Thief Alert

Benzman, this thief's real name is Michael Campbell.  He's been ripping people off for years. He's used addresses in Ohio and Florida.  He took me for $100 maybe a decade ago.  More recently he took a good friend for around $2000.  Crime doesn't pay?  Ho, ho, ho.

I always use Pay-Pal, no problem....I always pay their fees, I don't do friends and gifts.....I tell people when they pay me , keep it straight .......I would say Pay-Pal has paid me back at least 6000.00 in bad purchases.....That 4% they charge is cheep insurance .......I had a strange thing happen....I bought something in UK for 750.00, didn't get a tracking number after several days so I asked Audiogon to check it out....The seller got mad and cancelled my buy and sent my money back.....The seller was new to Audiogon, was out of the US and had one very short feed-back........Wonder why he got mad at me ???   autospec

Be careful. Always look at the price. Always see if he is overseas. Ask multiple questions about how he got it. See if he knows the equipment well enough.  Etc.  I only do PayPal.  If I can't then no deal!

In case any of you don't know it, AudioGon had a serious problem with many accounts being hacked about 5 years ago when they started trying to update the site. It can still be happening? When I emailed them stating my account was hacked they took action but I had to lose my account and start over. They also tried to keep it secret as when I posted it on the Forums they quickly deleted it. Ever since Agon has been Rare selling platform for me. Ebay currently has continuos hacked accounts, so even mega buck companies with lots of security get screwed. Members with excellent feedback and havent used their accounts in a while are usually the targets.
There is no reason not to use Paypal, its insurance for buyers and protects sellers as well. They have saved my ass many times because of shady buyers looking to get either discounts or claim false information to gain from. You simply need to educate yourself with Paypals policies and generally will have no problems. That said I have had some minor losses, stuff happens. But if you are so desperate to buy something and fall for a story that sounded too good to be true then it was a good lesson learned. 

Someone should ask a public question (if a site allows it) with a link to this discussion.