scam? or Legit?

[Cia]

Any real shipping company is going to have their name after the @ "freight@shippingcompany.com", they are not going to be using "shippingcompany @ gmail.com".

If you have the address they want the items shipped to in the Netherlands than Google the address and see for yourself where it is.

My brother almost got scammed out of $40,000 worth of material plus 2nd Day Air shipping charges to Georgia. Supposedly a manager from a North Dakota vendor we use wanted to buy this material from us and ship it to their division in Georgia. I've seen these 'purchase requests' come in before and ignored them since the e-mail address had an extra 'al' added to the company's name - which I checked out and it went to a Dutch website. Last time I checked ND wasn't in Holland. I didn't know my bro didn't know these were fake. Luckily he got suspicious and after I told him to look closer at the e-mail address and Googled the address in Georgia (which turned out to be a trailer house in the middle of no where - yeah division my foot) he contacted the vendor in ND. They were very interested in the fake paperwork my bro had received from this guy. Bro e-mailed the guy back and told him since the dollar amount on the material was so high that we required a down payment he hasn't heard from him since.

Large amounts of items that they could get locally or at least from someone in their home country, a request to use an off brand 'shipping company' and then a request that you pay the shipper which they will repay. I smell a scam.

[Gilhelmi]

I'm truely sorry I just do not feel comfortable using an unknown shipping company on my end. If this is a serious enough problem then I would ask you to look elsewhere for your order, if not I have a very good track record with packages being shipped and not getting lost or damaged.

All packages come with tracking and insurance.

My email to the person, this way I don't sound like I'm accusing them. Not to strangely....haven't heard back from them.

Do not be sorry. It is smart, especially for small business people because a $1500 could servilely damage your ability to pay bills.

I have never heard of a "small rural town that has trouble getting its mail" not when it comes to larger shipping companies and not in this day in age. and Definitely not in the Netherlands (do they even have rural areas there?).

I know scammers tend to target smaller businesses because we have fewer resources to fight back, and we also have a tendency to be more trusting then we should. (every crappy policy was written because, someone scammed the company)

[msjazz79]

Dealing with similar scam

As many of you know I run a small business, and a few weeks ago I was sent an email asking if I shipped overseas? Since I'd never shipped to that part of the world I immediately emailed my distributor and confirmed that they will ship to that part of the world.

We go back and forth since some items they wanted were out of stock and some were discontinued...

I finally reach a total for her for the items I do have on hand....and with shipping and an additional discount (without her asking for one), the total still reaches over $1500, not exactly small change.

I send her an invoice with exact price break down...and happily sit back and await payment (NOTHING has been shipped yet, I refuse to until payment is received, even if you lived across the street from me).

This morning I wake up to a reply email that reads thus...



I don't want to outright call her a scammer JUST in case shes legit, but wanted a second opinion.

I also am dealing with this same issue right now.

Dealing with this issue right now. Person contacted me last week interested in an order. I ordered supplies to get everything together and then received the email about not wanting to go through UPS, immediately made me suspect:




From: OLIVIA MCGREGOR

Hi,

Thanks for your reply back with the total quote of my order,I really appreciate you getting back to me.

We have experienced lots of difficulties when it comes to receiving shipment to our address here in The Netherlands, We're located in a very remote area of the city, which cause us a lot of hindrance in receiving shipment in the past. I want you to contact my shipper which i use every time i purchase order worldwide via the below e-mail address about my order RAPIDANDSPEEDFREIGHTLLC@GMAIL.COM with the weight and dimension inclusive the value for insurance quoting my customer ID #AA357429522A. They will deliver the shipment to me door to door, their cost will include the custom clearance and handling cost with my order. They will come pick my order up at your location when the shipment is ready. I will need you to obtain a quote and tell them that i want to Insure the package and I will like you to get back to me with overall cost of the items with the details from my shipper.

Once I have these details, I will get back to you with my credit card details immediately for payment.
God Bless you (Amen),

Kind Regards,
Olivia

This was my response,




Good morning Olivia,

I did a google search on the email address you provided and it stated that rapidandspeedfreightllc@gmail.com was unfortunately not a reliable company to do shipping with. If you would like to still continue the order I can still do so through UPS, all packages come with tracking and insurance. With payment through Paypal. Please reply back at your earliest convenience.

She then responds with this.




Hello,

I have been having difficulties in the past. I'm in a very remote area of the city which make it hard for me to receive shipment in the past,not until i started using the shipping agent.They're reliable and their service are favourable. They have been helping me with shipment for my oversea order for the past 5 months or so,i want you to proceed and send an e-mail to my shipper and they'll get back to you with my shipping quote.

Await your reply back

Thanks
God bless you

So needless to say. I'm pissed that I fell for this and ordered way more supplies than I needed. But in the end I guess it works out for me because now I have enough to probably carry me into the next year. LOL. I'm thankful for this site, it sure did save me a huge headache and financial loss.