Following from the unfortunate experiance of one of our members being defrauded, I thought I'd put together a quick guide to avoid it.
1/ "If it seems to be too good to be true it probably is"
Whatever you are looking for will have a 'base price' below which no-one can sell it and make money. Little effort is required to find out what that is.
For example, when the
N95 came out, it didn't take me long to find that the base price was 450 pounds UK.
Anyone selling below this price is probably a scammer.
2/ Always try and pay with a credit card. In the UK you can get your money back from the card company if its over 100 pounds.
If they don't take credit cards, that's another big warning. Only use Western Union or similar if you can contact Interpol and have the collector arrested - its the only way you'll not have your money wasted.
3/ Never deal with suppliers who only have a hotmail or yahoo address or similar. I know of no exceptions to this.
4/ Never order from unsolicited email, phone calls, texts or forum spams. No exceptions.
5/ Be very wary if buying from ebay.
Paypal protection only lasts 45 days. It can take much longer than that for a phone to be blocked. I bought from a buyer with over 500 feedback, the phone was blocked 90 days later and I had no comeback. Ebay still let him trade, too.
6/ Look for a physical address and a landline phone number.
If in doubt, post here and someone will be able to advise.
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