Relentless overseas scammers
Having issues with overseas buyers purchasing items off my store and trying to ship them to sketchy 3rd parties.
When I refund their money because I don't ship to 3rd party re-shippers, they delete their account and try again a few days later.
Each time with a slightly different name.
I've noticed when you click on their profile, it directs you to a different eBay seller. Typically one that has years and years of sales history. But that's not the account that are using. I don't know how they are doing that.
I know these are scammers looking to steal my designs.
As car parts I sell are for vehicles that do not exist in China.
Ever since this started happening my eBay is sales in general have plummeted.
I'm assuming the eBay algorithm is punishing me for canceling orders.
How am I supposed to deal with this?
It's relentless, non stop every week.
And it's hurting my store by a huge margin.
reallynicestamps
·2 years agoFreight forwarders are the second safest addresses you can ship to. Safer than an apartment house mail room or a suburban porch.
Most of the MBG does not apply to shipments sent to forwarders.
https://www.ebay.com/help/policies/ebay-money-back-guarantee-policy/ebay-money-back-guarantee-policy?id=4210#specialcoverage-inr
And while the MBG still applies with Not As Described disputes, you are only required to supply the Return Shipping Label to the forwarder's address.
I know these are scammers looking to steal my designs.
In passing.
"Your" designs? How do they fit a mass manufactured car if they are not copies of the manufacturer's part?
Before I cancel the order, The buyers account will show a completely different store front.
Not this account, but another Store I have has a different name than my eBay account.
It's not unusual.
I really should change it since I don't even use the Store name on my address labels.
steph-bagne
OP2 years agoParts that I make are completely unique.
I design, engineered, & modeled everything myself.
But as I said in the post above apparently they got one of my designs unfortunately.
It was before I was really vetting addresses closely.
dbfolks166mt
·2 years agoParts that I make are completely unique.
I design, engineered, & modeled everything myself.
But as I said in the post above apparently they got one of my designs unfortunately.
It was before I was really vetting addresses closely.
If you are the IP owner then become part of the VERO program and you can have postings removed if they infringe on your IP rights.
https://www.ebay.com/help/policies/listing-policies/selling-policies/vero-policy?id=4349
gurlcat
·2 years agoCorrect me if I'm wrong but I don't think anyone in the thread tried to assure you that freight forwarders are safe when it came to the particular fears you expressed, only that they're safe when it comes to the fears eBay sellers typically have (INR scams, return scams, etc.).
But as for design copying, I still don't get what you think the FF's have to do with that. They are just middlemen, and if it's not 'this' one it's 'that' one .... and if a manufacturer in China was absolutely determined to get their hands on one of your items for copying, and it appreared you were resisting by cancelling all orders with FF addresses ...... they would just figure out some other way, like pay a FF extra to let them use their home address rather than the strip mall office or whatever.
What is the title of your item that they copied? This I gotta see.
steph-bagne
OP2 years agoThey copied my item name &
Description.
And of course the design itself.
But since eBay doesn't care about IP rights, I'm out of luck.
But, it looks like they haven't sold any so far.
Jokes on them, the community I make parts for is VERY small.
& Since The part is incredibly difficult to manufacture, they only managed to undercut me by 10%.
Usually the China boys can under cut by 1/2 .
I'll be more diligent next time.
gurlcat
·2 years agoCan you post a screenshot of your listing and then one of the copycat's?
steph-bagne
OP2 years ago china copy on top. My legit item on the bottom.
Search for those titles and 27 China listings show up.
The description is basically a copy paste of mine just mixed around.
If you notice they don't even include a real photo of the item. Just a rendering.
So annoying.
gurlcat
·2 years agoIt's interesting that they didn't include 'Camaro' or 'Firebird' in their title. I wonder if there was a reason for that, seems like it would be a real handicap for this item to be visible to owners of those models who use the model name in their searches. Ha, dummies. And I don't think the slight amount of $ savings will make up for the fact that you can't even see photos of the real item, also I bet your feedback and history is better and longer -I can't speak for all buyers but those things matter to me; I will definitely pay more to a more trustworthy-looking seller. Also if I know car pimpers, they don't want to wait for their next modification; they want it YESTERDAY, and yesterday aint coming from China, ha.
steph-bagne
OP2 years agoWell the thing is, the Chinese have no idea what a Camaro or a Firebird is.
So they can't write accurate descriptions.
But whatever, I'll be more diligent next time.
Always learning.
gurlcat
·2 years agoNow when you say you'll be more diligent, just to reiterate, I don't think cancelling orders with freight forwarder addresses is going to stop a diligent copy cat who really wants to get their hands on a creative specimen for copying. What's more, every cancellation is a risk of the buyer reporting you for it, and that can get your account crippled badly and even shut down. Starting your own website would certainly enable you to set your own rules, but you realize it would take years to establish a buyer base, whereas eBAy has a huge one built-in.
steph-bagne
OP2 years agoWell, my fears were correct.
I accidentally let an item ship to that same RE-SHIPPER address everyone here was telling me was "legit".
Now there's 21, TWENTY ONE! Chinese eBay accounts selling a combined 2,100 counterfeit copies my my item.
Undercutting my price of course.
Amazing.
I think I'm gonna try out my own e-commerce website.
Between dealing with an onslaught of Chinese scamers, I pay a crazy 14% commission to a group of people who don't care about sellers.
And surprise surprise, that Chinese account that purchased the item is now DELETED.
Doesn't exist.
a_c_green
·2 years agoYour first post here was 11 days ago. Are you saying that within the past 11 days, 2,100 counterfeit listings have appeared for your part? (That would include the days spent getting the part forwarded from the U.S. to China, tooling up for copies, getting listings prepared for 21 accounts, etc.)
I suspect that they had their hands on a sample a lot longer ago than that. Which item are we talking about here?
steph-bagne
OP2 years agoNo, apparently before I started noticing the China boys scammers I let one ship to that 3rd party reshipper.
The same address I mentioned above.
That was December 22nd 2023.
The copy cat item listings are almost all new within a week ago.
I guess on the positive side, because I water marked all of my photos; they couldn't steal any.
That and that and they don't have the cars that I'm selling parts for so all all their photos are just CGI nonsense.
It's all so tiresome.
ajw2203
·2 years agoI think the freight forwarders are good for sellers. If a buyer from Kuzcek, Kazakhstan wants to return an item you only have to pay return shipping from the USA address. The buyer is not going to send the item back to the freight forwarder.
gurlcat
·2 years agoAgree 100%. For MOST of us it is only a matter of whether the buyer could pull a scam or not, and in that regard overseas buyers are actually safer than American buyers (even more true if they buy through Ebay International Shipping).
But the OP's concern is a totally different thing. They're not worried about return scams or anything like that -they create and sell original designs for car parts, and they are concerned about Chinese manufacturers purchasing their items to copy and sell cheaper. It's a legit concern and hard to navigate preventing it.
I remember hearing about a Chanel luxury store in France prohibiting Chinese customers from buying their handbags, due to counterfeiting concerns. But I mean ..... if we're talking about banning customers in-person, based on their appearance .... that's the definition of racial profiling, and someone who "looks Chinese" could be from any Asian country or even a Chinese-French citizen, with zero ties to manufacturers in China. Yikes.
dbfolks166mt
·2 years agoAgree 100%. For MOST of us it is only a matter of whether the buyer could pull a scam or not, and in that regard overseas buyers are actually safer than American buyers (even more true if they buy through Ebay International Shipping).
From a scamming perspective both the EIS program and eBay's policy regarding FF's absolutely provide better seller protection for international sales than sellers have for domestic sales.
But the OP's concern is a totally different thing. They're not worried about return scams or anything like that -they create and sell original designs for car parts, and they are concerned about Chinese manufacturers purchasing their items to copy and sell cheaper. It's a legit concern and hard to navigate preventing it.
If China wants to obtain the design it can easily be accomplished a multitude of ways. Given the amount of counterfeiting taking place in China I am quite sure there are a number of Chinese businesses that have established contacts in the US that simply obtain the items they are looking for and ship them directly to China or route them through a FF once they have received them.
I remember hearing about a Chanel luxury store in France prohibiting Chinese customers from buying their handbags, due to counterfeiting concerns. But I mean ..... if we're talking about banning customers in-person, based on their appearance .... that's the definition of racial profiling, and someone who "looks Chinese" could be from any Asian country or even a Chinese-French citizen, with zero ties to manufacturers in China. Yikes.
Globalization.
gurlcat
·2 years agoYup. While I feel for the OP, there's essentially no point in waging a 1-man battle against a whole nation with utterly abysmal business regulation, in the Information Age. Especially considering he (probably correctly) assumes eBay punishes his account for so many cancellations. He didn't say how many, what menu reason he chooses or whether he's had buyers report him, but it's risky every time.
luckythewinner
·2 years agoBut when the buyer's account hyper links to a completely different account
I don't see how a scammer would be able to accomplish this.
Or when the address provided has nothing but forum posts saying "GOT SCAMMED BY THIS RE-SHIPPER"
That is the nature of this board. Very few people come to this board to report that a transaction went smoothly. You generally only see comments here when something goes wrong. And most of the time you read those threads, it was not the re-shipper who did the scamming.
dbfolks166mt
·2 years agoBut when the buyer's account hyper links to a completely different account
I don't see how a scammer would be able to accomplish this.
Possibly a seller searching for buyer items and using different guest accounts to make the purchases and keep track of the orders?
It would be a perfect way for Russian buyers to work through Chinese sellers to place an order through some communication channels and have the seller locate and purchase an item, have it shipped to the seller in China. The Chinese seller simply turns around and sells it to the Russian buyer outside of the eBay process.
gurlcat
·2 years agoBut when the seller sees the buyer's i.d. on the order page and clicks on it to see the buyer's profile, how could it be a profile for a whole other account (even both accounts were started by the same person)? They would have to hack eBay's navigation software, wouldn't they?
dbfolks166mt
·2 years agoBut when the seller sees the buyer's i.d. on the order page and clicks on it to see the buyer's profile, how could it be a profile for a whole other account (even both accounts were started by the same person)? They would have to hack eBay's navigation software, wouldn't they?
I am unsure since OP has not posted screen shots I was just hypothesizing about a possible way this could be taking place. I am not sure if you can purchase an item as a guest while using an established account similar to the way you can enter a different shipping address for an item that is different from your registered address the way buyers do with freight forwarders. I have no way to test this it was just a theory.
gurlcat
·2 years agoYeah it's a head-scratcher for sure. I really think the OP didn't see what they thought they saw, and I provided one possible way to tell (message #9) but unfortunately as is so often the case, the OP has left the building ...... sigh.
soh.maryl
·2 years agoJust checking -- you aren't referring to overseas buyers who use freight forwarders, are you?
gurlcat
·2 years agoDid you mean buyer? Or maybe they are also a seller, but in this transaction they bought from you. Often an account name is different from address name (and store name, if they are also a seller) so if you're going by name alone, that's not proof of what you're saying.
If someone has figured out a way to hack and hijack eBay's navigation software .... that would be on a whole other level beyond sending phishing emails and what-not. So either you're mistaken or you're the first to report something huge.
steph-bagne
OP2 years agoBasically every time I cancel and refund an order, The buyer's account becomes "no longer a registered user".
Before I cancel the order, The buyers account will show a completely different store front.
A storefront with a completely different name and usually something well established.
But when I cancel the order, that username will just default to "No longer a registered user"
gurlcat
·2 years agoUgh in this case it is so frustrating that you can't show us. Well you could show screenshots but you would have to blur out the names, and the names matter. But HERE'S something you can do ... blur out the name but not the feedback number next to it. If that number matches that of the "Storefront" then it is the same person. If not, then something utterly novel and scary is going on.
broto_64
·2 years agoSomething isn't right here, let me say this:
When a buyer pays for a purchase it is the seller's obligation to ship that item to the buyer.
It is my suggestion don't go looking into that, doing things such as playing detective by googling the address is not going to work out in your favor. Also I am not sure how you are refunding these buyers but if you are cancelling for reason "problem with buyer's address" or even "buyer asked" ebay can impose severe defects if you're caught (and all it takes is a buyer reports you for "unwilling to complete the sale") and soon it will be your account that is NARU.
So again it is my suggestion simply ship anything and everything a buyer has paid for, don't question it, just ship it.
This I can relate to, I've had my original parts stolen before and the practice has become widespread.
There is however no way to truly stop it, that I know of.
Certainly cancelling sales is more likely to hurt us as sellers than it does them, so be careful there.
I am actually glad to hear that.
Again I've been having trouble with this as well, so diligence on our part should pay off...
Watermarks is good, supposedly against ebay policy but I'm far past caring there.
Odd your item hasn't been duplicated onto the US-ship ebay, many a Chinese copycat have US sellers too... These are far more damaging than China-ship ebay sellers.
One thing I have found that helps is nowadays I sell way more one of a kind items than multi-quantity.
I have also included in my "description" (and item specifics too) a line that states "This item originated from (name of my ebay store)" and am waiting for them to copy that into a listing.
You may wish to check into DMCA takedowns.
Not VERO's, although if you can become a Vero member that would be even better, but DMCA.
Keep in mind most often these copycats are not just on ebay, but I've watched them take my items onto Amazon and Walmart as well (hence why I got into researching DMCA takedowns, have never actually sent one off but I may sometime in the future).
dbfolks166mt
·2 years agoI am not sure what you mean exactly by "sketchy 3rd parties". If you are referring to Freight Forwarders (FF) that is not an uncommon practice. Lots of seller use US based FF to consolidate purchases and save on shipping for the international leg. If you are referring to something else please elaborate.
EBay has, for some valid reasons, never allowed a seller to block based on their registered address the only thing a seller can block is countries they do not ship to. If the buyer is using a US based FF then it doesn't matter what country their account is registered in. In reality you have no idea what a US based buyer is doing with your item once they receive it. They could just as easily be shipping in to some other destination anywhere in the world just as a FF does.
I have shipped a number of things through FF'ers and only had a problem once and in that instance I was covered by eBay policy since the buyer looses money back guarantee coverage once the item has been delivered to the FF. This of course does NOT protect you from CC chargebacks for NAD items.
Interestingly enough with the sanctions against Russia a lot of Russian buyers are purchasing items and having them shipped to Chinese, and other, based FF'ers who receive the items, consolidate the shipping and forward the items to Russia bypassing the sanctions that are in place. Even if the blocks were based on the buyers registered address to impose the sanctions there are easy loopholes around that.
steph-bagne
OP2 years agoI've shipped to legit 3rd party re-shippers before.
That's not an issue
But when the buyer's account hyper links to a completely different account,
Then the buyer immediately deletes their account, Red flags pop up.
Or when the address provided has nothing but forum posts saying "GOT SCAMMED BY THIS RE-SHIPPER"
I tend to not trust such buyers.
Idk what to do when I get spammed with this group or individuals.
lakefor94
·2 years agoJfyi, All freight forwarders have bad reviews. It is normally not an issue with the freight forwarders but with the buyers that have used the freight forwarders over the years.
Unavailable member
·2 years ago@steph-bagne
No one can immediately delete their account, if they are NARUd then eBay suspended their accounts.
steph-bagne
OP2 years agoEvery time I cancel one of these orders the users account is deleted.
eBay gives me a nice red bar that says "no longer a registered user"
Why does that happen every time???
dbfolks166mt
·2 years ago@steph-bagne
No one can immediately delete their account, if they are NARUd then eBay suspended their accounts.
Guest account possibly?
mam98031
·2 years agoSomething is really wrong here.
Buyer, heck any member can't delete their account. They MUST submit a request to Ebay and Ebay has to approve it. The process takes a little time.
IDK what this "hyper link" is about. There isn't a place for a buyer to legitimately have one of those in or on their account.