P.S. jecasc's experience confirms this even if his main conclusion is slightly off, but then it seems he has not had the unhappy experience of receiving significant funds from a stolen bank account in one country (Netherlands, Austria, UK, US, etc.) that has been compromised by phishers and cybercriminals and sold on to Nigerian and other scam gangs...

As he says:

But that does not mean you can keep the money when you get money by error or by fraud.

So if you receive an order from John Doe in Nigeria and the money comes from an account in Austria with the name of Gretchen Müller - you would be stupid to send out the goods - at least without contacting the bank in Austria and asking them to verify that the transfer was carried out by the account holder.

And the same goes for funds sent from banks anywhere in the world, even from banks in Nigeria or Ghana for orders to be shipped there. These two countries are at the present time the most obvious high risk places for orders in the world.

Don't discover why the hard way.

Caveat venditor!

If money is wired to your account in error, it isn't yours (why would it be?), but it can (and sometimes does) take a court order for the rightful owner and / or bank to reclaim it.

That's how difficult 'chargebacks' are.

Hi

I recently purchased an apple macbook from china, and the payment was by bank transfer. Now, its been over one month and i still have not received my product, and the company have stopped replying to me. The tracking number i was given is wrong.

I don't know what I can do, could I contact someone to get this money back?

How did you find the company / product?

Welcome to WebmasterWorld!

Had you previously dealt with them?

When they were replying, what were they saying?

My instinct says 'save your breath' - but your answers to the above questions may conceivably give a little more optimism.

I don't know what I can do, could I contact someone to get this money back?

Why don't you approach your bank with the fraud and report back to us with the result.

We could then settle this matter.

brown brother wrote:

I recently purchased an apple macbook from china, and the payment was by bank transfer. Now, its been over one month and i still have not received my product, and the company have stopped replying to me. The tracking number i was given is wrong.

As per Mr Hard's suggestion you can try your bank, but a wire sent in this way is unlikely to be reversed in your favour as you initiated the bank wire. It is far better to pay using a credit card for this kind of thing as you then have the card association rules to fall back on.

You should be very cautious of any offer that seems too good to be true.

So called replica goods sellers (i.e. counterfeit knock-off goods) do a good trade from China.

In the case of apparel and footwear, while some are actually good quality copies, they are all of course sold without the permission of the trademark/patent owners, with attention to detail and quality control to match.

As to consumer electronic brands such as Apple or Sony, you will not of course get a cheaper price by buying direct from China. The majority of such offers are simple advance fee fraud.

Infamous at the current time for this kind of fraud (i.e. selling fake Nike training shoes, etc., and pretending to sell cheap 'name brand' consumer electronics) are companies operating from the prefecture-level city of Putian, and Xianyou County on the coast of southeastern China. (Not generally though from those in the Fujian Province of the Republic of China/Taiwan.)

That is not to say that all companies operating from there are engaged in fraud of course, just that there are some infamous bad apples operating in this area.

Due diligence can be tough in China, although you can find due diligence experts to retain, for a fee, at sites such as Alibaba.com

To bring this thread back on track since it is not about sending money but receiving a wire transfer, I have received the money from the customer in Nigeria. I have spoken to 3 different representatives at my bank (Wells Fargo) about transfer fraud. Each one told me the same thing, "The transfer can not be reversed." I pressed the issue about fraud and suggested the sender had stolen someones identity to have the funds sent. How would the true account holder get their money back? The answer again is they can not; it would be up to me to send the money back.

It seems that the answer to my original question is fairly conclusive that wire transfers can not be reversed by the issuing bank and it is safe to receive funds this way. Thanks to all for the exchange of experiences and thoughts.

Larry

Starlight wrote:

I have spoken to 3 different representatives at my bank (Wells Fargo) about transfer fraud. Each one told me the same thing, "The transfer can not be reversed." I pressed the issue about fraud and suggested the sender had stolen someones identity to have the funds sent. How would the true account holder get their money back? The answer again is they can not; it would be up to me to send the money back.

Unless this guarantee is made in writing from an authorised officer of the bank, this promise is worth the paper it is written on. Did you ask for follow-up in writing?

Also, be vigilant for transfers out your bank account as you gave the Nigerians your bank details in order to transfer the money to you. If this is a US checking style account it's quite easy to pull ACH transfers out if you have the routing and bank account number.

I have confidence that the bank representatives were telling me the truth so I don't need to see it in writing. I have never understood all the bank rules in my agreement and trust I get the right answer from them.

As to ACH removals I have personal experience. When our business changed merchant accounts, the prior company removed $99 as a cancellation fee. I called my bank and told them it was not authorized. They immediately reversed the ACH and replaced the funds.

I also received a bank transfer from a Nigerian Cutomer in lagos. I checked with the bank who did the transfer and was told it was legitimate and also checked with my bank and its not reversible. I even got the money out already. The problem is that the way this nigerian customer dealt with me is like he did hijack someones account and use that to pay for these goods (over 10K). Seemed rushed to transfer th money, used a yahoo account, was told he had to send in installments because the nigerian gov wont allow over 10K transfers (is that right?) What do i do? I even feel that the nigerian bank rep is in on the action because as soon as the rep emails me the customer emails me too (maybe the same person?) Should I go ahead and just ship out the goods? I do have the money, and its not reversible. But totally feel its a hijacked scam... I would love to hear what Starlight has to say, seems i'm in the same boat. maybe we are both dealing with the same customer since the transfers are also in Feb. is this a new scam? just not have hit attention yet? Starlight any comments, it can sure help what happened so far to you.

I even feel that the nigerian bank rep is in on the action

What makes you think this Nigerian is really with a real bank?

I checked with the bank who did the transfer and was told it was legitimate

So the Nigerian bank said it was legitimate. How did you check this? Did you ask after walking thru the door of a 20 story marble building in downtown Lagos?

R I Vegas, I really don't have any answer to your situation except to say follow your conscience. If anyone is pushy or has the tone of nervousness or if ANYthing just seems wrong, pass it up. Perhaps the right thing is to wire the money back where it came from and explain your concern to the buyer.

Update: I received the money from a bank in Singapore, I shipped the product, two months have passed and no problems. After much correspondence with the buyer, it just had the ring of being a legitimate transaction. Turns out that the person works for an oil company and travels back and forth to Nigeria.

Thank you to everyone that kept this thread on track. I considered the input from this list and did much investigation and I am convinced that wire transfers can not be reversed. The road to recovery of money that has been transferred by fraud is extremely difficult. Not one bank that I spoke with has ever had a customers money wired from an account by fraud. The banks are just thorough about how these transactions take place because (drum roll...) they can't be reversed.

no wiki and the site...ecobank. thanks Starlight

Try this in Google for a start:

+ecobank +scam

Bet a few would take this Ecobank check even with FAKE written across it :) And notice "One Million Two Hundred Thounsand United States Dollar."

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[edited by: jsinger at 1:44 am (utc) on Mar. 28, 2009]

yes i did do that too. Ecobank however has been around and been in legitimate business for some time. I went to their site and used their email feature to get an official response (somewhat all I can in writing). However if its a hijacked account I don't know if they would invstigate it as a priority. they just verified its a transfer from their bank. The weirdness is the email from the ecobank rep and the customers email is just 2 minutes apart. Seems like the same person.