⚠ NEVER pay by gift card, wire, or "friends & family" — there is no chargeback.⚠ A SELLER badge is a review, not a guarantee.⚠ Screenshots can be faked — ask for a timestamped photo.⚠ If they rush you, that IS the scam.⚠ Report scams to your local authorities as well as here.⚠ Nobody legitimate needs your ID, a selfie, or a photo of your card.⚠ NEVER pay by gift card, wire, or "friends & family" — there is no chargeback.⚠ A SELLER badge is a review, not a guarantee.⚠ Screenshots can be faked — ask for a timestamped photo.⚠ If they rush you, that IS the scam.⚠ Report scams to your local authorities as well as here.⚠ Nobody legitimate needs your ID, a selfie, or a photo of your card.
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SAFETY GUIDE

Read this before you send anybody anything.

Payment is the whole game

Almost every recoverable loss and almost every unrecoverable loss is decided by how you paid, not by who you paid.

METHODIF IT GOES WRONGVERDICT
Credit cardChargeback rights, often 120+ daysSAFEST
PayPal Goods & ServicesBuyer protection, opens a disputeGOOD
Debit cardWeaker, but a claim is usually possibleOK
Bank transferEffectively none once it landsRISKY
PayPal Friends & FamilyNone. This is why they ask for it.NEVER
Gift cards / vouchersNone. Instantly drained and resold.NEVER
CryptoNone. Irreversible by design.NEVER

If a seller who accepts card payments suddenly insists on one of the red methods for your order, walk away. That switch is the single most reliable scam signal there is.

Vetting a seller in five minutes

  1. Search here first — the handle, the shop name, the domain, and any alias they have used. Then search the same terms with the word "scam" on a normal search engine.
  2. Check the age of everything. Domain registration, account creation, first post. A three-week-old account with forty glowing reviews is a farm.
  3. Reverse image search their photos. Stock photos and stolen listing photos are the norm. Ask for a fresh photo with today's date on a handwritten note next to the item.
  4. Read the negative reviews only. Ignore the five-star ones entirely; they are the cheapest thing to fake.
  5. Price sanity. Nobody sells a current-generation item at 40% under wholesale out of kindness. If you cannot explain why it is cheap, the explanation is you.

Red flags, in rough order of how often they precede a loss

  • Pressure and deadlines. "Three left", "price goes up tonight", "another buyer is waiting".
  • Moving you off-platform to chat, then off-platform to pay.
  • Refusing any payment method with a dispute process.
  • A brand-new account, or one whose post history was recently wiped.
  • Vouches that all arrive within a few hours, from accounts with no other activity.
  • Grammar and formatting that changes between messages — often a different person.
  • An address that is a freight forwarder or a mailbox shop.
  • Asking for a "deposit to reserve".
  • Any request for your ID, selfie, or card photo. No legitimate seller needs those.

If you have already been scammed

  1. Contact your bank or card issuer today. Chargeback windows are measured in days, and they are the only thing that reliably gets money back.
  2. Open the platform dispute before the window closes, even if you think it is hopeless.
  3. Screenshot everything now — listings, chat, profiles, tracking. Scammers delete accounts within hours of a complaint.
  4. Report to your national fraud body and the police. A report number matters for insurance and for the bank's decision.
  5. Then post it here, with the evidence, so the next person searches and finds it.
  6. Ignore anyone who messages offering to recover your funds. That is a second scam targeting people who just lost money. It is always a scam. There are no exceptions.