Copyright 2003, Roadracing World Publishing, Inc.

FIRST PERSON/OPINION

Via e-mail:

Back in June I had a guy contact me about buying my bike. He said he was sending me a $12,000 Bank of America cashier’s check. I asked him if he wanted to see pictures of the bike, he said he has seen the bike before or a replica. He told me that the check was to be cashed and for me to hold out my share which was $6300. He wanted me to send the rest via Western Union quick collect to a shipping company. The bank I cashed the cashier’s check with never checked to make sure the check was good even after I mentioned holding the check to clear. It did have a watermark and it looked totally good.

So I received the change of $5700 and sent the money off. Well, the next day the guy called me and said that there had been a problem with his company and they where going under. He said he would not be able to purchase the bike. He told me to keep $1500 for my inconvenience and send the rest of the money back to him. So I went to the bank and the bank said they where waiting for the check to clear. I was like “What the hell, you should have done that three days ago.” They didn’t give me the rest of the money.

Later that afternoon I received a call from the bank stating that the check was fraudulent. So now I’m paying the bank back $5700 plus interest, which amounts to about $6600 and it’s cost me a whole season of racing.

I was the third person this happened to in western North Carolina and none of the banks knew about the scam. I don’t know when the scam started but if anyone can help me figure out a way to stop this shit from happening to someone else I will be more than happy to help.

Please, if you read this don’t buy anything from overseas and don’t sell anything overseas, either.
Watch for ATVs, I found the same problem with some guy in Austria trying to sell Yamaha YFZ450s for $4000 new with free shipping. I e-mailed him and he said they had clean titles and all thepaper work but never explained why the ATVs were so cheap.

Keep an eye out, you never know

Thanks, Roadracing World for a great site and mag, I’m OUT.

Eric J. Douglass
WERA, CCS #537
Franklin, North Carolina



And now, some reader reaction:

FIRST PERSON/OPINION

Via e-mail:

Regarding the guy from NC who got burned: Seems he has an issue with his bank. Unless he has the amount of money in his own accounts, how did the bank allow the check to be drawn upon? If I were him, I’d do some checking with the state banking commission, FDIC and or some other banking authority.

Just doesn’t seem right this guy has to cover that amount of money for a flaw in bank procedure.

Lee Block
Morgan Hill, California