A little something for you to keep your eyes on.

About six weeks ago I sold a van to a company who eventually could not get
finance for it, and so could not take delivery. I hate it when that happens,
but it happens, not their fault and we all part unsatisfied, but not
unfriendly.

So I placed an ad in this groups entitled 'PANIC SALE' - after all, I now
had an eighteen thousand pound van that I needed to get rid of quickly.

I was pleased when I got a reply within 24 hours, from someone calling
themselves 'Swizzee' saying that they would buy the van. 'Swizzee' also
calls herself Sandra Cole.

She sent me a company cheque drawn on an offshore account for £25,000,
asking me to take my eighteen thousand, and send the remainder to her via
her shipping company who would contact me to arrange collection.

Two days later I got another email from 'Christian Ronaldo' (it was off
season) with the same story, but sent me a bankers draft for £22.500, with
me to send the remainder back to him.

Naturally, both cheques bounced double quick, but in the meantime I had lots
of emails from both parties asking me to send 'their share' as soon as I'd
received the cheques - but before they'd cleared.

Our friend Ronaldo even send me a second fake bankers draft without my
asking for it!

The police weren't interested, because they said that as I'd held onto my
goods until I'd got cleared funds, there was no fraud.

I found myself wondering how naive someone would have to be to write a
cheque out and part with a vehicle without waiting for payment to clear, but
perhaps some people are more trusting than I am.

There is a serious warning for anyone reading this email though. When
dealing with anyone, even if you know them, if they are paying you by cheque
or even bankers draft, wait until the bank tell you it's cleared before you
give them anything in return.

A piece of paper is a poor swap for your car or van!

I was pleased when I got a reply within 24 hours, from someone calling
themselves 'Swizzee' saying that they would buy the van. 'Swizzee' also
calls herself Sandra Cole.

She sent me a company cheque drawn on an offshore account for £25,000,
asking me to take my eighteen thousand, and send the remainder to her via
her shipping company who would contact me to arrange collection.

Two days later I got another email from 'Christian Ronaldo' (it was off
season) with the same story, but sent me a bankers draft for £22.500, with
me to send the remainder back to him.

snip

There is a serious warning for anyone reading this email though. When
dealing with anyone, even if you know them, if they are paying you by
cheque
or even bankers draft, wait until the bank tell you it's cleared before
you
give them anything in return.

Personally I'd ask why they didn't send me a cheque for the right amount in
the first place. Any genuine person buying a van for £18k isn't going to
accidentally write a cheque out for £25k.

Peter

"Vans" wrote in message
...
A little something for you to keep your eyes on.

She sent me a company cheque drawn on an offshore account for £25,000,
asking me to take my eighteen thousand, and send the remainder to her via
her shipping company who would contact me to arrange collection.

Two days later I got another email from 'Christian Ronaldo' (it was off
season) with the same story, but sent me a bankers draft for £22.500, with
me to send the remainder back to him.

If the cheques/bankers drafts were genuine it could of been attempted money
laundering see http://www.ex.ac.uk/~RDavies/arian/s...s/launder.html -
you could of been guilty of committing an offence if you had received
payment and returned the surplus.

On Tue, 21 Sep 2004 18:09:35 +0100, Jack Ketch wrote:

uk.adverts.cars , AstraVanMan ,

Tue, 21 Sep 2004 16:28:23 GMT

She sent me a company cheque drawn on an offshore account for £25,000,
asking me to take my eighteen thousand, and send the remainder to her via
her shipping company who would contact me to arrange collection.



Personally I'd ask why they didn't send me a cheque for the right amount in
the first place. Any genuine person buying a van for £18k isn't going to
accidentally write a cheque out for £25k.


I think they wanted a free van *and* a few grand :-)

No, the story is that it's a banker's draft that was originally for
something else, that's why it's for more than your price. And the guy
doesn't want the vehicle, he only wants the change from the fake
banker's draft.
--
Dan Drake

Hi Guys,

I asked the question why was the cheque for more, and I was led to believe
that the person contacting me was some sort of broker, and the remainder was
his/her commission - hell of a commission though.

I do believe that they were after a van and a few grand, or even just the
cash. The two drafts that were sent were not supposed to be used for
anything else - they were supposed to be for a van and their commission, but
the bankers drafts were fakes. The first one looked genuine, but the second
didn't.

But the real point is to advise other people in this list. Most of us would
accept a bankers draft on face value as being safe - I've done it in the
past, but because of other fraud attempt I now verify every draft by calling
the bank and giving them all the information they ask for from the draft -
better safe than sorry.

0700-Vans
"Dan Drake" wrote in message
...
On Tue, 21 Sep 2004 18:09:35 +0100, Jack Ketch wrote:

uk.adverts.cars , AstraVanMan ,

Tue, 21 Sep 2004 16:28:23 GMT

She sent me a company cheque drawn on an offshore account for £25,000,
asking me to take my eighteen thousand, and send the remainder to her
via
her shipping company who would contact me to arrange collection.



Personally I'd ask why they didn't send me a cheque for the right amount
in
the first place. Any genuine person buying a van for £18k isn't going
to
accidentally write a cheque out for £25k.


I think they wanted a free van *and* a few grand :-)

No, the story is that it's a banker's draft that was originally for
something else, that's why it's for more than your price. And the guy
doesn't want the vehicle, he only wants the change from the fake
banker's draft.
--
Dan Drake

AstraVanMan loved his monkey enough to say...
I was pleased when I got a reply within 24 hours, from someone calling
themselves 'Swizzee' saying that they would buy the van. 'Swizzee' also
calls herself Sandra Cole.

She sent me a company cheque drawn on an offshore account for £25,000,
asking me to take my eighteen thousand, and send the remainder to her via
her shipping company who would contact me to arrange collection.

Two days later I got another email from 'Christian Ronaldo' (it was off
season) with the same story, but sent me a bankers draft for £22.500, with
me to send the remainder back to him.

snip

There is a serious warning for anyone reading this email though. When
dealing with anyone, even if you know them, if they are paying you by
cheque
or even bankers draft, wait until the bank tell you it's cleared before
you
give them anything in return.

Personally I'd ask why they didn't send me a cheque for the right amount in
the first place. Any genuine person buying a van for £18k isn't going to
accidentally write a cheque out for £25k.


An additional warning, a bank can clear a cheque within three days but
will still remove the money from your account is the cheque is
subsequently found to be fraudulent. There is no time limit for this,
it can be a month later or a year later.
Don't ask me why it's not the banks fault for clearing a dodgy cheque
in the first place, but it isn't.


--
Trooper
(remove the obvious)
GamerTag: TrooperNeil

Vans ) wrote...
A little something for you to keep your eyes on.

snip tale of selling a van

She sent me a company cheque drawn on an offshore account for £25,000,
asking me to take my eighteen thousand, and send the remainder to her via
her shipping company who would contact me to arrange collection.

This is a pretty well-known scam, but the warning is still useful!
e.g.

http://www.autotrader.co.uk/CARS/new...-template.jsp?
dbid=23732
http://www.autotrader.co.uk/CARS/sell/cc/fr-1.jsp
http://www.fraudaid.com/ScamSpeak/Ni...check_fraud/co
unterfeit_check_01.htm
http://www.data-wales.co.uk/nigerian.htm

etc., etc.

The police weren't interested

Well, nobody was speeding during this sorry episode, were they ;-)

Ian
--
Ian Riches
Bedford, UK

An additional warning, a bank can clear a cheque within three days but
will still remove the money from your account is the cheque is
subsequently found to be fraudulent. There is no time limit for this,
it can be a month later or a year later.
Don't ask me why it's not the banks fault for clearing a dodgy cheque
in the first place, but it isn't.

Yep, that happened to me once. Cheques weren't fraudulent though -
basically I had a lot of cash sitting about for a while when I was at uni,
and a girl in my hall kept on wanting to borrow money, as her bank was
****ing her about in issuing a replacement cash card (as she'd lost the old
one) - had no reason not to believe her (knew her reasonably well), and she
wrote me out a cheque every time. Now I suppose it was my fault for not
banking these cheques sooner (took probably a good month or two, I'm useless
when it comes to doing things like that), but pretty much every one of them
bounced, but a while after the money clearing into my account.

I'd paid them in, and the amount initially got added to my balance, but not
cleared ("available") funds (checking on smile's online banking), then days
later the balance and available funds displayed the same amounts, so all was
fine, I assumed. Then a while later (forget exactly how long) random
amounts of £60, £40 etc., just got removed from my account, with an
accompanying letter (IIRC by post, with the original cheque returned) saying
that the funds weren't available and the cheque had been returned, so they
were taking the money back out of my account. I phoned them up and
complained, saying that they shouldn't have cleared the cheques in the first
place (they totalled around £400), and they have the cheek to inform me that
my problem shouldn't be with them, but with the friend who wrote me a whole
load of bounced cheques. Well excuse me, but if a bank tells me a cheque is
cleared and then months later tells me "oh, actually, erm, sorry, no it's
not, the money wasn't there in the drawing account" then I've got every
****ing reason to be angry with them - anything else is my own business.

So I don't really know what the answer is to be honest? It seems a cleared
cheque is no guarantee of payment - so is a genuine banker's draft the only
way?

Got the money back off her eventually, after months of being messed about.
Fortunately her parents didn't live all that far away, and they sorted it
out (she left uni + all her wages went into an account her parents had
control over, so they paid it off from her money over a few weeks).

Peter

"Vans" wrote in message
...
A little something for you to keep your eyes on.

Well, seems I have one of these cock-f*ckers having a go with the car I had
up for sale...



MSG FROM DATE: 23rd September 2004 01:50AM
Thanks for the immediate reply of my email, i will like you to send the
picture of the car, there is this i will like you to know,this my client
is owning me £3900 , so i told hime abou the car and that he should make
out a cheque of £200 payable to you, but she made me to understand that
he want to make the payment at once becuse of the death of her mother so
he will be able to make the burial arranagement. so i want to end my
transaction
with him this month, so when you get the cheque i will want you to update
me, cash the cheque and send the outstanding balance to my shipping agent
that will come for the inspection and pick up,i want you to assist me in
making sure that the shipping agent do
the work properly. i will want you to send your contact detail so i can
make it avalible for her
YOUR FULL NAME....
HOME ADDRESS.....
HOME PHONE NUMBER...
OFFICE NUMBER AND
CELL PHONE NUMBER.....
waiting to hear your reply.
BEST REGARDS..
GABRIEL....

On Wed, 22 Sep 2004 10:35:58 GMT, "AstraVanMan"
wrote:

An additional warning, a bank can clear a cheque within three days but
will still remove the money from your account is the cheque is
subsequently found to be fraudulent. There is no time limit for this,
it can be a month later or a year later.
Don't ask me why it's not the banks fault for clearing a dodgy cheque
in the first place, but it isn't.

So I don't really know what the answer is to be honest? It seems a cleared
cheque is no guarantee of payment - so is a genuine banker's draft the only
way?

Yep, a cheque can be cancelled up to 6 months after it's date I think,
even if it has cleared into the payee's account. For example, you are
paying for something you've bought on ebay and you send a cheque. The
seller then pays the cheque in and the money clears out of your
account. A month later you still have not received your item, and the
seller isn't answering your emails. You can instruct your bank that
the transaction was fraudulent and they can cancel the cheque. The
money is then returned to your account. I think you have to have a
pretty good reason (ie fraud) for cancelling the cheque though.

--

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