eBay Scammers Tried to Rip Me Off

This happened to me yesterday on eBay. In this day and age everyone is well aware that scammers are out there just waiting for their next victim. What happened to me yesterday is mind boggling. Let me start here. I have bought many items off of eBay for years and never had a problem with the sellers or the items I bought. Never once had I felt like I was dealing with a scammer or that I was about to get ripped off. eBay and PayPal have protection plans that help out in case you are taken for a ride.

After using eBay for years as a buyer, I decided to try to sell a guitar I have. The guitar has been listed for a few weeks with no takers. Yesterday, I woke up and checked my eBay account to see if the guitar had sold, and loe and behold, it had sold! I checked my PayPal and sure enough the money was right there. Here's where it gets crazy. At about the same time that morning I got a message from the buyer, or the scammer, still don't know who it was. It was the account that bought the guitar. Same account. Same name. Same name that payed. But this message wanted me to change the shipping address. Red flag! My response to them was that I could not ship to any other address other than the one that was on the account.

Right then, again I received another message from the same account saying that the account had been hacked and he did not buy the guitar and to please cancel the order. I began receiving emails from eBay warning me that the account I was dealing with was compromised. I received several messages from the same account Sunday morning, saying he did not buy the guitar and did not want it. I don't know who I was talking to. Weather it was the scammer, weather it was the real account holder or both. In the lines of messages, it appears that both were messaging me at the same time.

I googled the new address that the scammer sent me. It came back as a known scam address used over and over in other scams and frauds. A shipping port in New Jersey. I though for a minuet that the buyer may have been drunk the night before, bought the guitar and then had buyers remorse. If that was the case, all he had to do was ask me to cancel the order.

It appeared that both, the scammer and the account owner were in control and able to send me messages at the same time. All of this with the very first item I've ever tired to sell on eBay. This caused my guitar listing to be removed and it is marked as "sold". I had to relist it. I would've never shipped to the address that was not on the account any way. Never ship to an address that is not on the account. I would've been taken for the guitar, I would've had to pay back the money. So I would have been a victim as well as the real account holder. He would've gotten his money back but my guitar would be in a shipping port in New Jersey.

Thanks for taking the time to read this. Maybe this will help others to not fall for this scam if you deal with eBay.