I think I was ripped off for $4,000. Can you guys help me?

I need the help of my Ferrari friends.

I purchased a Ferrari Opus Enzo Edition Book from Alberto M. in December for $4,000 and I’ve received nothing. He listed it on ebay and after many talks, I trusted him enough to wire him $4,000 outside of ebay. The deal was that if I sent payment right away, he’d try and get it shipped out asap before he leaves on holiday. He said that worst case scenario, he’d ship it the 3rd week of January when he got back from Holiday.

Ebay ad: https://www.ebay.com/itm/The-Official-Ferrari-Opus-Enzo-Edition/282758175090?hash=item41d5b35972:g:IwAAAOSwUMxaI38t

He finally agreed to refund my money, but communication has been awful and all I’ve gotten are a bunch of excuses. The last time I heard from him was Feb 13th.

Does anyone know him or have some advice for me?

Here is his information,

Alberto M

United Kingdom



Picture of the receipt for the transaction below.



View attachment 2508316

 

This was the last email I got from him and the first I had heard about his Father. I understand his situation, but I think I've been more than patient with him. Right?


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Ebay should be able to take care of that for you. Send what you posted here to their dispute center and they can dial it in. It's not fast but they've always been good on the rare occasion that I've had to use it.

 

I already went that route. They won't cover a wire transfer that was done outside of ebay. I was told to kick rocks.

 

Ebay won't cover this since it's a wire transfer.

 

Oh. So you didn't buy it through eBay? Well then yes, they would tell you to kick rocks. They don't want people transacting eBay deals outside of eBay. To them that's the equivalent of cheating.

I thought you hit the buy-it-now and bought it through eBay's channels.

EDIT: I just took a look at the listing. Did you see the guy has an eBay rating of zero?

 

I originally did hit the buy it now button, but he offered it at a better price if I paid outside of ebay. Stupid me!

 

Aha. Okay. Well, I'm not saying that you're screwed but I'm going to say that the odds are better that you have a $4k hole in your bank account than an Opus book at the end of all of this. Let us know what happens.

 

Note - the seller has a feedback of (0) on ebay..

 

Ouch! This does not look good for you. I hope I'm wrong . . .

 

Lesson learned.

Just looking for advice at this point.

 

My personal opinion is that you have been ripped off and there will be basically nothing you can do about it. Once you wired the money you basically removed all options for forcing a refund beyond suing him cross-country, which he knows you won't do.

 

Can you just call paypal and get a refund please don't tell me you sent it as a gift.

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He sent a wire, not a paypal payment

 

Ouch

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No. I sent a wire transfer outside of ebay. I hit the buy it now button, but he offered it at a better price if I paid outside of ebay.

Big mistake and lesson learned.

I'm just now looking for advice.

 

Same thing I did to ferrparts and got screwed for $44k have a lawyer for 3 years now witch has done nothing lol.

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sorry, that does not look good

you really bank wired USD 4000.- outside of ebay to someone overseas with zero feedback and zero transactions who`s ebay membership started just 4 weeks ago ?

hmmm ...

maybe one of the local F-chatters can have a look ...
[edited]

 

Problem #1 - you should always use PayPal for these types of transactions because you will likely get some remuneration. If you wired the money, you probably aren't getting anything back.

That sucks - eBay blows and I won't bother with it. Haven't for years.

 

Well not sure what you have said to him, but I’d say you have very few options.

So who suggested a transaction outside ebay? Why not use PayPal? Looks like your money is gone, as he could have done a bank transfer in the time it took to write that email.

I’m guessing the address Above is a bank address? You could always try your luck contacting them but I’d doubt you would get far.

If you can track him down ie an address in the uk you can file a court claim; possibly. Google “small claims court” and look for the www.gov.uk website. I have no idea if a foreigner can use this system or not but worth a dig. It’s an easy system.

Other than that I’d send him polite specific requests on a regular basis.

A hard lesson.

Good luck.

 

He wanted to do the deal outside of ebay. I assumed that address was his home address, but I guess I'm not too sure?

 

Unfortunately, outside of his very suspiciously worded email, the fact that he offered you a better price outside of eBay / Paypal means its almost certainly a deliberate fraud. Sorry.

 

What is confusing to me though, why bother replying to me at all when he could have just took the money and disappeared?

 

I assume you have contacted NatWest, and alerted them of the fraud, and the London police, both of which at least won't cost you any further money.

 

The people that do this sort of thing are at best dysfunctional. If there were proceedings, an email like he sent you would not do him any favours.