How Ebay sellers are cheating buyers – fake delivery information scam

I want to share few fraud schemes that Ebay sellers are using to trick buyers. This one is using fake delivery information. You can find the other one here.

Since indicated parcel delivery date has passed and I still didn‘t receive the item, I‘ve notified seller about missing item. Seller promptly replied with a tracking number and a website to check tracking number: http://www.17postservice.com/shipment/ (number was 89820111387).

My first reaction was what the hell my post office has done to my purchased item? Since it did not have a valid international tracking number, I could not even inquire post office about lost parcel.

Then I‘ve taken a closer look at the website seller has provided and soon discovered many signs of a fake website. Namely these are:

The buttons to dedicated lines in different continents are not working.

The news section has only two testing strings that are 3 years old (what a big give away).

Contacts section – would reputable courier service or post provide only email? No phone, no address?

Maybe contact section was empty because it was a translation to English? What about Chinese version of contact section – yes, still empty.

Finally, but not less important, whom does this domain belong to?

Well, I have informed seller about my findings of a fake website. This time there was no prompt reply, but after a couple of days I have received a refund.