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Dirt On Your Dirt-Bike
By Will from Holland
People are putting large dollar ‘toys’ for sale on the Internet. Dirt bikes, boats, cars, etc. are sold on Web sites like ebay all the time. The sellers get responses via email from prospective buyers.
One guy listed his dirt bike for sale on his dirt bike club’s website. What could be safer than that?
Very quickly, the guy received a lot of responses, but one person in particular wanted to buy the bike right now. Nice!
But there was one hitch: the buyer wanted to pay with a “certified” check, made out for more than the cost of the bike. “But that’s okay,” the buyer said, “I trust you, so you can send the balance back to me, and then I’ll pick up the bike.”
The young seller talked with friends and was told that “Certified” and “Cashiers” checks are like cash. (They are if they are real.) He deposited the certified check in his credit union account, and sent the overpayment back to the buyer.
That’s when the credit union got involved: the “certified” check was a forgery and bounced. Forged “certified” or “cashier’s” checks are getting to be a big problem. Our member was out $6000.
What happened?
Our member was taken by a version of the “Nigerian” scam.
Here’s what a consumer expert has got to say about these scams and how to avoid them:
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Counterfeit Cashiers' Checks—a twist on the Nigerian Money Scam
How the scam works…
You have a fairly valuable item for sale at one of the online sales or auction sites. Sellers of such items as cars, furniture, boats, and even purebred puppies and horses have been hit by this scam. A potential customer calls from overseas—usually from Nigeria or West Africa but they could be from anywhere. Let's say you've advertised a car for $2,000. They say they want to buy your car. To pay for it, they'd like to have a creditor in the U.S. who owes them $7,200 send you a cashier's check for that amount. You deposit that check in your account and when it's cleared, they'll trust you to wire that money to them. You say yes.
What went wrong…
