Rebecca and Simon Gregory had been on a protracted weekend away in Disneyland Paris when the primary stranger rang the doorbell at their two-bedroom dwelling in Littlehampton, West Sussex.
The couple, who’re of their 30s, knew it wasn’t a good friend or relative due to their ‘good’ doorbell, which beams CCTV photos from their entrance door within the seaside city to their cellphones.
After briefly watching a person wandering round on their porch trying confused, the couple began to get involved.
Fascinating: The VW Transporter has gained a cult following lately, which has led to it turning into Britain’s most scammed automobile
However then one other stranger turned up. And one other. And one other.
Rebecca began to get frightened. What on earth was attracting so many individuals to their dwelling 300 miles away?
The merchandising account director requested her mom, Davina, 62, who lives close by, to pop spherical and examine.
When Davina reported again, Rebecca was gobsmacked. Each one in every of their surprising guests had turned up for a similar cause: to gather a Volkswagen Transporter van they’d purchased on eBay.
Davina had politely defined that there was no means her daughter and her husband might be promoting a VW Transporter. They merely didn’t personal one.
In whole, about 13 eBay patrons turned as much as discover solely the couple’s Ford Fiesta on the driveway.
And so they had been nonetheless arriving when Rebecca, 35, and Simon, 38, returned dwelling two days later.
Every purchaser had put down £2,000 to £3,000 as a deposit on a VW Transporter listed on the market on eBay. They’d then been given Rebecca and Simon’s handle to gather the van.
One couple had pushed a number of hundred miles.
Others had booked motels. One had spent 5 hours on a practice from Liverpool.
Alarmed: Rebecca and Simon Gregory found their handle had been utilized in a rip-off when folks started turning up on their doorstep asking for his or her vans
Most had been livid once they discovered the van they thought they’d purchased didn’t exist. Briefly, that they had all fallen sufferer to the most typical automobile fraud in Britain in the present day: the faux second-hand VW Transporter van rip-off.
The Transporter — particularly the fifth-generation T5 fashions, which had been constructed between 2003 and 2015 — has gained a cult following.
It’s an affordable however cheerful business automobile ripe for changing right into a campervan which you’ll be able to journey and sleep in, due to its dimension and workhorse engine.
Social media is awash with movies of easy methods to convert them on a shoestring.
However that recognition has additionally alerted fraudsters.
Actually, VW Transporter fraud is now so widespread {that a} devoted Fb web page with 3,500 members has been set as much as observe down dodgy adverts.
In keeping with fraud skilled Jack Buster, who runs Motion Rip-off, a gaggle which helps victims recuperate cash, most of the phony VW Transporter adverts are recycled and used quite a few instances.
He says vans carrying the identical quantity plates seem repeatedly on eBay and Fb Market, hooking in dozens of patrons at a time.
‘A number of the photographs getting used on these adverts are sometimes eight or 9 years’ previous,’ he says. ‘They’re a scammer’s goldmine.’
Glad campers: The VW T5 is a well-liked alternative for DIY camper vans with social media awash with movies of easy methods to convert them on a shoestring
Victims are inspired to ship cash — or no less than an preliminary deposit — by financial institution switch earlier than they choose up the automobile in particular person.
The vendor then both goes chilly and ignores any additional messages, or gives a faux handle for assortment as a way to give their ruse the looks of legitimacy.
The string of strangers who appeared on Rebecca and Simon’s doorstep had all been taken in by the identical faux itemizing on eBay. Collectively, they misplaced as a lot as £40,000.
The couple say they needed to break the information to victims again and again. ‘With some folks you possibly can inform by their expressions they couldn’t afford to lose that sort of cash,’ she says. ‘It was actually upsetting for us.’
Final yr, instances of on-line automobile scams referred to Motion Fraud, the reporting physique, had been up 21 laptop on the extent recorded in 2019.
And the VW Transporter dominates the rip-off listings, Mr Buster says.
It regularly got here out prime in polls rating the most well-liked second-hand vans.
Its recognition boomed through the pandemic as journey restrictions gave extra folks the eager for campervan holidays within the UK.
A second-hand VW T5 in good situation can simply be bought for greater than £10,000 after costs shot up by £1,294 in a yr, in line with on-line automobile market AutoTrader.
Pretend advertisements, which often contain scammers itemizing vans for a a lot decrease — but nonetheless believable — worth can entice dozens of patrons who suppose they’re securing a cut price.
Elliott Boddy, who runs Travelin‑Lite, a enterprise that sells Transporter elements, says: ‘It’s usually folks new to the VW scene who fall sufferer to those scams.
‘Individuals shopping for their first one are most susceptible.
‘Inform-tale indicators are the vans being listed too low cost for the mannequin being bought. In recent times, I’ve regularly seen the identical vans utilized in adverts.’
Kim Rees and Tim Barrett, each 51, paid £2,650 for a VW that turned out to not exist, after having seen an advert on eBay.
Fraudsters’ favorite: VW Transporter fraud is now so widespread {that a} devoted Fb web page with 3,500 members has been set as much as observe down dodgy adverts
The 2006 T5 mannequin was listed as having 77,000 miles on the clock, with assortment from an handle in Bicester, Oxfordshire.
The couple, from Shaftesbury, Dorset, needed the van to make use of for Tim’s job as a self-employed carpenter. After registering their curiosity on eBay, they spoke to the ‘vendor’ on the telephone and had been persuaded to pay a deposit by way of financial institution switch.
Kim says: ‘The vendor sounded so real on the telephone, so we paid the £1,000 deposit.
‘However then he referred to as to say he must refund the cash as he had discovered one other purchaser who would pay the complete quantity.
‘So we paid the complete £2,650 for worry of shedding out. As quickly as we acquired to the handle, I knew one thing was improper. The home didn’t appear to be the one within the advert.’
Kim and Tim’s financial institution, NatWest — with whom they’ve been clients for greater than 30 years — has refused to cowl their loss because it insists the couple had been ‘negligent’ in shopping for a automobile with out seeing it first.
Had the couple paid by way of eBay — versus a direct financial institution switch — they’d have been coated by the positioning’s money-back assure.
Fb doesn’t supply a built-in cost service, that means customers are compelled to ship cash immediately by way of financial institution switch.
That leaves them with out the protections in opposition to fraud supplied by PayPal or credit score and debit playing cards, the place the cost supplier may be compelled to step in and canopy losses.
Motion Rip-off’s Mr Buster, who battles banks on behalf of fraud victims, instructed Cash Mail of a case the place a person affected by most cancers was scammed by a Transporter advert.
The person was regularly being handled in a single day in Leeds Basic Infirmary regardless of dwelling 150 miles away in Blackburn, Lancashire. He needed a VW Transporter T5 so his rapid household may journey with him and keep in it whereas he was handled.
He misplaced £10,000 after falling for a faux advert and paying in full.
Mr Buster’s Fb group is full of victims who’ve changed into sleuths to assist others keep away from the identical destiny, sharing particulars of rip-off adverts and trying to get them shut down.
Mr Buster says: ‘eBay and Fb Market are head and shoulders above the others for the sheer quantity of fraudulent automobile adverts.
‘These platforms have to shut down the adverts quicker.’
He says one of the simplest ways to keep away from falling sufferer to automobile fraud is by by no means shopping for something you haven’t seen in particular person.
If that isn’t potential, he recommends asking the vendor for a video telephone name — by way of Zoom or FaceTime, for instance — the place they may give you a dwell tour of the automobile. ‘It have to be a dwell video as a result of pre-recorded movies may be stolen from real sellers and utilized by fraudsters,’ says Mr Buster.
Fb says if a consumer sees indicators of suspicious exercise, they need to instantly cancel the transaction and report the itemizing to the positioning as a faux.
An eBay spokesman says: ‘1000’s of our customers purchase and promote automobiles on eBay safely and efficiently on daily basis.
‘At all times view the automobile in particular person earlier than handing over any cash.
‘If any of your readers have been a sufferer of fraud, they need to report it to eBay, Motion Fraud and their native police power instantly.’
h.kelly@dailymail.co.uk
