Posted by I recently had an Ebay buyer that raised a lot of red flags on my scam alert radar. This buyer had sent me a message offering a lower price for an item only a few minutes after it was listed. Against my better judgement, I responded with a higher counteroffer. To my surprise, the next day they accepted the offer and paid for the item. When I checked their profile, I saw that they had set their reviews to private. I didn’t even know you could do that. It can cause concern when a buyer has zero reviews, but this buyer had over 9K positive reviews in the past year and no negative reviews. I thought the guy might be a reseller, but there was no Ebay store under his profile. I suppose they could have an Ebay store under a different name. I don’t mind selling to resellers, as long as they don’t ask me to ship to a different address. The next concern was that the address they listed was a business address. I looked it up on Google Maps and saw that it was in a strip mall, but I couldn’t find the number on any of the doors. Google search of the address came up with a vitamin supplement business.
That could have been the previous tenant at that address. The item they had purchased from me didn’t have anything to do with supplements. The name they had on the order was for a doctor in a neighboring city. It seemed unlikely that there would be two people with the same name within 20 miles of each other. Next, I looked up the phone number. That came back to a wholesale & closeout distribution business that was located in the city listed on the Ebay order. The street address was correct, and the address number was close. I could only assume that this was the correct business, and they received their orders in an adjacent space.
I decided to send a message to the buyer to confirm the address. They responded that the address was correct and that they receive multiple packages there every day. Despite my list of concerns and their efforts to conceal their business from Ebay sellers, I decided to ship the item. They had paid for the item plus shipping. I usually avoid buying from sellers in California, Florida, and New York. This buyer was located in Florida. Four days later, I received confirmation that the package was delivered. So, it looks like the sale was a success, but I would be surprised if they bother to leave a positive review. As difficult as it is to make money on Ebay, you have to be on alert for scams.