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As my youngest is now nearly as tall as me, I have an adult bike taking up space in the garage. It's a half decent, but well used, small framed 29er with an upgraded fork. Not that bothered about getting much money for it, but it's taking up space so needs gone, and I can't be arsed to break it, or arrange postage etc. so eBay is out
Up on Facebook and I'm getting nothing but enquiries from Filipino men. I initially ignored as assumed scam but replied to a couple, one wanted delivered etc so that was out. The latest is offering to collect and wants to meet in a public place in the nearest town, which is fine by me.
But, I have a nagging doubt that there is a scam afoot just due to fact that they are all Filipinos. I also appreciate that there could be a reasonable explanation and I'm being a bit judgemental here.
Am I missing something, or to quote father Ted 'I hear you're a racist now father!'
Look at their profile and look for any indication they are local/in this country, such as photos and places they have liked (often you can see this with default privacy settings) I don't think the Filipino is likely to affect things, they would just use a VPN and open a fake account with a UK name.
I check the profile of anyone trying to buy from me on Facebook
The first few I blocked without checking, the next one had nothing local, but the latest one appears to been local within the last few weeks
Trust your gut. When it comes to FB Marketplace there's so many time-wasters and scammers that the actual genuine ones stick out and are obvious.
Unless you live in the Philippines?
You've accidentally set your location to Manila haven't you?
Trust your gut. When it comes to FB Marketplace there’s so many time-wasters and scammers that the actual genuine ones stick out and are obvious.
^^^ That - proper buyers stick out a mile.
Move along if you feel there’s something even slightly dodgy.
If a buyer asks for a contact number give one that isn't linked to your FB account. I've had a few enquiries recently that on initial inspection / replies liked fine. But then should ask to phone me, I give them my work line - which they never phone and ask for my 'Cell' number....
I sold a bike recently via fb, it was a bit depressing how many scam enquiries I got offering for it to be picked up and paid for by DHL or whatever, however on the bright side, I got a genuine enquiry from a guy who lived less than a mile away who messaged me on a Saturday morning and by lunchtime he’d bought and paid for it and took it away, so stick with it, just be careful!
Nowt to add but, out of curiosity, would a courier ever carry cash to pay on collection? Curious if the scam has any truth behind it.
Couriers won’t pay on collection, not sure how the scam works tbh, but they are conniving ****ts (scammers - not couriers!).
I'd be a bit wary too, but the hospital I work in pretty much runs on Filipino nurses so I wouldn't rule it out as a genuine enquiry
Is there any kind of port nearby? Lots of Filipinos on ships and prices of some goods make "exporting" a worthwhile additional income.
If it looks scammy feels scammy seems scammy etc etc
I'd go along with the seemingly genuine guy with due caution- as in be ready to bail if it even starts to look dodgy. I had a similar thing once when I was selling on a former pub pool table. I was contacted by a buyer from Africa, can't remember which country, who was happy to pay full asking price, and told me he would drive to my house and collect it. He was in London, which all started to sound really dodgy as I'm in Yorkshire, but as he was offering to pay cash on collection I gave him my address. I was incredibly sceptical but couldn't see where the scam would unfold. He turned up about 1am with a couple of buddies and loaded the table into a hired luton van which already contained three other pool tables. Over the obligatory cup of tea he explained that pool was a massive craze in his country, and he would make a decent profit exporting them. He was keen to make sure the coin slot mechanism worked.
So as others have said, Fillipinos might just have a special market for used bikes.
Update: The guy who was coming to get it, suddenly couldn't due to working overtime for the entire weekend.
Almost immediately I got another message from a new buyer, same ethnicity, asking if the bike was available and they could arrange collection...So seems like it was a slightly longer scam with the same end game.
Anyone want a small framed GT going cheap, sigh.
FB is full of dodgy profiles, based in other countries, who reply to all my ads.
There's also a lot of adverts for underpriced things or giveaways which are all connected to similar accounts.
Ignore or block as needed.
monkeyboyjc
If a buyer asks for a contact number give one that isn’t linked to your FB account. I’ve had a few enquiries recently that on initial inspection / replies liked fine. But then should ask to phone me, I give them my work line – which they never phone and ask for my ‘Cell’ number
Out of interest are you concerned they may hack your FB if you give them the associated cell no? If not why the concern?
Loads of 'Hospital folk' like bicyles ...
30,000 Filipinos working in Hospitals
If you're meeting in the park/tesco car park /outside a police station - take same precutiations as any 'Nationality' 🙂
Out of interest are you concerned they may hack your FB if you give them the associated cell no? If not why the concern?
It's theoretically an issue if they have your password and SMS is your 2FA, cloning numbers isn't impossible. You'd probably have to be a high-profile target to merit the effort though.
The red flag here is the word "cell" rather than mobile, I expect.
The red flag here is the word “cell” rather than mobile, I expect.
Yeah, I’ve always thought it a bit odd that the first cellular network in the U.K. was Cellnet, or BT Cellnet, but the term never got traction here.