy violation, an eBay policy violation, and I don't even have conclusive evidence yet.
gurlcat
·2 weeks agoJust wanted to say kudos for making a very easy to follow post including the relevant dates and bullet points for the various weirdnesses. This one IS kinda bizarre, but it's quite possible that the strange observations are totally unrelated to each other, only making the situation look weirder than it really is.
I agree that the missing package search is the action to take now, and it's refreshing that you already know how to do that.
I don't know if you bought extra insurance, but even if not, if you end up filing a claim for the $100 free insurance, that would recover a significant portion of the loss for whichever of these 2 cameras that would eventually need refunding to the buyer. -I'm kinda surprised you haven't heard from them yet, but maybe they're not watching tracking because they know it always takes a long time to receive any US shipment in China.
The thing about the weight adjustment does concern me for this reason: it sounds like it could be the result of the package being emptied somehow, and that could also explain why tracking has stopped. Sometimes busy facilities notice a problem and just set it aside to deal with "later." Considering cameras are your forte, it's hard to imagine you failing to pack really well, but was there anything about this shipment that could have enabled the contents to fall out? Like maybe one end of a box relying on only one strip of tape or something?
bdmh-enterprises
·2 weeks agoAt 0.16oz the box would not only have to be emptied, it would have to have been turned into a poly bag. Very strange indeed.
Unrelated to the missing delivery scan IMO though. I would suspect the item has actually been delivered but, like Doral FL, it did not get a normal delivered scan. I've noticed this happen at one on Airport Rd in Portland a couple times. I now get sig conf on anything over $200 going to that one. A MMS will come up as 'can't provide info because it was delivered to a 3rd party shipper' or some such jargon if that's the case.
gurlcat
·2 weeks agoI've seen tracking stop after Out For Delivery despite having been delivered, and I have seen Delivered but the OFD scan was skipped. Never seen both missing. Of course it's possible but it would be extraordinary.
LOL I just weighed one of the eBay 6x9 poly envelopes (the smallest one available) and it's 0.23 oz. So I think that adjustment has to be an error, but I don't know if these happen by automation or if humans are involved at all. Anyway so weird!
babyers88
·2 weeks agoIt's not entirely unusual for these places to get a late scan, as already noted file a lost package claim when the time rolls around and see how it plays out either it will update or you will get a check in the mail.
a_c_green
·2 weeks agoI wouldn't say they "get mixed up all the time;" the buyer in this case seems to be aware of a common scam in which someone else spots a recently-sold item and sends a message to the seller to try and fool them into shipping the item to a different address. Your buyer simply confirmed for you that the address you received with the payment was the correct one, so that's that.
The "obviously fake" name on the Addressee line was probably the buyer's account ID for the reshipping service that they are using at that address. The high feedback count would seem to be a good track record.
The reason for a reshipper to have terrible Google reviews is generally that no one goes on-line to loudly announce that everything went fine. A scammer might indeed use a reshipper, but there are also domestic scammers who do not.
If their on-line shopping accounts were compromised, then that is a different fraud that has nothing to do with your eBay sale here. Return switching is, again, a problem not connected to the delivery address but to the person who bought the item.
Right, but again, this address is widely known because they are a reshipping company, not because they are a nest of thieves. Long-time sellers such as myself are well familiar with the Portland reshippers as well as those elsewhere (Miami/Doral is another popular location, as is Maryland or California), but I have shipped to those addresses countless times without a problem.
Regarding your specific shipment, you get free coverage up to $100 of value on Ground Advantage or Priority shipments, so if you are within the window of time when you can file a Missing Mail report with USPS, go ahead and do so.
tsme35
·2 weeks agoIt's a freight forwarder, had a problem last year and was basically told they deliver so many packages, some don't get scanned. If buyer asks, just let them know it was scanned and should be there soon, it help with mine but might not. After 15 days file a lost claim
mamacassidy
·2 weeks agoYou need to Google "freight forwarder". This is a very common thing to encounter when selling on ebay. Yes, there have been some bad experiences with freight forwarders, but there have been many thousands of no-problem sales with them.
As another poster mentioned, I'd not contact the buyer unless they contact you. However, I would file a Missing Mail Search with USPS, and if it's not marked delivered in a couple of days, I'd file a claim for a refund.
gurlcat
·2 weeks agoThe OP said they discovered it was a FF, and made a point to say "Forwarding services are legitimate businesses, nothing inherently wrong with that."
mamacassidy
·2 weeks agoYou're right, I missed that sentence.
But then if he knew what a freight forwarder is, then why is he on here making all these "fraud, magic tricks, customer with the silly names, nonsense going on with my order" statements? That sounds like a person who has no idea how freight forwarders work...
kensgiftshop
·2 weeks agoDon't know why, but for some freight forwarders, USPS has stopped scanning packages as delivered, even though they were.
You look up any freight forwarder, you're going to find a lot of complaints, but doesn't mean the buyer is going to be a problem.
morning_rain
OP2 weeks agoI've never experienced that, so this is good to know. In your experience, have they not bothered with "out for delivery" updates either?
caldreamer
·2 weeks agoFirst off, don't believe everything you read on the internet. Basically, the only facts you know are USPS delayed delivery. The logical thing to do would be to go to USPS.com and file a missing package claim.
morning_rain
OP2 weeks agoI forgot that was a service they provided, thank you for reminding me. I just did it.
gone.c-33
·2 weeks agoDo nothing unless the buyer raises a dispute.
It’s possible the item was delivered and someone skipped the delivery scan. The postal service wouldn’t just decide to stop delivering to an address because they have bad reviews, the lack of scanning is most likely due to the package actually being missing or just not having been scanned.
I would just do nothing for now.
morning_rain
OP2 weeks agoI figured doing nothing was the right idea, but I had to rule out the possibility of there being something I was supposed to do first. It's reassuring that I haven't gotten any messages from the buyer. The weight claim made me wonder what was even going on physically.
You're probably right, thank you.