Uh oh...

[macman]

I recently agreed to purchase a laptop from a fellow forum member (from another forum i frequent) and i transferred the exact amount of money to his account via internet banking.

The transfer is instant (done yesterday) but today he says the money never appeared in his account???

Have i been totally scammed? Is there anything i can do besides wave goodbye to my money?

[plext]

With whom did you transfer the funds?

Get in touch with whatever agency handled the transfer and ask them to confirm all the details. It's fairly easy to transpose account numbers and get these things wrong.

[FASTXR]

I've done a few money transfers for stuff off Ebay and I've found that it can sometimes take a day or so to appear in the other person's account, even though it will tell you the money has gone across. I'd give it another 24 hours before hitting the panic button.

As suggested, you might want to confirm BSB and account numbers just to be sure.

[EA2BA]

It can take 3 days for a transfer to complete if you have never sent money to the concerned party in the past, this is a security feature to stop your money being sent o/s to a scammers account before you realise you have been hacked.

check your banks terms and conditions, I should be correct.

[schmidty]

Sometimes i've had money take as long as 4 days to transfer between my own accounts at different banks

If i transfer from my commonwealth account to someone elses commonwealth account in business hours, it happens almost instantly. If i was to transfer from my commonwealth account to my ANZ it can take 3 - 4 days.

you can always use this bsb tracker to check that the account is where they claim it is and you havent sent it to a scammer in perth instead of a forum member who claims to be in brisbane.

http://www.caughtatwork.com.au/ebay/bsb/index.php

[macman]

Thanks for all the reassuring and positive responses so far. It's HSBC to Commonwealth so i'll wait a few more days before i **** my pants.

If i am in trouble however, is there anything i can do?

[brendo83]

I used to work for a bank, transfer is def not instant between banks, 1-5 days
If its big bank to big bank and the transfer is made before 5pm you can normally expect it the next business day, if its a smaller institution or credit union expect it to take a few days.

My advice is to wait until say wednesday next week and check back with him, if he's still claiming non-receipt of funds ask him for a bank statement for the dates in question, whatever you do dont accuse him of being dodgy, just say your bank has requested it so they can trace where the funds have gone.
Obviously make sure its a document not easily altered, (a pdf or screendump of his net banking statement, or photocopy of the physical bank statement.)
This is what we advised customers to do when in the same situation, 95% of the time the funds magically appeared.

[normxb]

Man , there are some variations , isn't there .

I have transferred eBay payments from our Credit Union in Young NSW to a seller in Melb. with an ANZ Acc. by 4pm the next day they had confirmed my payment , then another seller in Sydney with a CBA Acc. , took 3 days to confirm .

Now that explains it all , thanks guys

Norm

[AlbertM]

Originally Posted by macman

Thanks for all the reassuring and positive responses so far. It's HSBC to Commonwealth so i'll wait a few more days before i **** my pants.

If i am in trouble however, is there anything i can do?

There you go. HSBC are slow when transfering funds to others. It's happend to me a couple of times, it took 4 working days to clear.

[Tribal]

May also be worth raising with the administrator of the forum you both frequent as well.

Good luck

[macman]

Ok, this is working out more trouble than i'd hoped, but the guy's actually said that the money has gone through (last Friday) and he sent me an email saying he's email me the details (tracking number etc) but he never got back to me and isn't replying to ANY of my emails anymore GRRR!!!

So, if he never gets back to me, and i never see this item (which looks to be the way this is going) Is there anything i can do?

[adrianb]

Give him a reasonable amount of time to ship the goods (i.e. as much as a pain as it is, sometimes people get busy or forget the goods when they leave for work etc) and send a few well documented requests (i.e. emails or letters) asking for the goods to be shipped and confirmation of the payment.

If it doesn't happen at all and he tries to rip you off then I'd imagine small claims court where you'd need to have proof of the sale (i.e. the agreement for you to buy the goods at the sale price and for him to sell it to you) and the evidence that you paid him and tried to contact him.

Good luck mate!

[macman]

So, the guys got my cash now, he's admitted that. And after telling me he's posted the item and after asking for a consignment note/tracking code, he's ignoring me.

I've called daily, and he either leaves it to ring then turns it off, and once he answered then hung up on me.

He's got my cash, i havn't got my item and it's been too long.

If i've got proof that i've given him the money, where do i stand legally? What can i do, do i get in contact with my local Police?

[Kommandant]

Name and shame, hopefully someone on the others forums you visit knows him and can go around and smack him.

[XCSEDAN]

call the cops, ask them for advice.

[Ridin-High]

Sorry to hear macman, very hard to trust people when things like this happen... i tell you what i would do, call the person from a public phone and go "Hi i was wondering if you still have the laptop for sale?" Get a friend to do it (perhaps a girl) and then say "I would like to buy it, am i able to pick up?".


you need to get someone to sound really genuwine, the basic idea of this exercise is to find his address