Fraudulent Buyers Using Their Own Name?

In this article Tips on Avoiding Fraud as a Seller, @jdconstriction presents a strategy of shipping to the hub which works well against avoiding fraud by stolen credit card. This works because they can only pickup if their name was on the credit card.

However, in general, isn’t there still a risk that a scammer will boldly use their own credit card/paypal account and credentials, receive the animal, and report it never shipped?

Who has run into this situation, and how difficult is it to win under various payment methods, e.g., Paypal, Square, etc.

@otbp @mbr

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I’m not sure if this is the case with live goods but my wife does a lot of online selling and this happens a lot more often than you would believe.

With PayPal it is a bit of a ballache but 99.99% of the time she has got her money back. It just takes a few calls and if you have screenshot of the transaction taking place (emails/invoices/any communication) it makes it a lot easier.

Always pay for tracking if it’s available. You can watch your item being shipped and even screenshot it on its journey as evidence.

Basically if you take all precautions to ensure your selling and documentation for it are done properly you won’t lose.

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pay for signature required as well…

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Signature is actually not recommended for the safety of the animal. It can result in the animal not being dropped off if they don’t answer the door fast enough, and then the animal goes back to the shipping facility for another day rather than arriving “overnight”.

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I was referring to a signature at the hub to prove they picked it up.

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That is a good point john, I never thought of that. Maybe sorting something out with local breeders might be helpful.

As a example.
Say I want to buy your snake, I pay for it and you ship it but I’m not home when it arrives, have it delivered to (verified and trusted user) gbeathars store/home.
Or even to a local store.

This would take a awful lot to sort out and arrange but it’s better than having a snake spend the night in the back of a delivery van. But it also comes with added “I didn’t receive my snake” complaints, which puts us back at square one.

Maybe something for the future.

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If you ship to hub then the hub requires a signature for you to accept the package so a scammer would not be able to claim they never received the animal because there would be proof of the pickup

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I am trying to formulate what MorphMarket recommends, which could have a lot of impact on many sales. How is this summary:

We recommend sellers ship to a hub and require a signature, for the exact name which was on the payment method used.

Now a related issue:

Right now, a lot of sellers only use PayPal friends and family (F&F) with people they don’t know. While this is against their rules, it’s outside of our system, process, and control and is something we take a neutral stance on since PP doesn’t often do a good job arbitrating disputes. However, with the above recommendation to sellers, it seems like the sellers should then feel confident enough to use standard Good and Services. Thoughts?

Sadly not receiving an animal is not the only claim that can be made and while Paypal does not cover animals purchases, if the person back their purchase with their credit cards they will be able to make a claim (not delivered or stolen if you do a home delivery, or DOA if you do a fedex pickup.)

Now having people sign for home deliveries can be problematic (those drivers do not get people enough time to people to answer the door and might be gone with the animal on the truck the whole day when it happens). Hub deliveries can be problematic too not everyone is within short distance of a hub and there are people with physical limitations not allowing them to go pickup their packages.

Now as a seller it is important to ship to a verified Paypal address or to the billing address unless shipping to a hub, I don’t recommend third parties (like a friend’s house etc) the other important thing and I thing this is where people don’t do enough is that if as a seller you are getting scammed go to your local police department, file charges which will be forward to the recipient PD. A lot of breeders do not do that, they take it as a loss and do not want to waste any more time or energy.

Those scammers have no fear and no incentive to stop if their are no consequences, for me if I run into this type of scam I will not hesitate to file charges and take them to court regardless of how small the amount is even if that cost me money and time, why? because it is a matter of principal.

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I bought two snakes from one seller who asked me to use Friends and Family. I used that method for my deposit on my snakes, and then used Good and Services for the final payment upfront.

The other snake I alsp purchased from morphmarket the seller send a Paypal invoice directly to my email address. While it was sent to my personal email address I was able to pay for it through my husband’s PayPal account (some people think it’s not possible - but it is).

When I start selling snakes in the future I will be using the invoice feature on PayPal. It’s a free service and allows you to send it directly to the buyer, and you can allow payments on the total amount or request it up front. You can also keep track of your inventory of snakes on what was purchased, wants on hold with a payment plan, etc. I wish a lot more breeders would use thr invoice option PayPal offers. It protects the buyer and the seller in the end.

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