WARNING - EBAY/QCHEX FRAUD ATTEMPT

[trixshooter]

Recently I was selling an old camera on Ebay. After the auction

ended (the item did not sell) I received an email from a potential

buyer supposedly in the UK telling me he decided to buy the camera

after all. He asked to wire the money as it would be secure and

fast.

 

I provided my business bank wire transfer info as wire transfer

fraud is almost non existent and very difficult to do. A few days

went by and I heard nothing.

 

All of a sudden I noticed that a company called QCHEX was issuing

bogus checks against my business account to the tune of $5,000 a

pop. After notifying the bank of the situation they placed the funds

(now about $30,000) back into my account and launched an

investigation.

 

The really sad part is that the people who accepted the counterfit

checks began calling me and were obviously quite upset that they had

been scammed for thousands of dollars. I really felt bad for them

but there is nothing that I could do.

 

I immediately opened a new account and changed out account numbers.

This has been a pain for me and a nightmare for the retailers who

are out tens of thousands of dollars. The bottom line is watch your

accounts very carefully. The investigators tell me that the

perpetrator is in Indonesia and has been running these scams through

QCHEX.

 

BE VERY CAREFUL!

THE WORLD IS FULL OF DEAD BEATS.

[mdickerson]

Honestly, the only unusual part of this story is that your bank covered the stolen money. Most people are not so lucky.

[andre_noble4]

Jay, it's not over yet. Your bank may not let you KEEP that $30,000 they temporarily reimbursed you. Consult a lawywer asap.

[ed_prest]

Here (Canada) for commercial accounts the banks hold you responsible for all checks written. (maybe electronically its different as you dont have control of a checkbook but then there is passwords etc) This may be true there too.

 

Move all money to a new bank immediately. Then you are in the position of control.

[trixshooter]

Folks,

 

Met with the bank on Friday and there is no problem. Our account is insured up the $100,000 against fraud and loss. Now that they have been notified, there is absolutely no liablility on the part of my company.

 

BTW, they tried to pass another $5,000 check on Friday. Bank refused payment.

[john_hollenberg]

There is a story about this at http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/7914159/

Frightening how many holes there are in the system.

 

--John

[michael schub]

This has nothing to do with niceness or insurance. Under the Uniform Commercial Code as it pertains in the USA a bank is 100% liable for paying out on a forged check or a check bearing an altered or unauthorized signature. One or all of these circumstances would apply to the bogus QCHEX.. As with everything else in the law there are exceptions but none that would seem to apply here. It is however important to check your bank statemenst and notify the bank promptly.

[michael_j._kravit1]

Without being rude, I often wonder why people who know absolutely nothing about a subject post responses that sound as if they are based in absolute fact.

 

Mr. Schub is correct. If truly you were defrauded and your bank did not make good on your account, I would suggest that you pursue the situation further.

 

I hope Jay has resolved his situation.

 

Mike

[jeff_drew4]

. . . so Ebay had nothing to do with the fraud part but you added that info to your headline, why?<p>

As a banker in the U.S., I have seen this stuff happen and can fault the criminals directly. Some of the information posted above is not accurate or does not apply equally in all countries. Periodically we wire funds and accept wires for our customers' Ebay transactions to other continents. We have not had problems except with customers and their lack of understanding on how things work in the 21st century. Wires are no more secure or safe than any other electronic transaction! DO NOT RELEASE YOUR BANKING INFORMATION TO ANYONE FOR ANY REASON UNLESS YOU ARE ABSOLUTELY POSITIVE OF THEIR POSITION & INTENT IN THE TRANSACTION! If the sending bank and receiving bank do their homework and follow proper procedures, both sides can be checked out and the money can flow. Nowadays most BANK employees WILL NOT release sensitive, non-public information to anyone unless legally authorized, IF they are properly trained & supervised. That said, the U.S government, credit bureaus, very large banks (Like Citigroup ahem!)state governments datasystems all have their security issues. Do you ever notice the multitude of Ebay sellers who will NOT for any reason sell to anyone in Indonesia and a few other places? Believe me that the U.S. FinCEN people are now watching U.S. banks like hawks and following the money! Be patient and do transactions by the rules, and if your banker does the same, then your risk is minimal. If the banker screws up they can file claims. If QCHEX is lax then they deserve to fry because we all pay for their laziness!

[jeff_drew4]

By the way, Jay, you did the best thing possible by meeting with your bank and getting the whole matter out in the open for them! Seriously! The best way to root out fraud & deceit is to shine a light on it and go after it! Kudos to you for pursuing it! By helping pursue the crooks, some others of us may be spared later! We all can take personal responsibility and help solve a crime like this. Thanks for sharing your story. Earlier this week CitiGroup had to 'fess up that they lost lots of sensitive customer data. Can you imagine all the corporate flesh-tearing that happened? Jeez! The feds are all over us small-banks about systems security and fraud and its because the big dogs are getting whacked! All of you will see more stringent controls, stricter rules and higher transaction costs in the future for foreign transactions. Sorry people, but this subject really is a hot one for me and I kinda blabbered on. Have a safe weekend.

[carolyn_roome]

I was scammed by a person that was in the UK. I received 5 checks, put the first one for $3500.00 in the account. The bank said it cleared went and took out money and paid bills. Took the next check in for $5,000.00. Found out first one didn't clear and that it was fraudulent. Took in all information to my bank including IM conversations and contracts and the rest of the checks that were sent to me. Bank had me there for 2 1/2 hours and then the police showed up and I was handcuffed in front of my community and taken in for pre-booking and was released they even took me home. Very Embarrassed with the situation, and found out that you can't trust anyone. I have also found out that many people have been scammed this way through Qchex. There are quite a few of us that are starting a class action suit against Qchex for this problem and the actions ,comments and complete denial on Qchex part for this problem. I have heard many times from people that have been scammed that Qchex told them "They are not responsible and you should have joined the system to keep other people from opening an account under their information." To me that seems like they are saying they will not take any steps to fix this and to keep this from happening to you sign up with them before someone gets your information. Why would we want to join a system that doesn't protect us? What would you call this?

If you would like to join our lawsuit email me at rlcarolyn@msn.com and I will give you the information we have gathered and the other people who have been intruded on or have received these checks from people's accounts like you. It is a real shame that this happens when we try to live a honest life.

[marcus_ruff]

I am extremely lucky I found this website because I am in the same situation. Received an email from a guy in Spain and the other in Italy about cashing checks for them because their income taxes were 38% and they need someone to cash the checks and receive a certain percentage. Well I have cash two totaling about $4300. What should I do now that I am reading this I know these checks are fraudulent? I have emails from the the two guys and Western Union transfer info any help would be great.

[michael_briggs2]

Perhaps consult a lawyer? Perhaps deposit the money at the bank at which you cashed the checks, requesting that they hold the money until they are absolutely confident that the checks are valid. That way when the checks are found to be void, they will have money from your account to cover the checks and the bank won't be worried that you are trying to steal from them. But I am only guessing -- a lawyer will know how best to protect yourself in your state.

[scrub_scrub]

This is such a sad story for ebay sellers and buyers. This scam has been going on now for over four years now and it seems like there is not an end in sight.

Much of these con artists or scumbags activities have been documented on www.ScamFraudAlert.com and www.scam.com. YOu may want to visit each site and just engaged yourself.

 

Scrub,

Founder, ScamFraudAlert.com