So, a customer contacted me via email asking for warranty support.
I asked her to contact the dealer who sold it to them, and she said it was Amazon.
I asked her for her order number, and why she had not gone to Amazon or through Amazon for this request.
She told me that Amazon refused her request because the sale was more than 30 days ago.
She wanted replacement on 2 identical items purchased in the same order that retail for the grand sum of $21 each.
The order number she gave me was provided on a very authentic-looking invoice document purportedly from Amazon, but not at all like the one I can get when I go to an order I placed, and click on “invoice”.
But the order number does not exist, confirmed with seller support. So she lied.
The address she gave is one of those freight forwarding companies that take a package, and ship it out to another address.
So, it is a scam, but she is going to a great deal of trouble over not very much money. Why?
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Test balloon. Try it with a tiny order so it’s not worth coming after them if it doesn’t work, and if it does work, they know you are a sap and open for business. Then they hit you hard.
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But how would they “hit me hard”? By ordering a large quantity of product from Amazon, and… then what? Returning it all? To what end?
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They may not have thought that part through. They are testing the waters to see how far they can get a seller (you) to go.
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If you “replace” a tiny order that doesn’t exist, you are more likely to “replace” a large order that doesn’t exist than a seller who is careful even about the small orders.
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Yep; saw this when I was working in a wine/liquor store.
A guy came in, bought a bottle of liquor (not sure what), paid with a credit card, and left.
A couple of hours later, he came back, bought multiple bottles of Grey Goose, Hennessy, and other expensive popular bottles. Thankfully, FE manager recognized him, and had the cashier stall while she called the cops. By the time the guy walked out with over $2000, there were several police cars waiting; caught him with over 50 fraudulent credit cards.
Had it been declined first time, he would have known that card was no good, would likely have just walked out, and not come back.
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OK, those scams make sense. But this person trying to con me went to a LOT of trouble - setting up an account with a freight forwarder, making up a phony Amazon “invoice”, all for 2 units of a very niche technical product of use to only a very small group of people, and like I said, $21 retail.
I told her (or him, who knows?) that the order number did not exist in Amazon’s records, verified by seller support, and that the ship-to address was a freight forwarder, and the address even included a forwarding code, so the forwarder could match it to a receiver, and those two facts meant that she was lying, and was not entitled to any replacement, as she never bought anything in the first place.
The reply here was “lol”.
Very strange. If she would have just ASKED, I would have sent her a “free sample” of this consumable item without question, postage prepaid, as this practice has always paid off, and earns me a reputation in the very tiny community I sell to as a “cool guy”.
But she wanted to con me, and thought I was too dumb to check an order number?
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One thing to keep in mind about scammers, crooks, and other dishonest people. They will often go to far more trouble to do something dishonest than would be required to get the same result honestly.
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They aways start small so they can get a refund.
Do that 1000X and that $20 refund turns into $20,000
Then they know the gullible sellers and go bigger.