Being a hands-on car enthusiast, I’m often looking for car parts. The fun and frustration of buying bits is a subject I mentioned a few issues ago – when I discussed the loose use of terms such as ‘immaculate’ by some very optimistic second-hand parts sellers – but it seems the latest scare for car enthusiasts recently is the increasing number of scams.
This is where a part is found advertised online, paid for … and then never arrives.
And we’re not talking about stuff simply being lost in the mail. No, we’re talking about the shameful, sinful theft by increasingly sophisticated scammers who are, these days, joining various online enthusiast-car pages with fake names.
By ‘fitting-in’ with some casual Hey-I’m-Your-Mate interaction over a few weeks, these scammers seem to be giving people false confidence before duping them of their money.
The scammers are also setting-up fake online ‘shops’ that appear to be proper specialist wrecking yards or parts stockists.
By using stolen names of proper Aussie parts businesses (so a quick online check shows the business to be apparently ‘real’) and often showing weeks’ or months’ worth of updates about plenty of fresh cars/stock/parts arriving, they look legitimate.
Unfortunately, often, it’s all a façade: By stealing the names of proper parts businesses, they’re sucking-in, trapping and ripping-off plenty of people.
So we all need to be really careful. Often, there are clues: Usually these scam businesses don’t display a phone number or street address, request direct messaging for enquiries about any parts for sale and have the on-screen comments turned off.
Sometimes there are pics of overseas cars (LHD, or models not sold here) in the ads … so the pics aren’t legit. I’ve never gone deeper than that, but apparently once an unwitting ‘customer’ makes an enquiry, a quick bank-transfer payment (or a holding deposit, whatever that is!) for these very popular parts is requested …
Boom … the buyer’s money is gone.
So, I don’t want to be too Dad with you all, but please be careful when buying parts. Some people I know of who are far smarter than to fall for a scam, have been lulled into falling for these online scams.
Me? If it’s not someone I know, or I can’t personally look/collect, I usually don’t consider buying. These scams happen with other items, too – from concert tickets to second-hand building materials to kids’ toys or whatever.
I’ve had some of my pictures stolen for a scam. One day last year, a few pics of my ‘Coomadore’ project car’s interior (the blue six-cylinder 1981 VC Commodore I saved from Flynn’s Wreckers in Cooma, NSW; as published here in Unique Cars) were pinched for use in an online scammy ad.
I only hope no-one was ripped off before it was reported… Trust me, Coomadore’s gorgeous original seats were NOT
for sale!