Dismantling a Scam: eBay sellers use warranty fraud to make money
Last time I wrote about a scam, it was a PayPal scam around sending a fake letter to an address in your city to win PayPal claims against novice users (not counting Kickfurther which certain companies have used to scam investors). This time its Paypal’s old cousin, eBay which is at the center of the scam.
A few weeks ago my Sonicare toothbrush went kaput. Looking to find a replacement, i saw a seller selling the handle for cheap on Ebay. Since Ebay guarantees purchases, it seemed to be a good deal. I ordered the sonicare toothbrush from this seller who seemed to be some kind of a distributor.
Anatomy of The Fraud
When I received the sonicare toothbrush from Ebay, I was shocked to see that it was shipped by Philips directly. I was sure I bought it off a random account and the Paypal transaction showed me it was a middle aged person on the Easy coast.
However the proof of the fraud was in the package itself. It had a warranty claim with my name on it. Looks like the seller files a fake warranty claim in the name of the buyer stealing their identity.
Ebay is useless (and so is Philips USA)
Despite alerting Ebay to this scam, Ebay has taken no action against the seller. It did have to refund my money as the seller was probably scared that I exposed their scam.
I also alerted Philips to the scam who took some time to find a good team and then just decided to let the seller use their systems and scam others.
Since the identity theft seems to continue and eBay is not doing anything, I have filed a complaint with the State Attorney General so that they have to respond.