I have been hit with this seemingly latest new scam on eBay twice in the last two weeks: Pending ECheck Payments through Paypal.

The buyer will buy an item, usually a larger ticket item (both of mine were well over $300.00).  They will pay right away through echeck through Paypal, which will show as pending and the payment screen gives you an estimated date of clearing.  On the day the payment is supposed to clear the payment clearing date will jump to a date a few weeks away.

You will then usually get an email from the buyer, upset that you have not shipped the item yet, insisting the payment has cleared their account on the day Paypal originally specified and that Paypal has made an error.  They will sometimes say they have talked to Paypal and that Paypal is fixing their account to show cleared.  They may even forward you an email from Paypal with this information.

As a good seller you have to make a decision.  1) Send the items because you have Paypal's email from the buyer stating Paypal made a mistake, or 2) risk your good feedback & a Paypal Item Not Received dispute and don't send the merchandise and wait for the new clearing date or to see that Paypal has updated your account with the funds. 

In these two cases, I chose to hold on to the merchandise and see the update for myself in Paypal.  Am I ever glad I did.

So what has really happened here?  The buyer makes sure they do not have enough funds in their checking account for the payment to clear the first time so the echeck bounces and the clearing date jumps two weeks to allow Paypal to automatically try and clear it again (as the seller you don't know this happens, when the echeck bounces only the buyer is notified).  Paypal will attempt to clear it a total of 3 times.  The scammer does this purposely to buy time to persuade you to send the items.  The scammer is betting you will send the items because, in fact, they claim, the echeck did clear and it's Paypal's error.  They have emails and banks statements they are willing to forward to you.  The buyer will now usually either fake cooperation, using the you-get-more-with-honey approach of persuasion or may still pretend to be angry and make threats of Item Not Received Disputes or negative feedback.  All of this is to get you to send the goods.  Then, as the new clearing date arrives they cut off all communication and you find out from Paypal they voluntarily cancelled the payment.  The scammer hopes by this time that you had sent out the merchandise to them. 

* NEVER, EVER send anything to a buyer until the payment has cleared and you see the funds available in your Paypal account.  I don't care what email or bank statement the buyer forwards you from Paypal.  This is probably fake!  Even though I didn't send the goods I am still out over $50.00 in listing fees that I cannot re-coop on these two auctions because these two yoo-hoo's used buy-it-nows on my featured auctions and ultimately didn't pay.  And I was technically out sales because I held on to this merchandise without relisting it right away and was not able to sell it to a good paying eBayer because they were jerking me around for weeks.

*Sometimes they will ask you to send the merchandise to a friend, or to a relative.  It's for their birthday, or Christmas, and please, they need it there in time.  They will try and play on your heart strings and try and make you feel bad.  You know doing this also negates your protection through Paypal as the seller.  ONLY send to a confirmed address and the one on file when they pay.  Someone asking you to send something to an address other than their own confirmed address can also be a red flag of an account hi-jacking.  They may be using someone else's eBay, Paypal, or checking account information to conduct this con.

*Check to see how long the person has been a registered eBay user.  If they are new or fairly new, this can be, but not always, a red flag.  You can see this by clicking on their user id.  You can set your eBay account so that people with certain criteria (has received unpaid disputes, has a negative feedback score, etc.) cannot bid or use a buy it now on your items but this can still leave you open to threats for criteria that eBay has not pre-populated to have blocked.  You can also cancel the bids of someone that has placed a bid on a high dollar item of yours before the bidding ends if you look in their feedback or are disturbed by their bidding history.  Be careful doing this however, because you could potentially cancel the bid of a good eBayer.

*Check to see how many auctions they are currently bidding on or have won in the last 30 days.  You can do this by going to your messages and click on find and contact a member.  Then choose by bidder.  Both of these two scammers in my case had recently won several, I'm speaking of over 10, auctions for mostly large ticket buy-it-now items.  This also can be a red flag. 

*Look for any feedback at all.  If they have recently bought several items, look to see if any of these sellers have left positive completed payment feedback.  In my case, none of the other sellers had left any recent positive payment feedback, indicating they were trying to pull this bull with the other sellers at the same time.

As I realized I was never going to get the payments, I left negative feedback for both (this is when sellers still had some rights on eBay and could do this for non-payers that deserved it).  After I did, I saw that about 10 others had also done the same. 

I love eBay, it is my means of income.  I have a heart condition that precludes me from working full time outside the home and one of my little girls has a host of medical bills as well.  I really depend on these sales to pay medical bills and put food on my table.  It angers me that someone would prey on anyone else just trying to make an honest buck.  The sad part is that these scammers will probably just register under a new user id and try it again until someone takes the bait.  I hope you find this guide a useful warning.

UPDATE: In the fall of 2008 I have received many emails from fellow eBayers that claim this has happened to them a lot.  I am very sorry to see that this is still happening.  I have been asked a lot: What can I do if this happens to me...

First, again, as listed above, and I cannot stress this enough, not to send any items or goods until you have the funds.  Unfortunately if the transaction is still in limbo with Paypal there is nothing that you can do.  eBay and Paypal are so slanted towards the buyers these days that you just have to wait and see if the transaction clears.  If it's been 8 days since the item sold you can file a dispute in the Resolution Console on eBay to cancel the transaction due to non-payment.  More than likely the scammer will not respond to it so you will at least get your final value fees paid for the item back.  You will be out the listing fees though, which can be pricey if it was a high dollar item or a featured item.  And you need file as soon as you are able because scammers doing this to a lot of people at once will become an un-registered user once eBay catches onto them and then you cannot file a claim to get your fees back from with regard to a transaction associated to an unregistered user.