Shipping to a Third Party for Someone Overseas

[88hurstolds]

I sold an Aluminum Core Support for a LARGE amount of money to a person on this site but it has raised some concerns and has made me VERY wary.

1. Person inquired and asked how much to ship to "city, state", I replied with quote and the purchase was made, ok, so far so good...

2. My girlfriend prints out a label for me (since she had a label maker) through PayPal using the sellers address (not looking at the address and assuming it was to the "city, state" mentioned in the inital quote. I drive to FedEx to drop it off and they wanted nearly $400 to ship and I was shocked. I looked at the address and it's in Europe

3. I contact the buyer to find out what's going on and they told me that they wanted me to ship to a friend so they can ship it to them in Europe. Ok... well you never told me that nor did you give me their address initially all they gave was a city and state, that's it, poor communication.

4. Now I'm not feeling comfortable... the person is pessuring me to send to that address and a week goes by (being Thanksgiving and out of town) till I can look into it further to see if this is safe to do since I was scammed by someone in Cananda back in March... long story but in short the Police do not get involved in international matters.

I call PayPal last Thursday and they state that I must ship to the provided address in order for the transaction to have Seller protection and provide a tracking number showing that it was delivered to that address... well there's no way I'm shipping to Europe.

I start to think, could this be someone in the US using a PayPal account with a European address so as to pull a scam...

5. I contact the buyer and tell them that I cannot go through with the transaction and that if they wanted the item the person I'm shipping it to can make the purchase for them. Well that didn't sit well with them... so I proceed to refund them...

6. I transfered money via eCheck to my PayPal account last Friday (payday) and it still hasn't cleared yet. I did not have funds in my account to do the refund initially and didn't want the linkage from my Bank account to the refund. I rather have it drawn from a PayPal Balance. The buyer is very angry with me, calling me a theif and a scammer thinking I'm keeping his money and is now wanting to soil my reputation since I guess others on this board have sold to him and have shipped to the middle man and I will not... The funds are pending to be refunded to them but he's being impatient, I just got off the phone with PayPal and they said the funds will clear when they clear so for all I know it could happen later tonight or tomorrow.


What would you have done?
Do you think this is a scam?
Thanks guys!

 

[SuperSix]

I would NEVER ship a part like that. DO NOT ship it, and once the funds clear, refund him. I can't say 100% that it's a scam, I will say 99.9% though.

 

[Grumpy]

RUN AWAY !!! Way to much drama.. NO WAY would I get involved !!

 

[Chuck Leeper]

He's "angry".. Tell him to "George Fox", wait until ALL the transaction has cleared... Then do a refund.
Who's the 'a$$hat on this site that's raising so much hell??

 

[PLAINWHITE T]

RUN AWAY !!! Way to much drama.. NO WAY would I get involved !!

Ditto...refund their money and move on.

 

[Silver Fox]

Is the address in the Netherlands? I know a bunch of the American car guys over there from when I lived there, and stay in touch with them.

Rob

 

[Red C5]

Did he pay the $400 for shipping? I would wait until everything has cleared before refunding money. Unfortunately there's a lot of scammers out there. Not saying by any means he is one, just that you have to be careful and protect yourself.

Peter

 

[88hurstolds]

The seller is in Finland and has 21 posts here.
Nesis is the user name...

He doesnt seem to be pulling a scam but Im not 100% and now is giving me a TON of **** and just "doesnt get it" from my point of view.
I think there is a language barrier but its becoming very frustrating because hes starting to make personal comments...

Anyways, hopefully this can be resolved tomorrow... I just hate PayPal, they seem to take longer when larger amounts are involved.

 

[charlief1]

I have done this myself and will be doing the exact same thing for another member in Norway. Get the contact info for the guy that you're suposed to ship to first, refund the money, and then have him pay you and add the correct address to ship to. That way you have everything varified and you're off the hook.

 

[88hurstolds]

Thanks, those were my intentions until he started to make personal comments... I'm just gonna refund and hold onto it and put it back in the basement.
I'm tired of looking at this thing after sitting as a passenger in my two seater truck for a couple of weeks trying to figure this out...