This is a subtype of the common “don’t pay for stuff delivered to you that you didn’t order” type of scam, but this one took me by surprise so I thought I’d share.
Basically a package comes but it looks 100% legitimate from Amazon, with the official printed Amazon label, my address down to the building/room number, and my name as I have it written in my Amazon account. I order from Amazon a lot so I’m never surprised to get an Amazon package at the door. But this time it was “Cash on delivery” almost 20,000 yen, and marked as “Gift” (wth sends gifts as COD??)
Anyway long story short, it is a legit label, simply somebody cloned my Amazon account and ordered from the cloned account. So when I reported it to Amazon they could see the cloned account and that it was a scam.
If this happens to you, before rejecting the delivery take a picture of the label, then if you report the reference number to Amazon they can identify the fraudulent shop, and hopefully do something about it.
I didn’t pay so I’m not sure what happens if you do, whether Amazon reimburses you or not. Technically you are paying Amazon (who then pays the shop) so they would be part of the scam, and should be able to prevent the payment to the shop.
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Somewhat related to this, there’s a scam where you order something at a great price on Amazon through a 3rd party seller. They cancel the order and email you saying their credit card processor is broken or some nonsense like that, and that they will ship it to you COD instead. If you do pay for it at the door you’re not getting the item you expected, and since the payment was done outside of Amazon then you’ll get no resolution from them outside of maybe banning the seller account who have already scammed enough people and have backups ready.
saw this one on a certain japanese youtube channel..what the scammer do is send “gifts” to other person/address and set the payment as COD..and they will specifically send items that gives them amazon points on purchase..once you pay the item the points will be credited to their account..sending expensive high points item on tens to hundreds of people would easily rack them 10k yen or more…i suggest you check the name, address etc. during delivery and much better to transact only credit cards on amazon..that way when a COD package would come..you will know..also if the address/name are correct..better check the persons/organization that knows your full address with name..there is a high chance your details were maliciously being used by them..
Yeah this happened to me last year, I just rejected the package, but didn’t think to take a picture of the label since I just told the delivery guy this isn’t mine.
Thank you for sharing your experience, it could be useful to someone out there.
Just recently some of my friends were talking about receiving stuff they didn’t order and were asked to pay for it in cash, luckily no one fell for it.
Curious, cos obvs. a cloned account is a scam (not that you would know it at the time of delivery) but I’m uncertain how the scammer actually benefits?
Like if you pay the COD, and receive a product, in what way are they benefiting, unless maybe it’s a ¥100 item being “bought” for ¥20,000 COD?
How are the scammers getting paid here?
This happened to my aunt this year as well, got a random COD package from Amazon on a random weekend. Luckily she already knew the delivery staff and they fully trusted her that she didn’t order anything, so they just brought back the package to the warehouse
I also order very often from Amazon that I often can’t tell if a package should one on that day. One thin f I never did and probably won’t do after seeing these scams is COD.
I got a package that was CoD once. I don’t pay like that, so I just said I won’t accept it, but it was only $20, so I kinda regret not spending it just to see what was inside the mystery box.
> simply somebody cloned my Amazon account and ordered from the cloned account
How can they clone an Amazon account? How did they get your address?
This information should not be easily available to any scammer. If someone managed to do that, sounds like Amazon might have messed up their security.
Damn, this happened to me just last week. Wife rejected the delivery because it was sent from me, to me, and she thought it was suspicious. Unfortunately we didn’t get a picture of the label.
This happened to me. It wasn’t marked as a gift; the label had my correct name, correct address, and an old phone number I had used a year prior, so it looked like “I” ordered it. Dumb me paid for it (around 12,000 yen COD).
I promptly contacted Amazon support through the app, and they were able to find and close the fraudulent account using the order number written on the label of the package. They were able to arrange a return and a refund, though it took a few weeks before the money was returned to me.
Edit: Amazon representative told me to not pay for something I did not order next time.
the whole scammer mentality is so bizarre to me. like the same energy involved in setting up the scam could have been used to setup a legit profitable sustainable business… wild.
Yeah, this happened to me on Amazon a few days ago and the price was also, you guessed it, 20,000 yen. I ordered and paid with my overseas credit card but the thing came as COD. I rejected the parcel and asked Amazon for a refund. The thing I lost was the conversion rate from the overseas credit card of about USD$20.
There are 3 types of this scam:
– 1 Chinese shops that buy your info online and make fake accounts. They’ll send a cheap 100 yen item but COD you for 10,000 yen. Then they use the fake clone account to comment on theirs and the comment shows as verified. The verified comment makes potential buyers think they are safe. They also collect the points from your purchase and cash out on purchases for themselves the minute the points clear.
– 2 they use your leaked information to COD random junk to you. Many will reject but the few that accept end up paying into their pockets before they run or get banned on that specific account. And of course they have alts.
– 3 you bought from a third party seller, they cancel the item you bought during the “shipping phase”. Then they message you and say the system was buggy (or some other excuse) and say that if you can still pay them. They’ll say they already told the shipping company you will pay COD. Then you do pay and end up with 100 yen garbage. And amazon has no record of the sale since it looks like it was cancelled on their end.
r/scams
This one is talked about all the time.
What happened for the account cloning, did they just create an account with your name and address? It doesn’t have your payment details, right?
I’ve had COD orders show up before. The amounts are so high, like ¥20,000, that it’s easy to reject. If the amount was lower, like ¥5,000, I might have been fooled.
My hypothesis is that the scammer got my name/address from a sketchy Amazon 3rd party seller. I ordered an aftermarket battery for my Dyson vacuum. Then I started receiving COD orders, one was labeled Dyson Vacuum, but it was far too small. Another was labeled in Kanji that I and Google Translate doesn’t recognize, so maybe it was Chinese?