Scammer from BT

[dlcrow]

I've got a scammer on the hook. I posted a boat for sale on BT and the person wants to send me 4 grand. Any creative ideas on how to string them along?


David

[COUNT]

You could say something like "Due to size issues, I am unable to ship the boat through our local carriers and will have to fly to (insert desired destination) and mail it from there" and try and get him to mail you the plane tickets (of course you'll tell him you'll take the ticket amount off of the boat price, which you know he's never going to buy and you're never going to sell to him).

Or you could say "Hey they won't let me ship it as it is, if you can buy one of those nice boat bags the manufacturers make and ship it to me, I'll send you the boat asap."

You could try the "I looked up your info online, turns out we went to high school together/you live next to my parents/bogus personal connection I'll bring it with me when I visit next week and you can give me the cash."

Or go all psycho satanic worshipper, evangelical, member of the mob crazy on 'em.

Oh, the options are endless .

[bouldrmatty]

This happens every time I try to sell something on MTBR, Ebay etc.. Really frustrating...

At least show interest, and get him to send a check. They usually send it UPS overnight, and this cost them $10. Not much, but at least it is something...

[gh]

Your first mistake was listing it on Boatertalk. Your second was not putting your post in The Eddy.

[gh]

Wow, I was just kidding about the boatertalk part......about an hour after posting this I had a post deleted off boatertalk. Hmmmm....payback?

[Andy H.]

Do a search on scams and you should find where the topic's been dealt with before and links to sites that will teach you how to maximize the damage you do to the scammer. maybe google "scambaiting." They've got some tips on how to minimize any potential damage to you (first - don't give them any personal info).

Good luck stringing him along and hopefully you'll be able to get the a$$hole to shell out more than $10 for overnight mail.

--AH

[dlcrow]

Is this off topic?

[COUNT]

I don't know. It's really tough to decide where some of these threads belong. I figure it's not quite "on-topic" so it's okay in the Eddy.

[Andy H.]

There's all kinds of stuff floating around in "The Eddy" - at least it ain't as bad as what you'd find at Confluence!

[gh]

Just an FYI, dlcrow is a boating partner of mine so I decided it was offtopic partly to abuse him. I think it is offtopic due to being a discussion about scams and not about boating.