Is this Legit? Something I haven't seen yet in my 23 years of being here.
So, this seller has a rare coin up for sale. It has a few bids on it already but at the bottom of the listing, it shows a link to their eBaystore with what they will take for the coin. When you go to the link it takes you to the second page where you can make the offer they want for the coin. You fill out the info, name, and address stuff, click and it comes back with they will let you know if your offer was accepted. (Photo.) The seller has almost 10,000 100% FB. Any thoughts?
22 comments
redmodelt
·2 years agoRE the verbiage shown in the original post, yes I have seen very similar wording used a few times in Model Railroad listings. The one person that does it, gets called on it, cleans up their act for a while then goes back to it.
mike_jayroe
·2 years agoI would not trust this seller. Sounds like a rip-off artist at work.
dbfolks166mt
·2 years agoAs others explained it's a scam. Report the listing to eBay.
udoittwo
·2 years agoI honestly did try to buy this lot of coins. Fortunately, the way they are set up, they could not receive my payment so they got nothing from me.
They are contacting me now wondering about the payment and yes, they had a long list of "auctions" and they wouldn't accept any bids and all started at $.99 with FREE shipping. One that got me was 2500 vintage estate t-shirts. Starting at $.99 with FREE shipping. Wonder what it would cost just to ship them?
I've been buying on eBay for years so I trust it all. This "PAWNSHOP" has 4300 feedbacks and at 100%. Is that even real?
How they do remove every previous email as soon as I got a new one? The old ones were gone. Not deleted, not anywhere in any of my folders, just gone?
Can't eBay get in front of this?
dbfolks166mt
·2 years agoI honestly did try to buy this lot of coins. Fortunately, the way they are set up, they could not receive my payment so they got nothing from me. Even more evidence this is a scam. Every seller is setup under MP to receive payments.
They are contacting me now wondering about the payment and yes, they had a long list of "auctions" and they wouldn't accept any bids and all started at $.99 with FREE shipping. One that got me was 2500 vintage estate t-shirts. Starting at $.99 with FREE shipping. Wonder what it would cost just to ship them? Not only are they a scammer they are a few fries short of a Happy Meal.
I've been buying on eBay for years so I trust it all. This "PAWNSHOP" has 4300 feedbacks and at 100%. Is that even real? Possibly if in fact the actual account has been hijacked.
How they do remove every previous email as soon as I got a new one? The old ones were gone. Not deleted, not anywhere in any of my folders, just gone? That's a new one will have to defer to others on that one.
Can't eBay get in front of this? Surprised eBay has not suspended the account. I searched but could not find one of their listings.
eburtonlab
·2 years ago@udoittwo
[udoittwo writes]
I've been buying on eBay for years so I trust it all. This "PAWNSHOP" has 4300 feedbacks and at 100%. Is that even real?
If you used the link in the now-removed listings, that is not an actual eBay page -- you are (or were) looking at a spoof site.
Look closely at the page address. Real eBay addresses must have a slash immediately following the "ebay.com".
eBay usernames cannot have capital letters.
There is an actual username "pawnshop" account with 4300+ feedback, but it has nothing to do with those fake listings.
wastingtime101
·2 years agoYep. And I suspect the seller's account that was hacked from the listing the OP saw is the same seller's account that udoittwo saw. I found several posts on this forum, and several posts on other forums all between Nov 6 and today. The hacked account had 74k listings up that were taken down within 2 days.
The "pawnshop" account which is used in the scammers off-eBay emails does not match the account that was hacked and had listings posted.
From what I read on another forum, the scammer throws up tens of thousands of listings on a hacked account, and when they're taken down they move on to another hacked account. In the 24-48 hours the listings are up they harvest countless emails to pull their off site scam.
lacemaker3
·2 years ago@udoittwo,
On your other thread, you posted this picture of the listing you tried to purchase:
Would you please take a screenshot of the URL for that page, and share it with us? It's in the address box at the top of the browser window.
That would help us figure out if it was really that seller's listing that the scammer was using. I think there's a chance that that they just used the seller's user ID, and didn't really post the listing on their account. I would like to confirm if they did or not.
4pawsup*
·2 years ago@udoittwo When you receive a message or email take a screenshot of it before you close it. Save them and you will have a record of all the emails.
slippinjimmy
·2 years agoThe reason the emails
"go away" is that they don't originate from eBay.
A giveaway is that they are sent to the buyers actual email address. On many email systems you have to dig deep to see that info.
toomuchstuffagain35
·2 years agoCheck out the Buying board. There's a thread about another similar one going, as eburton said the "pawnshop" scenario.
safetyfirst5-91
·2 years agoThere is a similar story here.
https://community.ebay.com/t5/Buying/Is-this-a-valid-posting-method/td-p/34088632/jump-to/first-unread-message
oldwestcoins
OP2 years agoYep, same scam. Thanks
itsjustasprain
·2 years agoScam - as others have described (and that style of ebay logo in the 'ebay store' banner has not been used since 2012). Probably a hacked selling account. Look at the other listings by that seller and you will probably find a big hodgepodge of other completely different items with the same description. That text you showed is probably an image (in the listing) to hinder description text searches for other listings with the same scam wording.
They want to cast a wide net and lure as many bidders offsite as possible before Ebay shuts them down.
oldwestcoins
OP2 years agoAfter further checking, I found the seller shows a California location but on their ABOUT page, they show the United Kingdom. Most of their listings show this same bottom BIN verbiage. Yet in the listing, I was interested in shows a business card in the lower right-hand corner of the two photos as THE BOSTON COIN which after checking is a valid name of a coin show in Boston, Ma.
I got off the phone with eBay support and she concurred that they cannot list like that. She did notice that only the NEW listings show the BIN link on the bottom. Looks like this seller got hijacked.
reallynicestamps
·2 years ago@oldwestcoins
I got off the phone with eBay support and she concurred that they cannot list like that.
The phone reps have a terrible reputation for getting you off the phone as soon as possible even if that means giving you the advice you want to hear instead of the advice you need to have.

https://www.facebook.com/eBayForBusiness/ — Message button in upper right on landing page.
https://www.instagram.com/ebayforsellers/

https://community.ebay.com/t5/Selling/How-do-I-contact-Customer-Support/m-p/32016431#M1783851 -> Automated Assistant, type AGENT -> enter. You will then get more options.


The social media Chat accounts are covered by trained eBay employees with some authority.
And you get a transcript so you can compare what you heard with what you were told.
There is also a Report button on every listing.
And of course, @kyle@ebay might want to take a look at it for forwarding.
eburtonlab
·2 years agoSounds very similar to the "pawnshop" scam that involves hijacking an existing eBay account, listing hundreds of auctions for luxury items starting at 99 cents to attract attention, and including within each auction an image directing users to contact the seller off of eBay via email to make a purchase.
eBay eventually pulls the listings before the auctions end, but by then the scammer has collected many email addresses of potential victims so the scam can be continued via email. The scammer will typically contact the victim and either request payment via an untraceable/irreversible payment method or direct the user to another scam site.
No idea whether this seller is following the same script, but obviously if the transaction takes place off of eBay, there is no protection via eBay, and a minimum the seller is violating eBay policy and avoiding eBay fees, and encouraging buyers to get involved in risky off-eBay transactions.
wastingtime101
·2 years agoDid you check every URL along the way and are you sure they were all eBay.com domains?
I'm not in the market for coins. If you want to PM the item number to me I'm happy to take a look at the listing and let you know what I think. At face value it sounds like an off eBay transaction, possibly even a scam.
klhmdg
·2 years agoLooks to me like they are cutting eBay out of the FVFs.
lacemaker3
·2 years agoAnd also doing an end run around the eBay Money Back Guarantee.
No buyer protection in that case.
12345jamesstamps
·2 years agoNot legit per eBay rules and regulations.
mtgraves7984
·2 years agoIs this Legit?
Well, it's mighty dicey at the very least. Dang.