CAUTION to Crafters: Scammers like your products too.

 

Caution: It Can Happen to Anyone

Yes, it can happen to anyone, and those like us, that have a small crafting business with online visibility need to be especially watchful, especially during the Holiday season. What can happen you ask?

Before we dive into this topic let’s pick out the music for the mood.

Today’s pick(s) will be:
Holy Soldier, Holy Soldier, 1990, Myrrh
Zach Williams, Rescue Story, 2019, Essential Records

Ok crafters listen up, and I hope everybody already knows this. It is the best time of the year to be taken advantage of. Be careful of the online scammers that will say they want to purchase your item(s). I was recently tagged by a scammer after I posted an item on a couple buy and sell groups on Facebook. They (he or she), reached out on the private Messenger and asked if the item was still available. Pretty normal. What I did notice about this communication was that the individual had an empty profile, that is the first thing I check.
I continued asking how many sets they would like, “three they said”.
Ok, so then I asked what colors they would like them in, “any will do”, they replied back. Red Flag right there.
Everybody has a preference, especially when it comes to baby gift sets.
The communication continued, “how much will the total be?” they asked.
At this point I wasn’t sure because I was away from the storefront and couldn’t pack up the items and then configure the shipping costs.
I replied with, “I will be home later this afternoon, I can come up with totals at that time”.
“Please”, they said with, “ASAP”.

Very strange but I was still hopeful this was a real deal. I got home that afternoon and figured total costs. I went to Messenger.
“Hey, the total will be $...”.

I immediately got a response, “Ok, PayPal or Zella?”

No questions asked, the price was fine, Red Flag #2. I went into caution mode at this point.
I said,” PayPal”.

“Ok, watch for the transfer, you should get an email, check your junk folder if you don’t see anything in a couple seconds”, they said.

Boom!
Right there I knew this wasn’t right. I waited a few minutes and checked my Junk folder and low and behold there it was, this email individual had the courtesy to point me to.
While I was waiting, I did ask did they have a profile I could check out and follow?
“No”,” was the response.
I then asked,” Do you have a Facebook account”?
“No”, again.
“How did you find out about our items” I asked.

There was a long pause, then they changed the subject to” did I receive the email yet?”
“Yes I did, but this email looks bogus”, I replied.

“Send me a screen shot of what you see” they said.
At this point I decided to end our friendship, I could see within the email it was asking me to accept more money to setup a business account, which I already had.
There was a long pause as I thought this out.

“Are you still there?” they came back.
“Send me a screenshot”, they said again.

I said “no”, and that I was ending the deal.
“Wait”, they said, “if your worried about the extra $100 dollars just promise you will pay me back”. RED FLAG number 3 and the big one.
How did they know what was in the email?
How did they know it was asking me to accept more money?

I knew this was a bogus communication and I should have never engaged it.
First thing to look for is the email address from the sender. Example: They told me the email was coming from PayPal, PayPal does NOT use a Gmail account.
If ever in this situation check the sender’s address, DO NOT CLICK on anything within the email, just hover over the sender’s email address, and see if the results look legit or pop up with something different. Banks, financial institutions, online banking, and so on do NOT use generic email accounts.
Watch for this:
Always check the profile of the interested party. I never, (usually), respond to anyone with only a couple photos or less. Always check the dates of when the account was opened. If it’s new, beware.

All in all there are many articles on scams and how to avoid them, and we as crafters depend on online sales, especially in the cold season, so we need to know what to look for.

Just “Thinking Out Loud”.

Thoughts?