The Hazards of Handling Foreign Orders
Product Order Scams to Avoid
BY NOW, I WOULD HOPE that most product sellers are aware of the many variations of product order scams running rampant on the Web. One of the most common scams always begins with someone from Nigeria, Ghana, and even London who contacts a seller on the Web saying they want to place an order (sometimes large, sometimes small) for one or more products advertised on the business owner’s Web site.
What these con artists are really trying to do, however (besides order with stolen credit cards or counterfeit money orders), is get the business owner to go out and buy other merchandise for them and ship it along with the ordered merchandise. This scam is being tried not only with small craft and homebased businesses, but manufacturing companies and other retailers, even individual sellers on eBay.
I’ve received many reports from individual sellers who were either victimized by such people, or avoided the scam when they found my series of articles on this topic.
According to one article I found, Christian retailers are frequently hit with scams requesting large quantity or high dollar-volume orders that invite sellers to participate in transferring funds into their U.S. bank accounts. Some even involve sending checks to prepay for goods. Another scam involves requests for used Bibles.
Whether you’re doing business on the Web or merely Web surfing, you simply MUST develop a suspicious nature and not automatically trust everyone, especially someone from Nigeria or Ghana. Several sites on the Web have addressed this problem, so I am linking you to a couple of those sites here:
- Fraud and Scam News – for the latest on Email Scams, Phishing and Internet Fraud
- FraudAid.com – to learn how to verify the authenticity of a regular check, cashier’s check or money order. This site includes a wealth of information about Nigerian scams and how to protect yourself from financial loss.
- Federal Trade Commission (FTC). Visit this site and search for “Nigerian scams” to turn up many pages on this topic.
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