Online Safety Guide
Online Safety Guide For Business
Beware of SCAMS
A user posted an ad for someone else
When you are informed that an ad was posted on behalf of someone else. In some cases, you will also find that the scammer’s email is included in the description of the ad. You are then directed to a fraudulent user who will use the account holder’s good history to establish trust and attempt to scam you. They will often ask for an upfront deposit to secure the item/property.
While the prospect of getting paid or receiving an award for posting ads for someone might sound tempting, scammers tend to contact users to post fraudulent ads for them. Posting fraudulent ads from your account, even if you were unaware, could result in the suspension of your account.
Tips:
Buyer works offshore
The buyer would claim that he is unable to collect or view the item in person due to working offshore. The scammer would then suggest wiring the payment via Bitcoin transfer or any Crypto currency, Skrill, Bidpay, eWallet, Western Union or Money Gram. These payments never reflect.
What to do:
If you are unsure about a user, please send a snapshot of the conversation, contact number or email address used by the buyer to our helpdesk.
You’ve won the lottery
Fake lotteries, sweepstakes and competitions exploit a dream that many of us have – oh to live the Lotto life! Often these competitions will say that they are held in a different country and that you were automatically entered into the draw or someone entered on your behalf. Scammers rip you off by getting you to:
An overseas relative has left you their fortune
A scammer, disguised as a lawyer or bank, emails you saying that a long-lost relative has died and left you a huge inheritance. How many of us know our distant relatives? They can be convincing too, with ancestry and genealogy websites making your family tree readily available. Scammers rip you off by getting you to:
Brand name spoofing / phishing
You get an email that claims to be from Jozysales, your bank, PayPal, Western Union, or another company and offers buyer protection or an online payment system or perhaps a cash prize. These emails will typically request that you send money or provide personal information. Any emails which combine urgency with some need for personal details should be treated with caution, no matter whom they purport to be from. Jozysales and most other companies will never send out such emails. If you send money via these sites you are likely sending money to the fraudsters. If you receive an email alleging to be from a company offering a service then go directly to the company’s official website and look for details of the service. Tips:
Oops, I paid you too much! Cheque overpayment
A buyer or seller or prospective tenant will send you a cheque worth more than the value of the items/ rent and then ask for the surplus money to be returned to them or a third party, for example “to pay for shipping”. The cheque will clear into your bank, only to be stopped/refused weeks later. At this point, the Banks/Building Societies will take the full cheque amount back out of your account. Not only will you have lost the goods, you will be out of pocket for the amount of the cheque and the amount you passed on as the difference. Tips:
Payment for brokerage/importing
A seller claims that there are brokerage fees, import duties, or other such fees required to get an item into the country. Do not pay such fees, as you will most often never get the product and will have lost any money you paid. Please note that Jozysales is designed for local, face to face trading.
Fake escrow sites
A buyer or seller or prospective tenant/ landlord suggest using an escrow service to complete the transaction. Often these escrow web sites are run by fraudsters (even though they may look “official”) and they will take your money and never send you the product. Only transact face to face on Jozysales platform.
Make a fortune, Work from home
Many work from home offers are “pyramid schemes” which require you to recruit other members in order to get paid. For example, an ad may say that you can make 100 an hour by stuffing envelopes. But to make that money, you need to sell the system to others. Other work from home opportunities are fronts for money laundering – key warning sign should be any ‘job’ that involves you receiving cheques and cashing them. For these reasons we typically don’t accept work from home positions on Jozysales. Tips:
419 Scams
You get an email saying that your help is needed to take money out of a country and that you will be paid a commission for your help. Eventually they will ask you for money to help them take the large amount of money out of the country and once you pay you will never hear from them again. Tips:
Pet Shipping Scams
A seller will claim to have a pet and will offer to ship them. These are usually sought after dog breeds such as English Bulldogs, Yorkshire Terriers and Chihuahuas. These ads are usually accompanied by ‘staged’ pictures. The pets don’t exist and the fraudsters simply try to get you to pay money upfront.
Abuse / harassment
We don’t tolerate harassment or abuse of our Jozysales users and take reports of this nature very seriously. If you have experienced abuse or harassment in connection to either an ad on Jozysales or an email received from a Jozysales user then please report it to us at support@jozysales.com. You can click on the Report Ad button on any ad that is Abusive, Harassing or an Infringement on your right.