Scam???

[EkkieLu]

I saw an ad posted on CL for a beautiful 5 year old male macaw complete with large cage toys etc.located very near our home... Priced at only $300! Looked fishy to me so I answered it. I got an email back stating why the 6 month old well trained female was being rehomed. That she has been in numerous photo shoots for magazines and ad work. That they are now located in Virginia and not Michigan. Just send the money and the bird would be shipped to me promptly...

Now, if the ad would have been legit, I would have gone and picked him up, then posted him on Rehome Highway to ensure he was adopted by an experienced, knowledgeable pet parent as my flock is now complete. But the ad, in my opinion, is an outright scam. The man "selling" this poor baby has emailed me several times now trying to convince me to just send the money...

So I started looking thru CL bird ads...most seem to be legit, but of the dozen or so I emailed, the "send the money" routine was the same. One thing these ads all had in common were very low prices, like a Hy for $600, a M2 for $500.... You get the idea.

Is there any way to report these scammers to authorities for prosecution? Can we do anything to put a stop to this blatantly false advertising? I didn't realize before I did this research just how wide spread this is.

 

[EkkieLu]

Has anyone else come across this type of thing?

 

[Hankmacaw]

A couple of old, old sayings for everyone to keep in mind;

Buyer beware.
I don't trust anyone except me and thee and sometimes I wonder about thee.
Trust, but verify.

I seem to remember a button on the CL ads where you can report the ad.
'

 

[EkkieLu]

I don't think the button to report ads is there anymore. There is a link to learn about scams or to confer with the federal govt.

 

[Peachfaced]

A few red flags jump out at me; Any time you see something about shipping a bird, especially if they request that you send money to them. Low value of a relatively expensive bird.

It's sad, I know. I wish folks wouldn't scam others.

 

[EkkieLu]

A few red flags jump out at me; Any time you see something about shipping a bird, especially if they request that you send money to them. Low value of a relatively expensive bird.

It's sad, I know. I wish folks wouldn't scam others.

Involving innocent pets really upsets me!

 

[RachelM]

I agree with @Peachfaced. I’ve gotten messages a number of times on FB asking if I want to buy birds and only pay shipping. Occasionally I’ll have a little fun with the scammer. Most of the time I’ll ask if they have hyacinths and blue-throated's. They almost always reply “Yes you only pay shipping for $800” yeah right. Selling a normally $20,000 (CA) bird for nothing? I doubt it. And when I confront them with photos I find on the internet, (they almost always choose the very first images) they just don’t answer. One time someone called ME! A sc*mbag for not trusting them.. Is that really what you want to be in this world? It’s sad.

 

[Mockinbirdiva]

Scam. It went from being a 5 year old male to a well trained 6 month old female. Just send money.... yeah right!

 

[Mizzely]

Most of the time there is NO bird. It is pictures they steal off the internet and use to bait you. It's all a scam for sure!

On Craigslist the link to flag is now called "Prohibited".

 

[Brittany0208]

Before I got Java, I had responded to an ad about a middle-aged Jardines that had a scissor-beak and was needing to be rehomed. Well, a day or so later, I received an email from the person I contacted saying the Jardines had been sold before the ad was taken down, but they had a few babies ready for adoption. I asked for pictures, and they sent me pictures of two CAPE PARROT babies. I said,' these aren't Jardines, they're Capes.' And the woman emailed saying they were a hybrid and needed to be rehomed because her husband was the original breeder who was killed in a car accident and she couldn't bear to look at the babies anymore, so they had to go.
So, I asked a bunch of questions even though I knew it was all a lie. I asked:
-are the parents on site?
-how old are the babies?
-when will they be weaned?
-what are you currently feeding them?
-are you selling the parents?
I asked a few other questions but I can't remember, and the woman said I would need to send money in her son's name via Western Union and they would ship my baby of choice by TRAIN! When I asked about more pictures of the babies and the parents, they stopped responding to my emails. It kind of pissed me off because I was really hoping there was a Jardines I could give a home to.
In the end, Java became my companion, and I wouldn't have it any other way.
I was skeptical about adopting Java because I saw his ad on two different sites, months apart: one was birdbreeders.com and the other was hoobly.com Until I physically had him, I was skeptical if I was truly going to end up with the bird I paid for and had already fell in love with.

 

[EkkieLu]

Most of the time there is NO bird. It is pictures they steal off the internet and use to bait you. It's all a scam for sure!

On Craigslist the link to flag is now called "Prohibited".

View attachment 289487

Thank you! I'm going to flag the ad if it's still there! At least now I know there's not a poor little bird involved with these despicable people!

 

[EkkieLu]

Scam. It went from being a 5 year old male to a well trained 6 month old female. Just send money.... yeah right!

Do people actually send money to these scammers?

 

[M_Riddly]

Involving innocent pets really upsets me!

There most likely isn't any bird involved. They probably just stole the pictures of the internet. Scammers dip their fingers in lots of scam pies so they almost never actually have what they are trying to sell. I got scammed out of about 1,000 through a bird scam. It was really sad. On the bright side, loosing all that money delayed me getting a bird because I had to recoup the money and I got Leo. Not saying I'm happy to have lost that much money, but I probably wouldn't have my sweet baby if I had not been scammed. Not saying thanks....but there's always a silver lining.

 

[Shezbug]

Not sure about the USA but here (Aus) we have a site called 'scamwatch' and you can report any scams to them and they see what they can do about it. I am not sure if they shut them down or advertise the fact that it is a scam.

 

[EkkieLu]

Not sure about the USA but here (Aus) we have a site called 'scamwatch' and you can report any scams to them and they see what they can do about it. I am not sure if they shut them down or advertise the fact that it is a scam.

If anyone knows of a site like that for the USA, please share the link!

 

[M_Riddly]

A lot of people don't know this, but there is a specialized section of the police that actually attempts to go after these people and either make them reimburse the people they scammed or send them to jail. I went to the police but I don't think they caught my scammer.

 

[rocky'smom]

Do people actually send money to these scammers?

Yup they sure do send money to these creeps.

 

[Mockinbirdiva]

Do people actually send money to these scammers?

As hard as it is to imagine anyone falling for this type of scam, yes, they do. Probably not often but it certainly has happened.

 

[EkkieLu]

Don't know how they sleep at night!

There most likely isn't any bird involved. They probably just stole the pictures of the internet. Scammers dip their fingers in lots of scam pies so they almost never actually have what they are trying to sell. I got scammed out of about 1,000 through a bird scam. It was really sad. On the bright side, loosing all that money delayed me getting a bird because I had to recoup the money and I got Leo. Not saying I'm happy to have lost that much money, but I probably wouldn't have my sweet baby if I had not been scammed. Not saying thanks....but there's always a silver lining.

 

[rocky'smom]

This part of the reason that my vet clinic no longer allows any pictures to be taken in the clinic. There was some body working there that was posting pictures of rescued birds and other animals to the internet.
It was a huge mess, we all had to sign confidentially agreements. I'm a volunteer there.