When Will I Ever Learn- Mercado Libre Edition. (And Warning)

[lucha54]

I sold an iPhone 5 that I bought in the US on Mercado Libre. Someone posted a question asking if I would accept dollars (slightly less than what I was asking for in pesos). I agreed, not much difference to me, just really eager to get rid of it as I was having a hard time finding someone to buy it.

I didn't check to see that the user had been registered since 15 days ago and had no previous reviews/ratings. We communicated by text and he asked if he could come pick it up yesterday afternoon (there is security out front in the lobby so I wasn't too concerned about safety). I said that today would be better and he said he would send a 'cadete' to do the errand, someone who worked for him in his office.

$700 in fake USD bills.

I didn't look closely, just counted it, gave him the iPhone and turned around. Was flustered as he arrived early and I was in the middle of a long distance phone call when I had to go to the front door of the building. They were pretty good counterfeits, but I may have noticed if I'd checked the watermark for just one second. I checked it 30 seconds later after I returned inside. (I'm not a complete idiot, just sort of.)

My partner's friend works at Mercado Libre; says there's nothing he can do as it's obviously a fake account, says they have been getting several reports like this recently. Hoping it doesn't happen to you too, 'cuz it really sucks. :wacko: And please don't 'welcome to Argentina' me, I've been here long enough to know better .

 

[EricLovesBA]

That majorly sucks. Sorry for your bad experience. Thanks for sharing to help the community be on the lookout though.

 

[shoush]

OH MY GOD!!! same thing happened to me 700fake use for my iPhone 4s last year! those Mother #$#$#$#!!!!
i was super upset at myself for not checking better! apparently its super common, also the man looked suspicious, he just didn't seem that he would have dollars, and didn't seem to care when i was showing him some stuff on the phone (it was used) to show him proof that everything worked, he was just ready to grab the phone and then i learned why
theres not really anything u can do, mercado libre won't be able to track them down!
i wrote the guy and told me that i was thinking of selling my laptop too because I'm going to Canada, so i could see the asshole and try to get a police to come, but of course he never responded!

 

[StuckLikeGlue]

Similar thing happened to us selling a 4s, except the guy sent a fake email "from MercadoLibre" (it looked absolutely legitimate, a perfect copy of the one they really do send and even from a ML-like email account) confirming that the money had been deposited in our account. Sent a guy to pick up the phone and we handed it over... only to be told by ML that no such transaction had been made. Won't make that mistake again.

 

[nikad]

Oh man! that really sucks big time! I have been both buying and selling on ML for over 12 years and never had a problem like that. I do not sell to users with no reputation and if I do it is through MercadoPago. How long have you had the iphone5 up for sale there? It seems to be one hot item that sells relatively fast.

 

[nikad]

The bottom line: if you are selling expensive items, do not do it in cash, unless you inspect the bills and make sure they are legit. They sell those markers to avoid fake bills. Use MercadoPago or only deal with users with a solid reputation. Same thing would have happened to the OP if he had sold in cash though Ebay. Always use electronic payment methods, those are hard (er) to cheat on. My sympathies to the OP, if that had happened to me I would be extremely upset

 

[Farenheit]

Oh no!! That's terrible. Where's Frenchie, maybe he can track them down for you.

 

[EricLovesBA]

Someone could put another iphone on mercadolibre to ferret out the theives. Put a very high price to weed out the real paying customers. The thieves wouldn't care since they're paying in funny money anyway.

 

[lucha54]

nikad- maybe my asking price was too high and that's why it took so long to sell. I had it up on Mercado Libre for a week, the listing expired (I opted for the zero- commission option) and then when I reposted the second week i got the question from the interested party. I should have used MercadoPago but I didn't have the bank account, didn't want to bother using my boyfriend's account... I was lazy and cheap and there's just no free lunch in life. *sigh*

 

[lucha54]

And I didn't check his reputation and when he created the account, I didn't even think of it. That would have been an obvious red-flag. Hopefully we'll all do that from now on if selling anything there. !