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Can a Paypal payment be recalled?

Can a user fake a paypal payment?

  • I received an email today (from an add posted on Craigslist no less) of someone willing to buy the laptop I posted at $300 for here is the email: "Alright I'm willing to offer you $430 if you can assure me that it's in good working condition,I'm offering you this because i needed it as a B-Gift for friend wedding ceremony,the amount i offered you include shipping cost to his hostel address Via (DHL).your assurance to me about condition of this item is very important to me because i would not be able to meet you to see condition of it due to nature of my job.get back to me with payment request via PayPal to my PayPal ID( XXXXXX)so that i can transfer the money into your PayPal account asap.. Regards" It has all the wording and poor grammar of a scam, but I don't understand how someone can scam me when I request a PayPal payment. If this guy is a scammer, what is he planning on doing?

  • Answer:

    100% scam. There is no buyer. There is only a scammer trying to steal your possession. There is NOT any money going to make it to you but you possession will make it to the scammer if you continue. That is why all scammers demand victims send their possessions via trackable means, so they can watch that electronic item, clothing or jewelry travel half way around the world to their front door. The next email will be from another of the scammer's fake names and free email addresses pretending to be "paypal" saying "kindly send the tracking number and we will release the funds". Paypal does NOT send such emails, ever. Paypal does NOT have escrow or money holding services like that scammer describes. Paypal does NOT demand you send a tracking number before money is sent. EVER. No exceptions. Now that you have responded to a scammer, you are on his 'potential sucker' list, he will try again to separate you from your cash. He will send you more emails from his other free email addresses using another of his fake names with all kinds of stories of being the perfect buyer, great jobs, lottery winnings, millions in the bank and desperate, lonely, sexy singles. He will sell your email address to all his scamming buddies who will also send you dozens of fake emails all with the exact same goal, you sending them your cash via Western Union or moneygram. You could post up the email address and the emails themselves that the scammer is using, it will help make your post more googlable for other suspicious potential victims to find when looking for information. Do you know how to check the header of a received email? If not, you could google for information. Being able to read the header to determine the geographic location an email originated from will help you weed out the most obvious scams and scammers. Then delete and block that scammer. Don't bother to tell him that you know he is a scammer, it isn't worth your effort. He has one job in life, convincing victims to send him their hard-earned cash. Whenever suspicious or just plain curious, google everything, website addresses, names used, companies mentioned, phone numbers given, all email addresses, even sentences from the emails as you might be unpleasantly surprised at what you find already posted online. You can also post/ask here and every scam-warner-anti-fraud-busting site you can find before taking a chance and losing money to a scammer. If you google "yahoo buyer's protection program scam", "fake paypal email scam", "ebay escrow fraud" or something similar you will find hundreds of posts from victims and near victims of this type of scam.

Franklin Bluth at Yahoo! Answers Visit the source

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Other answers

There are numerous ways in which buyers can scam you through PayPal. Here is a site listing some of them: http://www.consumeraffairs.com/online/paypal_02.html

ivxoxvi

It's the classical Nigerian scam; don't fall for it. He's going to convince you that it would be best if s/he gotthe laptop before the payment, THEN you get the payment, but never receive it. To be honest, I bet you there's no wedding; no friend; I'm not even certain if there's even a JOB! You see, this person is OBVIOUSLY a lazy bastard, so s/he's try'na get a free laptop, bacause again, s/he's a lazy bastard! Remember, craigslist is a VERY unsafe place to sell your stuff! My suggestion: eBay. And no, a PayPal payment can only be either made or not. Stay safe, my friend.

My baby has a hitler mustache

Take your money by paypal and not ship you the item.

Kit

There are plenty of Paypl scams 1 - they send you a fake Paypal email that looks EXACTLY like a real Paypal email saying that the money has been sent but due to new security rules will not be credited until after you ship the item and provide the tracking number. Paypal will NEVER ask for this info. If you go to Paypal.com and log in and there is no money it was never sent 2 - they send yuo a fake Paypal email saying money has been sent but you need to click on a link to confirm the transaction, which leads you to a real looking but fake Paypal site where you enter your login and password and your account has just been hacked 3 - they pay you with a hacked paypal account, the money is in your account, you send the item, then the real account holder reports that theft and the money is taken out of your account 4 - they pay you with a real account, then if you don't ship with a tracking number that requires a signature on delivery and you have shipped anywhere but the verified Paypal mailing address, they will claim they never received the item and paypal refunds the money 5 - they pay you with a real account but if you send the package without insuring it, they claim it arrived broken and paypal refunds their money 6 - they pay with a real account, then file a false dispute with paypal saying their account was hacked and there is a fraudulent transaction and paypal refunds the money out of your account Craigslist's first warning is to ONLY deal with people you can meet in person and accept CASH ONLY

Kittysue

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