how much money have you lost to scams.ect

[coolazn]

wondering how much everyone lost between 2005/2006
scams. stupidness. gambeling ect


lost

$1400 (shipment of ipods got scamed)
$500 lcd light stop working
$100 used ipod i bought stop working after a few months.


well thats how much i lost.


i regret the scam the most since it was alot of money.


^^

[Mystix]

wow you got owned alot of times

I have nothing to bad besides an $150 parking ticket :mad:

[Geologic]

You lost $1400 on a "shipment" of ipods?.. How'd you fall for that one?

[Cyber6]

Between 2005/2006 .. I lost maybe 50$ on lottery tickets. :| :lol:

[Allen84]

$7000 lent to mom in '01 (yet to get back)
$4000 lent away to friend on '03 (in the process of getting back, in court)
$3200 lent away to friend on '04 to get him out of CC debt (yet to get back)
$500 lent away to Best friend '04 (for his car ins. renewal) (yet to get back)
$850 (in '06 (for a to fixing brakes on my car, i think i got ripped off (i would of settled for 300-400 price tag but oh well)

____________

$15,550
- ($300-400) ( i would of settled for on brake job)
___________

Total Money lost of this moment ($15,150-$15,250)



Moral of this story.................... Do not lend any friends any money whatsoever.

[CheapScotsman]

Nothing this year but 10 years ago we got taken in Cancun Mexico ... the taxi guy charged us $7 for a ride that I am sure wasn't worth anymore than about $2 or $3.

[Cyber6]

$7000 lent to mom in '01 (yet to get back)
$4000 lent away to friend on '03 (in the process of getting back, in court)
$3200 lent away to friend on '04 to get him out of CC debt (yet to get back)
$500 lent away to Best friend '04 (for his car ins. renewal) (yet to get back)
$850 (in '06 (for a to fixing brakes on my car, i think i got ripped off (i would of settled for 300-400 price tag but oh well)




Hey man.. can you lend me $ 5K?? :D

[Badger]

About $500 on some online investment site. Guy ran away, couldn't get a hold of him.

[nano]

i havent been scammed but...

My bf gets scammed by his customers all the time he got scammed out of $1000 last month. he has lost about $10000 to Non paying customers.

[Allen84]

Hey man.. can you lend me $ 5K?? :D

:lol: i believe i've learned my lesson, i vow to myself never to lend anything again. I gotta stop being generous. cause i basically screwed myself, which i need the money myself.

I neeed a new car soon, and ditch my Sh*tbox.

[coolazn]

lost $1400 through a friend. decieded too run off with my money. he ran pretty far. all the way back to hk. well the $1400 was split between 3 other friend since i was running a electronic store.

i learned one thing. always recive the item first or dont buy it >:(

[PrimoTurbo]

$0, but I nearly lost $5 at McDonald's 4 weeks ago. I was getting the now replaced McDeal menu for $3.99, paid with a $10 and only got back 70 cents from the $5. I was like, this isn't the correct change then the lady looked at me for about two minutes and then realized she forgot to give me my $5. That type of crap acctually happens all the time, they forget a few cents here a dollar there, but I always catch them. I heard some local places can do this on purpose and pretend they forgot...

[infamous_seller]

$7000 lent to mom in '01 (yet to get back)
$4000 lent away to friend on '03 (in the process of getting back, in court)
$3200 lent away to friend on '04 to get him out of CC debt (yet to get back)
$500 lent away to Best friend '04 (for his car ins. renewal) (yet to get back)
$850 (in '06 (for a to fixing brakes on my car, i think i got ripped off (i would of settled for 300-400 price tag but oh well)

____________

$15,550
- ($300-400) ( i would of settled for on brake job)
___________

Total Money lost of this moment ($15,150-$15,250)



Moral of this story.................... Do not lend any friends any money whatsoever.

AHAHAHAHAAHAHAAHAHAHHAHH......ure a funny guy for trusting anyone with money....money is ure only friend :D

[Canuck_2005]

$7000 lent to mom in '01 (yet to get back)
$4000 lent away to friend on '03 (in the process of getting back, in court)
$3200 lent away to friend on '04 to get him out of CC debt (yet to get back)
$500 lent away to Best friend '04 (for his car ins. renewal) (yet to get back)
$850 (in '06 (for a to fixing brakes on my car, i think i got ripped off (i would of settled for 300-400 price tag but oh well)

____________

$15,550
- ($300-400) ( i would of settled for on brake job)
___________

Total Money lost of this moment ($15,150-$15,250)



Moral of this story.................... Do not lend any friends any money whatsoever.


Moral is, never lend friends/family more money then you can afford to loose. If a family member/friend wants to borrow money the best way to treat it in your mind is as a gift, and not to expect it back, and if they pay back, consider it a bonus.

[Allen84]

Moral is, never lend friends/family more money then you can afford to loose. If a family member/friend wants to borrow money the best way to treat it in your mind is as a gift, and not to expect it back, and if they pay back, consider it a bonus.


yeah I made some bad decisions, the biggest mistake of my life, and trust me i've learned my lesson, but.... im not gonna think that way. as giving the money as a gift. I will get my money back eventually, hopefully soon enough. since im in a legal process right now, Im going on to the next person of difficulty of getting the money back, in order, until I eventually get it all back.

trying to meet my target goal of getting all this back by the end of '06 (mom $$$ i can let slide :lol: )

after that if im still un-successful, im buying a chainsaw and someone is gonna lose some legs.

[Siefer999]

$0, but I nearly lost $5 at McDonald's 4 weeks ago. I was getting the now replaced McDeal menu for $3.99, paid with a $10 and only got back 70 cents from the $5. I was like, this isn't the correct change then the lady looked at me for about two minutes and then realized she forgot to give me my $5. That type of crap acctually happens all the time, they forget a few cents here a dollar there, but I always catch them. I heard some local places can do this on purpose and pretend they forgot...
:lol: i thought a wendy's cashier burned me $10 so i went back and politely said that i know you must get this a lot but i just looked at my change and im missing $10 and she gave it me and appologized. i felt like an ass after i checked my pockets again and found it. i gave teh money back and she gave me a dirty look. it was my mistake.

i lost 8k in a pyramid scam. not really lost 8k but wasted 8k on overpriced products taht nobody wanted to buy. products work okay especially the household products but i didnt make back any $$ as promised. stupidest mistake ever.

i started telling everybody i knew so they wouldnt make the same mistakes i did but a few of them fell for a different one and it got so bad to the point where they even attempted to suck my in too by giving me the whole speel about how i can be making money by doing relativly nothing. i suggested they drop out of it right there and cut your losses ( because you cant just remain idle, you have to buy a certain amount ever so often or the people under you have to) but they dint so i had to stop talking to them. its so sad to watch them go down but for them to think im stupid enough to join their scam again after what i told them... and for them to even try to sell that crap to me... and for them to talk to me like im a sucker (deep down they know they got suckered), i just couldnt be around them anymore because every chance they got. they would bring it up and try to pretend that theyre well off.

[Amourek]

I've never put myself in a position to be scammed though I did lend $1000 to my best friend who said I'd get it back in a couple of weeks. Ended up being more like a year.

[webdoctors]

dude, gimme $2k,. U know I;m good for it, look @ all ma posting history.

Don't turn a fellow RFDer down.

Just gimme til '07 to make things rite yo.

$7000 lent to mom in '01 (yet to get back)
$4000 lent away to friend on '03 (in the process of getting back, in court)
$3200 lent away to friend on '04 to get him out of CC debt (yet to get back)
$500 lent away to Best friend '04 (for his car ins. renewal) (yet to get back)
$850 (in '06 (for a to fixing brakes on my car, i think i got ripped off (i would of settled for 300-400 price tag but oh well)

____________

$15,550
- ($300-400) ( i would of settled for on brake job)
___________

Total Money lost of this moment ($15,150-$15,250)



Moral of this story.................... Do not lend any friends any money whatsoever.

[Siefer999]

I've never put myself in a position to be scammed though I did lend $1000 to my best friend who said I'd get it back in a couple of weeks. Ended up being more like a year.
yea, i lent someone 500 that was supposed to be repaid in 2 weeks. its been over a year and he's paying me back 10 here, 20 there, 5 here. still owes me 380. im like 'fcuk man, give it to me in a chunk at least'. i know he will eventually pay me back and its not like i desperatly need the money but come on, be a man and pay off what you owe. im trying to be the bigger man since im better off than he is but i make it a point not to owe anybody for more than 48hrs and they get compensated for their generosity too. do people not feel shame owning someone for so long...

[Steeve Urkel]

Ok,

maybe not a "scam" but I did lose money and waste Alot of time trying to start a business through one of these government business assistance programs where you are supposed to get business grants and start up help.

I put in about $1,400 of my own money doing business research and going to all these meeting to be told I would qualify for money and that my business plan was good ect...

So, I pretty much spent a whole lot of time working on that only to be turned down in the end because of some stupid rule they decided to change or add at the last minute.

So, basically I wasted alot of time that I would have spent doing something else or trying to raise money in other forms instead of running around to stupid business seminars and "business coaching".

Next time I'll know that most of those government "help programs" are a waste of time......not all but most!

[Suzy Q]

I put a $300 deposit on a wedding dress, I wasn't told it was non-refundable so I changed my mind a week later & went to get back the $. The chick gave me a wicked hard time (I never even took the dress out of the store!), told me the commission had been paid out already. Called head office & got more crap. Anyway I never got back the $ so I spent the next while telling anyone who would listen what happened. The store closed 6 months later, don't know if I had anything to do with that or not tho.

[fishlips20]

$180


One Word about buying sunglasses off of eBay

F"oakleys"

[vladislav]

About 3k, all in paypal reversals from scamming buyers who get the product and reverse funds.

[lip1978]

Spent $498 on one of those 4 nights in Florida + bonus 3 nights in Vegas, if you go to the timeshare speech.

My gf and I drove to Orlanda and spent the 4 nights in the hotel, didn't go to the timeshare, so didn't get the bonus, and the price of the hotel was the same as it would have been otherwise. But we got to DisneyWorld and Universal Studios, and had a fun time, so it worked out.

[lip1978]

Double, sorry

[Rosico]

$180


One Word about buying sunglasses off of eBay

F"oakleys"

Got involved in an ebay scam when ebay was in its infancy (or, to be more accurate, I was in my ebay infancy). Bought a laptop off a guy in "Italy" for an unbelieveable price and very little feedback. Lost $600.

I was trusting and naeve of the all powerful internet and 'global village' concept.

Oh how I wanted to try to hunt this punk down!

[CodecX81]

$140 in NSF & a slightly lowered credit rating for ebay buyers trying to rip the money (via paypal reversal) out of my account after buying the item. Super pissed off (But they never got their money back) I thought I could sucker paypal off by waiting until it was fully transferred into my bank account, but they can reverse it anywhere, any-way.

Learned two things:

#1 When ebaying, "local pickup only" is your friend.
&
#2 exchange only for cold hard cash.

[Mehrtens]

I got scammed out of some candy when I was in grade 2, by bullies in grade 4 . Those bastards ! :mad:

[Cyber6]

I scammed a guy out of his candy when I was in grade 4. He was in grade two and was a total pussy. :D

[TCWeasel]

I got scammed for $20 on my digital camera battery purchase on ebay.

That's about it.

I did have someone call me once when I was using Bell High Speed. They called about my account. "Everything is fine, ", she said, "we just want to verify some of your account details".

I replied with "If everything is fine, why do you need my account information?".

She hung up.


Oh, and I lost about $60,000 to a few guys in Nigeria.

After the fifth time someone said I could make millions, I got wise to them!
(Of course I'm kidding!...sheesh!)


I never give money or buy anything that is brought to be me by phone, door to door or email. People looking for a donation get diddly. People calling on the phone trying to sell something either get nothing or I say I'll call back. If they call me on the phone asking for money for an overdue bill, I tell them I'll pay online.

Oh, I do make exceptions for children selling chocolates door to door. I'm an easy mark.

[Mehrtens]

I scammed a guy out of his candy when I was in grade 4. He was in grade two and was a total pussy. :D


ha ha :lol:

[coolazn]

and i thought i lost alot

$1400 is so dam little.

it should be $1700 since i lent this fat as 200 back in high school since he wanted these nike shock shoes in metro.

never paid a penny back

[najibs]

$7000 lent to mom in '01 (yet to get back)
$4000 lent away to friend on '03 (in the process of getting back, in court)
$3200 lent away to friend on '04 to get him out of CC debt (yet to get back)
$500 lent away to Best friend '04 (for his car ins. renewal) (yet to get back)
$850 (in '06 (for a to fixing brakes on my car, i think i got ripped off (i would of settled for 300-400 price tag but oh well)

____________

$15,550
- ($300-400) ( i would of settled for on brake job)
___________

Total Money lost of this moment ($15,150-$15,250)



Moral of this story.................... Do not lend any friends any money whatsoever.

Wow, you're quite the friend for having lent money so many times, only to be taken advantage of over and over again. I do agree that it's best to play poor when a friend asks for money, because ultimately it can cost a friendship.

Luckily, I've not been scammed yet. I've bought LOTS of $ worth of digital camera equipment, electronics, on other forums and on ebay. I guess I must be lucky and I certainly don't take it for granted, seeing what many other have gone through.

[kingfencer]

... too many to name, though the sum of the scams are not that much. If you consider online poker a scam, then i lost a few coin, they make it look like its so easy to win.

[BlueMax]

I lost $45 to a "work at home" thing. The "work at home" deal is to sign OTHER people up to work at home and send you $45 for the "kit". (Said kit was written by a grade-4 english dropout on how to write the ad in the paper, and how to get a PO box to protect your identity.)

Have yet to find a legit work-at-home thing, but I know they're out there. (For the wife, who's a stay-at-home mom.)

[charger]

I got scammed about $50 when I was 17. I was sold some crappy marijuana. It had almost no THC in it, and it was a total ripoff.

Otherwise, nothing.

[shadowfighta]

I lost around $100 us to a seller on another forum (offtopic) 1.5 yrs ago. The guy scammed a lot of people and one guy hired a private investigator to find the guy. He was eventually arrested and ordered to pay everyone back. I got a cheque for $200 US a few weeks ago!

[TrevorK]

Wow, you're quite the friend for having lent money so many times, only to be taken advantage of over and over again. I do agree that it's best to play poor when a friend asks for money, because ultimately it can cost a friendship.

The only problem is that I'm willing to bet the guy can't play poor, his friends know he has money.

I've had the same issue in the past with loaning friends money, they know I have it (There's no way to hide it), and they know they need it. I like to help out my friends when they need it. Hell, I even gave a guy a car on a 2 year payment plan (Which turned out on time in the end).


In total, I've loaned out ~$30K over the past 4 years. And I've only got $6K outstanding, and only $2K of that I have no idea when I'll get.



I agree it's getting taken advantage of, but I really think it's the person initiating the loan that is the guilty party. How do you say know to a friend, when it involves something that doesn't really hurt you (Loaning them spare cash)?

[Frankie3s]

$0, but I nearly lost $5 at McDonald's 4 weeks ago. I was getting the now replaced McDeal menu for $3.99, paid with a $10 and only got back 70 cents from the $5. I was like, this isn't the correct change then the lady looked at me for about two minutes and then realized she forgot to give me my $5. That type of crap acctually happens all the time, they forget a few cents here a dollar there, but I always catch them. I heard some local places can do this on purpose and pretend they forgot...

Happened to me in Chicago but at 7-11.

[EscaBoi]

lol, I thought I had it bad, but Allen84 seems to have it the worse.

I've got almost $900 (total) outstanding from friends...which I know i'll never see. Basically just lending out money here and there, and in some cases it's been over 3 years now...so I've already acknowledged that I ain't getting it back, so whatever.

Now I don't lend money out to anyone.

[poppa]

$2-4 a couple times from Scotia Bank, stupid fees...

[Asun]

Hundreds of $$ to University Bookstore. Man, what a scam they're running there.

[Steeve Urkel]

I lost $45 to a "work at home" thing. The "work at home" deal is to sign OTHER people up to work at home and send you $45 for the "kit". (Said kit was written by a grade-4 english dropout on how to write the ad in the paper, and how to get a PO box to protect your identity.)

Have yet to find a legit work-at-home thing, but I know they're out there. (For the wife, who's a stay-at-home mom.)

Well, if u want a legit work at home job try mystery shopping.
There is alot of info on www.mysteryshop.org

I earn most of my income mystery shopping.
It is not entirely "work at home" as you have to go visit the stores.....but u send your reports from home.

if you hate writing it is a bad job for you.
if you hate sceduling your own work and are not very prompt it is not the job for you
you can make an average $22 an hour!

[BlueMax]

Well, if u want a legit work at home job try mystery shopping.
There is alot of info on www.mysteryshop.org

I earn most of my income mystery shopping.
It is not entirely "work at home" as you have to go visit the stores.....but u send your reports from home.

if you hate writing it is a bad job for you.
if you hate sceduling your own work and are not very prompt it is not the job for you
you can make an average $22 an hour!

My wife already does! :) Downside... there's not near enough shops to do in the Red Deer area to make that kind of money - or even close! It does give us the occasional "free" dinner out.

[jason9945]

about $40, got scammed by Eldirect on ebay for an ipod and headphones. That was just shipping back to them. I got a refund. B*stards!

[gordholio]

Lost about $160 plus a lot of my time to Amway/Quixtar.

[FearSonic]

Ok,

maybe not a "scam" but I did lose money and waste Alot of time trying to start a business through one of these government business assistance programs where you are supposed to get business grants and start up help.

I put in about $1,400 of my own money doing business research and going to all these meeting to be told I would qualify for money and that my business plan was good ect...

So, I pretty much spent a whole lot of time working on that only to be turned down in the end because of some stupid rule they decided to change or add at the last minute.

So, basically I wasted alot of time that I would have spent doing something else or trying to raise money in other forms instead of running around to stupid business seminars and "business coaching".

Next time I'll know that most of those government "help programs" are a waste of time......not all but most!

What was the rule change? And why is it a waste of time, since you need startup capital for it?

[P__S__2]

hmm

about:

$50 on ebay for a pair of ball shoes
$20-30 for a small tv...rfd'er bought it,never paid or recieved back. wont name tho.

so about $70-$80

[Rometiklan]

I recently heard about a scam involving poetry. They have a few of these scam sites around where amateur poets send in their poems, and without fail, every single one of them gets chosen as a semi-finalist to win some prize, and have their writing published in an anthology of poems. The con artists flatter the poets, and shower them with praise for being poetic geniuses. Try it yourself. Go to their site and submit a nonsensical poem and soon you will get a letter prasing your genius, that you are a semi-finalist, and inviting you to come down to a ceremony to honour you.

Everyone is invited to some ceremony at some locale like DisneyWorld where semi-finalists have to pay their own way, and pay to get into the ceremony, if you can believe that! The fee is usually $475 USD or close to that which includes a dinner. Who pays $475 to get into a ceremony that is supposed to be honouring their poetry? Smells like a scam already, but there are tons of people who get scammed by this. They rake in millions of dollars preying off the hopes of young poets. They even scam kids and teens, making them think their poetry is the work of real talent.

These scam sites were also featured on 20/20. The biggest perp of this scam seems to be poetry.com. You can google "poetry+scam" for more sites, I'm sure. Check out the horror stories at this site which is trying to exposed these con artists for what they are.

http://www.eliteskills.com/writing_scams/poetry.com.scam.php

[UrbanPoet]

I recently heard about a scam involving poetry. They have a few of these scam sites around where amateur poets send in their poems, and without fail, every single one of them gets chosen as a semi-finalist to win some prize, and have their writing published in an anthology of poems. The con artists flatter the poets, and shower them with praise for being poetic geniuses. Try it yourself. Go to their site and submit a nonsensical poem and soon you will get a letter prasing your genius, that you are a semi-finalist, and inviting you to come down to a ceremony to honour you.

Everyone is invited to some ceremony at some locale like DisneyWorld where semi-finalists have to pay their own way, and pay to get into the ceremony, if you can believe that! The fee is usually $475 USD or close to that which includes a dinner. Who pays $475 to get into a ceremony that is supposed to be honouring their poetry? Smells like a scam already, but there are tons of people who get scammed by this. They rake in millions of dollars preying off the hopes of young poets. They even scam kids and teens, making them think their poetry is the work of real talent.

These scam sites were also featured on 20/20. The biggest perp of this scam seems to be poetry.com. You can google "poetry+scam" for more sites, I'm sure. Check out the horror stories at this site which is trying to exposed these con artists for what they are.

http://www.eliteskills.com/writing_scams/poetry.com.scam.php

Damn yo. i thought my poems were l33t.
Now i gotta post it in this thread.

[MtX]

How do buyers scam on you eBay even though AFTER you clear the money from Paypal?

[Siefer999]

about $40, got scammed by Eldirect on ebay for an ipod and headphones. That was just shipping back to them. I got a refund. B*stards!
i've purchased stuff off them before. items are not how they are stated, their descriptions are way to generic and good condition means dirty crap-ass condition.
Lost about $160 plus a lot of my time to Amway/Quixtar.
i believe Quixtar was the company my friend joined and tried to get me to join. it might have been somehting similar, many are the same business under separate names

[jason9945]

i've purchased stuff off them before. items are not how they are stated, their descriptions are way to generic and good condition means dirty crap-ass condition.

I got a set of car speakers from them in great shape. Then I got an iPod and a set of shure e2's. The ipod came with a defective headphone jack, sent that back got one with a defective hard drive, they kept sending it back saying it passed their test. Except It DID NOT WORK AT ALL! The onboard diagnostics even said it failed.

The e2's arrived with a huge split in the cord. Eldirect said that I did it and refused to refund my money. They did aventually give me money, but I had to pay shipping x5 and ended up with nothing. Then they left ME negative feedback. Said I was a scammer! What a great scam! For my next scam I'm going to take a $50 bill (my own) and burn it! F*CK Ebay!

[Homer88]

I got scammed 20 bucks from UPS for the duties fee. Comeon the tax was like 4 bucks and the bloody duty is 20?

[HBP]

How do buyers scam on you eBay even though AFTER you clear the money from Paypal?

Chargeback their creditcard. It takes funds out of your account. I don't know what would happen if there weren't any funds in your account.

[MtX]

Chargeback their creditcard. It takes funds out of your account. I don't know what would happen if there weren't any funds in your account.

You guys make it seem like chargebacks are so easy.....

[Steeve Urkel]

Chargeback their creditcard. It takes funds out of your account. I don't know what would happen if there weren't any funds in your account.

If you have no funds in your account for a credit card, it works like a bank overdraft usually.

Mbna chrges you an extra $30 "processing fee" on top of the extra amount you will owe on your/their account.

Carappy....you can't win at that!

[MtX]

So I guess the solution is to take non-CC Paypal/EMT/Cash only.

[gamer123]

$60 for videocard, from Paypal.

[BadDrafter]

I paid $100 to ukranian pirates over the internet for proprietary software that I was using in college and use at work today. The computers at school were buggy, crashy and slow as cold molasses and had tiny monitors and I had a 22" at home. My head was screwed on wrong, I know, I was desperate. I did not hear from them after they took my money via western union. Needless to say I ended up paying the software vendor $500 for a student license for one year.

[auto-m8]

AHAHAHAHAAHAHAAHAHAHHAHH......ure a funny guy for trusting anyone with money....money is ure only friend :D


A