AutoTrader scammer - Jordan Evans [email protected]

I put my car on Autotrader and recieced a lot of emails from Scammers.

Here's a scammer called Andrew Smith and his email address: [email protected]


Thanks for the mail, i am buying this for my son as his birthday gift because i would not be around to celebrate with him i am a petroleum engineer currently on a rig offshore in UK and due to the nature of my work,phone calls making and visiting of website are restricted but i squeezed out time to check this advert and send you an email regarding it. In case if you will want to call me to talk to me on phone you can easily call me on this number +447024041070. I really want this item to be a surprise gift for my son so i wont let him know anything about the item until it gets delivered to him , i am sure he will be more than happy with the item.I insisted on paypal because i don't have access to my bank account online as i don't have internet banking, but i can pay from my PayPal account, as i have my bank a/c attached to it, i will need you to give me your PayPal email address so i can make the payment as soon as possible for the item and pls if you don't have PayPal account yet,it is very easy to set up, go on www.paypal.com and get it set up ,after you have set it up i will only need the e-mail address you use for registration with PayPal so as to put the money through.I have a pick up agent that will come for the pick up immediately you have receive the payment in full.what is your final price including the paypal charges?

Welcome to ScamWarners yellowcar1992 and thank you for posting this information for others to find. Just do not respond to this scammer. That is the best course of action.

Just had the exact same person "andrew smith" email me this about my Golf which i recently put on Autotrader

"Hi,Do you still have it for sale? i will like to make an offer of the exactly amount you want to sell it,payment will be made through paypal and i will arrange for the pick up as well. Cheers, Andrew."

Keep an eye out for [email protected] too (Gemma Scott) Cant even spell her own name for her email.
She sent me this

"Thanks for the response,i am so much interested in purchasing the car and am very okay with your price,but i will not be able to come and inspect it because I'm not in town presently,i would love to know it's present condition and the reason you are selling it.I will arrange for the pick up and delivery through my private shipping agent,so kindly get back to me with your PayPal account email address so that i can proceed with the payment as soon as possible.

Thanks and hope to read from you soon."

I think not.

Welcome to ScamWarners golf_gti. Scammers do not care about your vehicle of anything else. They are trying to get real cash for little to no effort on their part. They would have over paid you for the itme and asked for a refund. You would be out the refund and the other amount including bank charges and probable arrest for passing a fraudulent document.

Thank you for posting this information!

Thanks for the posts - I thought it was too good to be true that someone was actually willing to buy my used car for £25,500 without seeing it or at the very least without asking for a discount.
I did reply saying that it was still for sell and then I have replied telling them the condition. I then said that the car will not be released until the money has transferred into my current account from PayPal. The whole way through they were very understanding.
After discussions with friends tonight (who thought the buyer may be genuine and I should not be so paranoid) I searched the email address - brilliant - great site guys.
The names and addresses I have are:

[email protected] - Jack Evans
[email protected] - William Bright
[email protected] - David Jordan

They are all fakes (and that's a nice word to use) - I will be contacting Autotrader later today to see what they are doing about this issue.
Also, can someone tell me, how do these scammers work, i.e. how do they know that I have just uploaded a car onto Autotrader - some software or are they searching the web all day everyday?
Thanks

Welcome to ScamWarners GoodLuck. We are pleased that our site helped you.

I do not know if scammers on sites like AutoTrader of Craigslist use software or look manually. I believe because of the nature of the sites and the "Reply to" requirements, they sit and manually reply with the same script. That is why their reply is generic saying "item" or "article". They don't know what they are replying about once they hit "reply".

I could be wrong here.

i have been e-mailed by the same scammer, from Auto Trader.
same sea tale.... e-mail addresses :

Sharon Edward [email protected]
Lonny Morries [email protected]

hope this helps someone not to send details of there paypal account to these scammers

Welcome frog! Thank you for this report. It is especially valuable as the second email account is posted here for the first time, so from now on others will be able to verify they are in contact with a scammer by doing a Google search.

It might or might not be the same scammer; they use to trade their scripts.

This one is very popular-listed a car on Sunday night and after an initial enquiry received the following on Tuesday:

Hi,
Thanks for the prompt response.. I am ready to buying it now as a for
birthday gift for brother in-law. I am at sea at the moment as I am a
marine engineer and due to the nature of my work, phone call making
and visiting of website are restricted but I just have to squeezed out
time to check this advert and send you an email regarding it. I really
want the car to be a surprise package for brother in-law so I wont let
him know anything about the car until it gets delivered to him, I am
sure he will be more than happy with the car. I insisted on PayPal as
my mode of payment because I don't have access to my bank account
online and also, I don't have internet banking, but I can pay from my
PayPal account. I have my bank account attached to my PayPal account,
so I will need you to give me your PayPal email address and your final
price as I am really not good at offering so I can make the payments
asap for the car and please if you don't have a PayPal account yet, it
is very easy to set up, go to www.paypal.com and get it set up, after
you have set it up I will only need the e-mail address you use for the
registration with PayPal so as to put the money through. I have a pick
up agent that will come and pick the car up after I have made the
payments for the car...

My Regards.

Really pleased to come across this forum as the it certainly sounded all wrong.

Welcome to ScamWarners Ordinaryjoe. Do you have any other identifying information on this scammer? The script is helpful, but an email address or anything that helps identify the scammer is helpful!

After seeing a very strangely spelt email address from an interested but suspicious buyer for my car on Autotrader, I googled [email protected] - William Bright and found your site great service here, keep it up!

I first saw the email on a phone, so it only showed as william bright, it was only when I read it on my webmail client that it showed as [email protected] - William Bright !!

The emails seem to be written by an idiot as he wasnt interested in the car it seemed, or the details which any serious buyer would HAVE to have asked about.

First - seems normal

Just viewed your listing and will like to purchase it.please what is
the condition and more detail of it. Cheers

Second - seems odd, alarm bells go off, friends think i'm paranoid (I am btw)

Thanks for your mail. am satisfied with your advert price,as am
requesting this transaction should be done via PayPal so the
PayPal charges is on me,If my offer is accepted send me your
PayPal email and your name including your phone# or send me
money request so i can pay you right away I am busy at work and
do not have much time around me.Make sure you get back to me so
that we can arrange for pick up as i will like the item to be
picked at your residence location,so no shipping
Regards.

Third - no mention of details I asked for clarification

Thanks for your mail am very busy and i have my own private
pickup agent,and my agent will take over the packing and
other document all that is required for me to have your money
sent is just for you to get back to me with your paypal email
address or send me money request through your paypal account .
And the pickup agent will be available to process/pick up
the tittle during pick-up and after you must have received your
money cash in hand. I can only feel secured sending my funds
via paypal due to there various security measures at ensuring
safe and secured transaction between buyer/seller. However, if
you feel otherwise, I totally understand.
regards

Just so google picks it up well, this is sent about an autotrader advert, from:
[email protected] - William Bright

Dear William, or should I say willliaam bbriigghttt


Regards

Paul

Welcome and thanks for posting this information. I'm glad Google lead you here and am glad that you are "paranoid". A little suspicion and following your instincts can help prevent you from being scammed.
Please do continue to post scammers here, every bit of info helps someone else from being scammed. When posting scammers, please start a new topic for each.
Let us know if you have any questions.

Well, both Google and Bing led me here and I can confirm that he's still at it.

Now with the name Jordan David Evans and email address [email protected] (up one from the thread title here), but obviously getting a bit lazy with the initial copy-and-paste email as all I received was

Hi,do you still have it for sale?

I also suspect there is another scammer at work on the AutoTrader and BuySell.com sites, going by the name David with the email address [email protected] he had this as his opening message through BuySell.com:

Hi, I have just gone through your ad here and i am satisfied with it so far. Can i inquire about its availability and the final price of this. Waiting to hear from you as soon as you can reply. bye Thanks

...and just a few hours later Dave at [email protected] (notice the similarity?) emailed me through AutoTrader.ca with this:

Hello , I would like to make inquiries about this car, I would like to know if its still available for sale and whats the final price. Thanks Dave

Just to be sure, I replied to the first one and shortly afterwards received the following:

Thanks for the swift response, am buying this as a surprise gift for dad for his birthday so i wont let him know until its been delivered to him and due to the nature of my job,i will not be able to come for inspection,am a very busy type as i work long hours everyday off shore ( am a petroleum engineer) who work at oil rig department,i have gone through your advertisement and i am satisfied with it.

As for the payment,i can only pay via the fastest and secure way to pay online i.e (PayPal) here, as i do not have access to my bank account online,but i have it attached to my pay pal account hence my insistence on using pay pal to pay.

I have a private courier agent that will come for the pick up after the payment has been made and with the issue of my details,transferring the name of ownership and signing of all paperwork will be done by the courier services company agent so you don't have to worry about that. You can now send me your PayPal email so i can pay in and also include your address in your reply.If you don't have a paypal account, you can easily set up one...log on to http://www.paypal.com and sign up its very easy... i would have loved to talk to you on phone but i work mainly offshore and our satellite server has been down due to the bad weather which restrict our calls,please get back to me asap. Yes the message was also from me, i thought i didnt get through to you the first time

David

...which I think pretty much confirms his scammer status

Hope this helps others spot the fakes.

Let's be careful out there

Cheers,
Conrad

Just about half a minute ago I received an email from [email protected] with an almost identical message as the one from [email protected]:

Hi, I want to know if your vehicle on Hebbes is still available for sale. Do get back to me via: [email protected]ersLouisa.

So I guess you may add this one to the scam list as well.

My first post wasn't published, or at least it appears so.

Anyway, I only wanted to confirm [email protected]'s scam status. He's still in business and quite agitated because I haven't sent him any money yet. Be careful if you get in touch with this guy. I think he's rather violent. He sounds quite aggressive on the phone.