How to stay safe when trading/buying/selling 101 – Read before making deals!

1 : Anonymous2017/03/08 14:11 ID: 5y83c4

Credit to /

and /" class="reddit-press-subreddit-link" target="_blank" rel="noopener">
for most of this. Check them out if you have games to trade!

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/comments/5l4r8b/mod_safe_swapping_thread_how_to_identify_and/" class="reddit-press-link" target="_blank" rel="noopener">https://www.reddit.com/" class="reddit-press-subreddit-link" target="_blank" rel="noopener">
/comments/5l4r8b/mod_safe_swapping_thread_how_to_identify_and/

Always feel free to message the modmail if you're concerned or want our approval/advice before making a trade!

TIPS FOR SAFE SWAPPING IMPORTANT QUESTIONS TO ASK YOURSELF?

Was it made to me in my Public Trade Thread? [COOL]

Was it sent directly to me in a PM? [NOT COOL]

You should always require a comment in your Public Trade Thread before swapping with ANYONE.
It doesn't matter how much rep they have, how old their account is, or how much karma they have. No comment in your Public Trade Thread -- NO DEALS. Scammers/banned users can still browse the forums and send PM's but they cannot post in threads.

In addition, I've very recently been reading TONS of "PM'd" comments in threads. I don't care for this, but it's much better than no comment at all. I'd rather see deals take place out in the open in comments, as it helps in transparency.

How old is their account?

While new users more often than not are trustworthy (I make deals with new users all the time), you should still exercise caution when making deals, mainly due to the following reasons: Do they have Flair, Completed Trades, or Rep Elsewhere?? When checking their Rep are you checking that the user is actually linking THEIR OWN REP? Compare it to the spelling and account age of the user commenting in your thread. Are they the same? Scammers may create accounts with similar looking names to trick you into thinking they have "rep", or just straight up make a new account if their main account was already outed for scamming.
Is the user linking to real 'rep' or are they using a personal subreddit?
If they link you to a personal subreddit for 'rep' - that is an immediate red flag.

Recently in other subs this has becoming more and more common. People will make a name similar to someone who is reputable and try to make a deal with you. For example someone might name themselves "JoeBoobyWii" and you think it's me, while in reality they're just trying to fool you into making a deal with them now that your guard is down because you think I'm reputable. Always check to make sure you know who you're dealing with!

Does the seller actually have what he says he does?

Sellers may use fake/stolen images of items they don't actually have. Make sure what they're selling you is something they actually possess. It's a great idea to always ask for pictures, even if it's NIB stuff. If necessary ask for timestamps! This is very important. If the seller includes the item and their username with a date, everything should be good to go in this regard.

Tineye or Google reverse image search their pictures. This is not as foolproof as timestamps, but you can look their pictures up that way if you yet have any doubts.

Paying for items

PAYPAL GIFT (Friends/Family) V. GOODS & SERVICES

If you pay someone via PayPal, understand the risks and differences between the two types of payments.
There is a 3% fee for payments sent as goods/services but it allows you to initiate a claim if there is a problem.
If you send payment as a gift (F&F), you CANNOT initiate a claim to dispute the charges.

As a buyer spending an extra 3% for your item shouldn't add too much more to the cost of your item. As a seller you could just build that cost into the price of your item. Under no circumstances should you send payment as friends/family, nor as a seller should you only ask for friends/family. There may be additional consequences from PayPal if they find out you're dealing with F&F payments when in reality dealing with goods and services. It's very rare, but you do not want this to happen to you. I've heard some horror stories about people getting screwed by asking for F&F payments. Additionally, if a seller sends the buyer an invoice, Paypal's fee to the seller doesn't apply to shipping costs. It's minor but still worth noting.

Always do goods and services even if you've dealt with someone before! You never know when things can go wrong and you want that protection.

For obvious reasons, money payment outside of PayPal should never be accepted

Unless you're meeting up in person to pay with cash of course... USE TRACKING & EXPECT TRACKING –

Domestic Shipping using PayPal will always include free tracking.
So does EVERY method of Domestic shipping from the Post Office and UPS/FedEx.

Just because someone gives you a tracking number, doesn’t mean that the item has been shipped since you can generate a tracking number online without sending anything.
If you’re expecting the other party to go first, make sure the package is updated on the USPS website as "package received" and NOT just "shipping information received".
Scammers may generate a tracking number for you but never actually ship the item. THE FAKE PAYPAL INVOICE SCAM –

You've agreed to sell an item to a buyer...

The Buyer says - check your e-mail, "Payment sent".

The Buyer actually sends you an invoice - NOT - payment.

The Scammer will fake a Payment Confirmation by creating an invoice - and immediately marking it paid.

PayPal allows the sender of an Invoice to write whatever they want in the message field. So a scammer may write something like, "You have received a payment from Scammer. Payments may take 24-48 hours to appear in your PayPal Account". This may create the illusion that you have received payment when in reality - the Buyer has just created an invoice - sent it to you - and marked it paid immediately.
In reality, PayPal Payments normally appear immediately. So check your account... if you don't see any payment - or pending payment - it might be a scam.
While PayPal may hold funds - or delay their availability - the transaction almost always shows up in your PayPal Activity immediately.
If the user starts to get pushy, playing the victim, calling you a scammer or really doing anything other than saying, "Let me know when the payment shows up"... immediately MESSAGE THE MODMAIL.
An example can be seen here: PayPal Invoice Scam OBVIOUS RED FLAGS

NEW ACCOUNTS

If the account is only hours old, or even a few days old, be on high alert. Not all new accounts are scammers, but I’d bet a very large portion are, ESPECIALLY if they’re asking you to send first.

THE VICTIMS PLEA

“Oh, I’ve been scammed before, so I’m not comfortable sending first” or "I need money quickly to buy _________ (fill in the blank - game on sale, food, medicine, etc)". While this may be true for some people, that's not your problem. If you are inclined to believe them - ask for proof of the scam. When did it happen? How? What was it for? Do they have any confirmed trades? Did they report it? Did they post on /

?

REQUIRES A NON-REFUNDABLE PAYMENT

It’s one thing if someone prefers or asks for gift payments or gift cards, but anyone that won’t even give you the option to use PayPal (Goods/Services) is most likely a scammer. The scammer wants you to pay using a source that offers no buyer protection. If you pay for something using any kind of Gift Card of Digital Credit instead of PayPal goods/services, you cannot dispute the payment to reclaim your money if you get scammed... so stop it.

ACCEPTS GOODS/SERVICES, BUT ACCOUNT UNVERFIED

Unverified accounts means PayPal has NO personal information about that user. No Bank Account, No Address. NOTHING. If you are dealing with an Unverified Account - I would exercise caution. While most Unverified Accounts may not be scammers, I may ask that they go first - or walk away if I see other red flags along with their Unverified Status.

OVERNIGHT SHIPPING

There's almost never a good reason to request/offer overnight shipping for miniatures. This should be a red flag.

COMMON COURTESY REMINDERS

REPLY TO ALL OFFERS

...and be civil in doing so. There are enough assholes around the internet and we don’t want them here. We want people to have fun and enjoy exchanging games without worrying about aggressive attitudes. It takes less than 5 seconds to reply “no thanks” if you’re not interested in someone’s offer. We have a DBAD (don't be a dick) rule here for good reason and bans will be handed out to anyone that refuses to treat everyone with respect.

STAY IN CONTACT

We’re all human beings. We all have family, school, work, bills, lives, etc. Shit happens. Things come up. Sometimes delays occur... and that’s okay. Just keep your trade partner informed, and don’t let a delay turn into a non-delivery. Because then you’re gonna have a bad time…

USE THE REPORT FEATURE & SEND A MOD-MESSAGE

There’s no need for you to enforce the rules yourself. If you see a violation of the rules, hit report and enter a reason. These come to us anonymously, though you’re free to put your name in the report if you’d like. If you report something PLEASE also message the moderators if the report requires explanation. If you report a thread and say, "User is a scammer" you HAVE to message us with proof. We want to ban scammers... but we have to have proof. As moderators, we aren’t all on 24/7, and sometimes things will slip past us. We will always rely on the community to help us weed out the bad apples.

What to do if you think you've been scammed

Message the modmail! Give us all of the relevant information and we'll make a call based on what we think happened with the situation. Sometimes things happen in peoples' lives beyond their control so they might not have been able to respond to you in a while. We'll try to make a good judgement call on what we think you should do.

If you know someone scammed you in a trade, you should have enough of the scammers personal information that you can file mail fraud charges with the United States Postal Service (a felony).

USPS - MAIL FRAUD CHARGE FORM If scammed through buying, initiate a claim with PayPal as soon as possible and send them chat logs of the deal that had been made. Assuming you paid with Goods and Services you should be fine, but you'll have to wait a while to get your money back. TL;DR

Make sure the person you're trading with posts at least once in the /

comments section

Check to make sure you know who you're dealing with - no impostors

Ask for pictures/timestamps if you're at all worried

Pay with PayPal Goods and Services!

Read this entire thread not just the tl;dr because it's good and important information

2 : Anonymous2017/03/08 17:30 ID: deo4rh2

Let me start by saying a lot of this is very useful information. That said, I don't understand why people need comments and negotiations posted in their public thread, and branding the practice as sketchy seems a over the top. I would like to see it removed from this list altogether or at least moved down the list in favor of promoting things that are actually real issues.

I respond to people's posts all the time through PMs and not to be shady, but because I find PMs are a lot easier to manage when you're talking with multiple people about multiple trades. Rather than trying to bounce around threads and dig through comments sections, which I've tried in the past and always seem to miss someone, I like to keep things organized in messages with relevant titles that contain our entire discussion start to finish. That way when it does get to the point of exchanging PayPals, names, addresses, emails, or whatever other personal information you don't want out in the public it's in the same place as the negotiations and I don't have to keep track of both a comment and PM thread when reviewing a trade.

Also (and I'm sure you're realizing this by now) I tend to be overly long winded in my responses to things, and I try to expose as few people as possible to that. I like to have an actual conversation with the person I'm doing business with, for example if I'm buying a new army I want to be able to ask tactics or how to duplicate a particularly sweet paint job, and that lends itself a lot better to PMs than a comment thread.

tl;dr - Not everyone who likes PMs is trying to scam you. It shouldn't be number one on our tips list and I would argue it shouldn't even be on the list at all.

ID: deo5d53

That said, I don't understand why people need comments and negotiations posted in their public thread,

Banned users can still view subreddits and PM people. It's just how reddit works. So we can ban as many scammers as we want, but they can still PM you and you would be none the wiser that they have been banned. A simple, "PMed" in the comments is all it takes to dispel any worry.

3 : Anonymous2017/03/14 15:36 ID: dex1jao

Good stuff JoeBobbyWii, thank you for tackling this.

I think folks reading this should remember, it is a list of suggestions, not hard rules... suggestions based on this and another subs experience with scammers and the red flags that could have been identified to notice them from the start.

This does not mean that all of these indicators are always absolutely characteristic of a scammer... its just things to look out for, and you will probably see more than one of these indicators if you are dealing with something fishy.

Again, these are not rules for the sub, nor are they hard rules about what indicates a Scammer. They are a list of things to be cognizant of, things to think about when doing trades. It has always been very important for

to let users work out trades as they see fit, that will never change. Just hoping to avoid scams in the future. Theres nothing I hate more than Scammers.

in the end, always listen to your gut, communicate and DBaD!

4 : Anonymous2017/03/29 12:52 ID: dfk19z2

Well, fuck me sideways.

Got scammed out ~$60 on Steam by Xen before this was posted. Woulda been nice to know beforehand, but at least other people will know now?

He went through this whole song and dance, too; wasn't til a few days later that I realized he'd unfriended me on Steam and whatnot. Still, harsh lessons and whatnot.

Good shit, this post, good shit.

5 : Anonymous2017/03/08 16:40 ID: deo212g

Some good advice, some nonsense.

I for example never "ask" for Friend and Family Paypal but offer it to the buyer, so they can decide between throwing 3% towards paypal for something that doesnt work (I had to ask for buyerprotection two times in the past and they always declined for some shady reasons... been using F&F ever since with no difference. If someone betrays you dont call Paypal call Lawenforcement) and saving the cash.

As a seller I dont care because I either shuffle the 3% to the buyer or dont. Calling this "shady" is absolute nonsense when it is an offer to the buyer to save some cash. Maybe rephrase that part to make it clear that its only shady when its the only offered way of payment?

ID: deoy9x8

I rephrased it slightly, but I still dislike the idea of asking for friends and family at all. I just can't think of a situation where the 3% money saved is worth the loss of protection. Asking for F&F might give buyers a false sense of security. Legless-Xen didn't ask for F&F, but I'd imagine he'd have been more successful if he gave the people he scammed the opportunity to save 3% if they sent him F&F. Maybe I'm speaking out of my ass, but I'll put more thought into it when I have more free time. I'd also be interested in hearing what else is nonsense unless that was the only thing you had issues with.

6 : Anonymous2017/03/23 00:18 ID: dfabeub

Do you have a blacklist compiled?

ID: dfai5ll

not really. we haven't had any reported scams in a very long time outside of legless-xen. there is a global reddit blacklist though somewhere but I'm not sure how useful that would be

7 : Anonymous2017/06/04 02:56 ID: difi7na

Hello,

I have a question. So my buddy at a GW store told me about this subreddit. What I have is a 2016 Blizzcon Illidan Stormrage statue. He suggested I try and sell it on here? But since I'm seeing it all being miniatures I wanted to ask if it was ok to do so.

Please note, that the reason I am selling this statue is for my 8th edition army fund! lol

ID: difuh0q

Hi, thanks for asking. This wouldn't be the correct place to put a statue/figure up for trade. I'm not sure where on reddit would be, but you might want to try /

/ . If you manage to trade it for money then it would be perfectly okay to make a post here trying to swap the money for miniatures.

8 : Anonymous2017/06/11 07:54 ID: diqxpkh

What would happen if the transaction was between the UK and USA, if the buyer were the scammer? Would the seller be able tl contact the Royal Mail and file for mail fraud, or cancel the shipment?

ID: diqyvvl

I have no idea really, I would assume you could contact the other country's postal service for mail fraud but I'm not positive

引用元:https://www.reddit.com/r/Miniswap/comments/5y83c4/how_to_stay_safe_when_tradingbuyingselling_101/

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