Scam or safe to buy on Bass Chat?

[Reggaebass]

The way I see it is ,if the money went to a different account to what was typed in then someone has been hacked (unlikely) or it’s a bank error which they are not admitting to 

[BassTractor]

What @JoeEvans and @Reggaebass say.
The banks will never admit this. Imagine the paper article headings ...
They know full well how leaky their software is (which doesn't mean it goes wrong all the time, but means that it isn't entirely perfect the entire time, and therefore something goes wrong once in a while), but the banks are dependent on our trust, so choose to pay out claiming "APP" without, as @TimR rightfully says, any further explanation.

Not saying my take is the only scenario, but am indeed saying it's the likely one.

 

 

Edited October 16, 2023 by BassTractor

[Beedster]

53 minutes ago, Paolo85 said:

When you say that the money went to a different bank account, you mean different sort code and account number (as was my initial understanding), or just different name and address from that provided by the seller? If the former, that's not an APP, just because it does not match the definition, and it's hard to imagine how the seller has any responsability. If the latter that's definitely a scam, a pretty straightforward one, and it should be looked into it closely by the mods I believe

 

 

That's a good question 👍

[theplumber]

3 hours ago, Paolo85 said:

 

Right, I have been thinking this through and I thought it was worth writing a summary, with a question for the OP

 

-The seller gave their bank details to the @theplumber

-The wife of the OP typed the bank details for the payment

-Both the OP and his wife doublechecked the bank details

-The bank details typed were matching those provided by the seller, this was confirmed ex-post

-they made the payment

-the money went to to a different bank account. Now, the question for @theplumber. When you say that the money went to a different bank account, you mean different sort code and account number (as was my initial understanding), or just different name and address from that provided by the seller? If the former, that's not an APP, just because it does not match the definition, and it's hard to imagine how the seller has any responsability. If the latter that's definitely a scam, a pretty straightforward one, and it should be looked into it closely by the mods I believe

 

Yes..everything as above. At the end of the transfer which took about 6 hours it was marked as received to a totally different person,and both the sort code and account number was  totally different. We had checked at least two times during the process and it was showing on the banking app the original name and details of seller and marked pending. We went out late afternoon and I received message from seller to say he had received nothing so we checked the app and that is what we found. I agree with what folk are saying re APP. But as mentioned we have been told in e mail from bank that they calling it an APP. We are still waiting on payment .They say they are looking in to our fraud case and will update us within 15 days. 

[theplumber]

4 hours ago, JoeEvans said:

I don't see any way for the seller to have orchestrated what happened with your banking. My best guess is that they're innocent and that your bank has a problem that they are highly unlikely to admit to. But without screenshots of the process you can't prove it either, so you might just have to accept the refund and move on.

Neither do we...and we are not saying that or thinking that at all. Its as I described and as some folk have pointed out. Its a scam of sorts with the money being diverted at some point to a totally different account whilst starting out with us and indeed the bank with the proper and correct details. And again as for the message from the bank saying it's an APP......It's doesn't by definition actually seem to be that as we set out at the start with the proper bank details going to a trusted seller. We have screenshots if needed of all conversations as it was done through this site and I agree it's a bank issue and we won't ever know what happened that's for sure. I put this up here to find out if it had happened to anyone on here selling and it seems by and large it has not!

[theplumber]

3 hours ago, Reggaebass said:

The way I see it is ,if the money went to a different account to what was typed in then someone has been hacked (unlikely) or it’s a bank error which they are not admitting to 

Yes!

[theplumber]

3 hours ago, JoeEvans said:

I suspect that the bank either simply don't believe the bit about the transfer going to a different account to the one entered, it know full well what caused it and have no intention of admitting to a system fault.

I wouldn't say they don't have to believe as all the process including original details and account it ended up will be on record and we confirmed all this with them. They asked us if we knew the person that the money ended up going to.....But yes if it is indeed a fault in their system as some folk have said or a fraud we won't ever know. And when we do get the money back that's the end of it! 

[Beedster]

Apologies for asking (but hey, you did start the thread), and just to be clear, your wife made the payment, you weren't with her when she made it, you just checked the details after the fact? 

[Beedster]

Just now, Beedster said:

Apologies for asking (but hey, you did start the thread), and just to be clear, your wife made the payment, you weren't with her when she made it, you just checked the details after the fact? 

 

This is her way of blocking your bass purchases mate  

[theplumber]

1 minute ago, Beedster said:

Apologies for asking (but hey, you did start the thread), and just to be clear, your wife made the payment, you weren't with her when she made it, you just checked the details after the fact? 

I was with her. I read out the private message from here with details. She has telephone banking on her phone although it is a joint account.We both checked the details and as folk have pointed out the bank automatic check sends the cash if all details are correct. Also we both checked during the day as I was in contact with the seller re the money coming through. He had parceled it up and was waiting for funds so he could nip out and post it to us. At 4.30pm I got a private message from him saying still no money in his bank....that's when we checked the app and found it had been marked as received...only it was a totally different person and bank details!

[theplumber]

Another thing and nobody has pointed it out...why did it take about 5 or 6 hours to show as payment sent or complete? I have received money from folk straight away in a bank transfer. Speaking to my wife who usually does the banking it say's on the bank app that transfers can take up to 5 hours.  Is this normal?

[Beedster]

22 minutes ago, theplumber said:

Another thing and nobody has pointed it out...why did it take about 5 or 6 hours to show as payment sent or complete? I have received money from folk straight away in a bank transfer. Speaking to my wife who usually does the banking it say's on the bank app that transfers can take up to 5 hours.  Is this normal?

They can do, depends on the bank, I have to send payments to a builder and it's very slow and makes me nervous as hell each time I do it, hence my interest in this thread as we also had a glitch a few weeks back, although it transpired that it's the result of the two banks having multiple checks. I always screen shot every stage, although i wonder how much use that would be if there was ever a major problem as the bank could probably simply dispute the integrity of them, but it's probably better than nothing. A couple of friends have lost large amounts, one through trusting a process that he - or more correctly his wife - was duped into but very very cleverly so, the other through something not dissimilar to what your case appeared to be at first sight, bank account details that appeared to be paying one person when they were paying another. He made the mistake of ignoring the notice on the screen telling him he should only go ahead with the payment if he was sure. 

[Downunderwonder]

On 19/09/2023 at 07:46, TimR said:

been caught in an authorised payment push scam.

That's what they said. But actually that's not what happened according to OP. The seller and OP concur that the numbers were correct and yet the bank sent the money somewhere else.

 

APP scam literally means the receiver is a scammer being sent money deliberately by a duped bank customer. I call bs on the bank.

[theplumber]

20 minutes ago, Downunderwonder said:

That's what they said. But actually that's not what happened according to OP. The seller and OP concur that the numbers were correct and yet the bank sent the money somewhere else.

 

APP scam literally means the receiver is a scammer being sent money deliberately by a duped bank customer. I call bs on the bank.

We contacted the bank again after getting a bit of an odd e mail in which the bank said that nobody was subjected to a scam and went on to say that we were in dispute with the seller!! So we can't take your claim further so we are raising a payment recall...which means they will contact the receiving bank and ask for the cash back. That as we know points to a bank error! As mentioned by some folk. The lady said not to be worried about it but contact them again next week if we don't hear anything. She also said she had never seen anything like this before!!.....

[Beedster]

26 minutes ago, theplumber said:

We contacted the bank again after getting a bit of an odd e mail in which the bank said that nobody was subjected to a scam and went on to say that we were in dispute with the seller!! So we can't take your claim further so we are raising a payment recall...which means they will contact the receiving bank and ask for the cash back. That as we know points to a bank error! As mentioned by some folk. The lady said not to be worried about it but contact them again next week if we don't hear anything. She also said she had never seen anything like this before!!.....

Who do you bank with and which bank was the payment going to? Feel free to decline to answer of course 👍

[tauzero]

22 hours ago, Beedster said:

They can do, depends on the bank, I have to send payments to a builder and it's very slow and makes me nervous as hell each time I do it, hence my interest in this thread as we also had a glitch a few weeks back, although it transpired that it's the result of the two banks having multiple checks. I always screen shot every stage, although i wonder how much use that would be if there was ever a major problem as the bank could probably simply dispute the integrity of them, but it's probably better than nothing. A couple of friends have lost large amounts, one through trusting a process that he - or more correctly his wife - was duped into but very very cleverly so, the other through something not dissimilar to what your case appeared to be at first sight, bank account details that appeared to be paying one person when they were paying another. He made the mistake of ignoring the notice on the screen telling him he should only go ahead with the payment if he was sure. 

 

Sub Zero works for A Bank, in customer service. He's just been investigated as £400k mysteriously moved from one account to another that wasn't controlled by the person owning the first account and he was one of the ones the customer called about it (although the call to him was after the money was moved, not before). I doubt that he'll find out the results of the investigation though. We did tell him that if he'd got it, we expected a cut.

[theplumber]

16 minutes ago, Beedster said:

Who do you bank with and which bank was the payment going to? Feel free to decline to answer of course 👍

We bank with Virgin. The payment was sent to a Santander account and ended up in a Nationwide Building Society account!!

[Beedster]

22 minutes ago, theplumber said:

We bank with Virgin. The payment was sent to a Santander account and ended up in a Nationwide Building Society account!!

 

Not exactly obscure small banks then? Hope this all works out for you @theplumber, and glad it wasn't a stupid amount of money if it doesn't   

[Minininjarob]

If someone says to me they have a problem with their PayPal account I halt the sale and block them. There is no reason to have a “problem” that isn’t self made and all genuine issues can be sorted in minutes as PayPal are very helpful. 
Been using PayPal for over a decade I think for personal and commercial reasons and if you follow their guides you will never go wrong. 
PayPal goods and services and I pay the fees for any private sales I do without having the item in my hands. 

[warwickhunt]

8 minutes ago, Minininjarob said:

If someone says to me they have a problem with their PayPal account I halt the sale and block them. There is no reason to have a “problem” that isn’t self made and all genuine issues can be sorted in minutes as PayPal are very helpful. 
Been using PayPal for over a decade I think for personal and commercial reasons and if you follow their guides you will never go wrong. 
PayPal goods and services and I pay the fees for any private sales I do without having the item in my hands. 

 

Personally I feel the polar opposite; I've been screwed over several times and lost goods and money due to paypal's system/decisions... so it has gone wrong!

 

I sold something to someone (not BC) and they claimed via paypal that the goods were broken/faulty on arrival.  Goods were returned to me and they got a full refund... only the returned goods weren't the ones I sent and despite my photographic evidence showing different serial numbers they closed the case in the buyer's favour.  I also sold an item and the buyer claimed not to have received the item, filed and got a refund.  I provided proof of postage AND a signature on receipt but apparently it wasn't the recipients signature so I was left trying to claim from the courier who washed their hands of it as they had a signature from the person at the address it was delivered to.  I've had several other disputes via ebay/paypal and it has been a right chew on to get resolution.  

 

Hey but we each make our own decisions and each to their own. 

 

[hiram.k.hackenbacker]

I think bank transfers are generally quite safe, but I always only send a very small percentage of the total cost to the seller and ask them to confirm how much I’ve sent. This increases the confidence that we’ve both typed the account and sorting codes correctly and also allows me to save the details in my banking app so I can send the balance without having to type numbers in again. I’ve had one instance where money went to the wrong place (not my fault) it was quite difficult to get back. I have no wish to go through that again.

[theplumber]

1 hour ago, Minininjarob said:

If someone says to me they have a problem with their PayPal account I halt the sale and block them. There is no reason to have a “problem” that isn’t self made and all genuine issues can be sorted in minutes as PayPal are very helpful. 
Been using PayPal for over a decade I think for personal and commercial reasons and if you follow their guides you will never go wrong. 
PayPal goods and services and I pay the fees for any private sales I do without having the item in my hands. 

Agreed but for whatever reason some folk don't use it... 

[neepheid]

4 minutes ago, theplumber said:

Agreed but for whatever reason some folk don't use it... 

 

Avoidance of fees and the (imo not unreasonable) accountability that one must adhere to as a seller would be my guess for the main reasons why not.

[msb]

My Visa card was recently hacked after buying something on Amazon. Visa contacted me , so I phoned the contact number on the back of my card. My card was immediately cancelled. There were a number of fraudulent charges from several countries. And it happened quickly.

 

This after several years of hassle free transactions. 

[TorturedSaints]

I have had 4 credit card replacements in the last 18 months as ‘somehow’ the accounts have been compromised, with people phoning the credit card company and pretending to be me, or fraudulently using them. No money lost by me thankfully. The last 2 cards have never been used and have always been in my possession - the only people that know the card number are me and the credit card company.  Go figure!