About two weeks ago I listed a car in the local paper here in Nashville, TN for $500.00. The car didnt run, needed a fuel pump and I listed that in the ad. The interior looked like Godzillas playground. Basically the car is a good parts car and I stated that in the ad.
I get a call from a man named Bobby, he has a Middle Eastern accent and was very hard to understand. He says he fixes cars and wants to buy mine and have it shipped to Canada. Ok the first thing I think is this guy is an idiot or con artist. So I go along with his story. He says he wants to call the company that he uses to deliver his cars and see if they pickup cars in my area. He calls back in 5 minutes and says that I am in luck, they do. He tells me that I will get a cashiers check via UPS in a day or so.
Sure enough I get a check via UPS but it is for $2, 450 dollars not $500. So I call Bobby at the number he wanted me to call him at and told him that the check was for too much. He said "What? You gotta be kidding me. How much is it for? " Then he tells me to hold on for a second and he puts the phone down and I hear in the background a phone dialing. Then I clearly hear his side of the conversation and it goes like this. "Did you send the check to Tennessee? You sent the wrong one. The one you sent to Tennessee was supposed to go to Illinois for a different car. I have him on the other line. I will call you back."
Then he picks up the phone I am on and tells me he is sorry, his sister sent out the checks and she got them mixed up. Well I gathered that from the conversation. So then he tells me "Here is what I would like for you to do. Deposit the cashiers check in your bank. Keep an extra hundred dollars for your trouble and send me a money gram for the remaining $1850." Something doesnt sound right, and remember he is going to ship a car that doesnt run 1000's of miles.
So I tell him I have to get a ride to the bank because I dont have a drivers lic. And that I will call him back when I have sent the money gram and give him the confirmation number that he wants. This buys me some time. Now I did the first thing anyone would do and called the 800 number on the check to see if it is legit. The phone number answered to an automated system that said press 1, blah, blah blah. I couldn't actually speak to anyone, had to leave a message. I didnt leave one. So then I looked up the bank on the internet.
I found it. It is a small bank in Lawrence KS. The phone number is different and the web page looks legit but so did the check. So I do some news research on Google and find old news articles about the bank and found some real local sites in Lawrence that talked about things that happened at the bank. So I come to the conclusion that the website is in fact real. So I call the number on the website and ask to speak to someone in the fraud dept. I get a nice lady on the phone and I told her that a man sent me this cashiers check for a vehicle and that I think it might be phony. She asks if the guy is from Canada. I said yes, she said its phony.
Apparently he has been doing this for a while. She tells me to contact my local authorities. So I did. But it doesn't end there. I have a phone number that he answers and I have an 800 number that he is probably getting charged per minute on. I do a search and findout that his 800 number is through easytel canada. I call them and inform them that he is using there nuber in a check scam, they dont seem concerned. So I ask, how much does one pay for an 800 number. She tells me 11.5 cents per minute. Wonderful!!!
So I setup a bogus ad on a large car website for a "good deal" on a car. I found some pics on the net of a nice looking car. I said it was a bank repo and all offers would be considered. I listed his 800 number (It answers as a bank) and his cell number. I listed the car in New York city. I figured there are lots of people there and it is on the other side of the continent so when they call at 8:00 in the morning it is very early in Victoria, BC So I periodically call him and his voicemail box is usually full. He quit answering my phone calls. His phony bank number is still going too. So feel free to give Bobby a call too. Here is the info.
Bobby
Bogus Bank # 866-781-2873
Bobby's Cell 250-885-8288
P.S. In the unlikely event you actually get him to answer or if you leave a message tell him his buddy in Tennessee says hi. I will warn you that he gets real upset with me very easy and he will probably say some things about your mom in a very hard to understand accent. And I always ask him "Bobby why are you so mad? I am the one that should be mad. You tried to rip me off!! Quite amusing.
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