WARNING!!! fluval303

[eklikewhoa]

I am sure you guys remember but there was a new member that went by fluval303 that was selling tons of tanks and a lot more of other stuff but hopefully this will keep from happening again.

http://www.marshreef.com/modules.php?name=Forums&file=viewtopic&p=242964#242964

[Delock]

Re: WARNING!!! fluval303.......

He is on craiglist also

[eklikewhoa]

Re: WARNING!!! fluval303.......

Well I guess there is not much I can do about craigslist but just watching out for my HFB peeps....I met the guy in person as well as talking to him on the phone...was too pushy about the sales so I just never bothered with him.

[mahoro]

Re: WARNING!!! fluval303.......

yeah, i remember that guy, told me he had couple tanks that i could pick up, but when i got there, there was none but the broken stuff

[rrocket2002]

Re: WARNING!!! fluval303.......

I met him in person.  He met me on the North Side, I picked up some air pumps from him.  Personally I have nothing bad to say about the guy.  I'm sorry to hear about the trouble others claim to have with him.

[JandJ]

Re: WARNING!!! fluval303.......

I have had some contact with Tracy before as well.
All I wanted was a few wet drys.
He agreed to sell me 3, but when I was ready to go pick them up he let slip that there was a big crack down the biggest one and that it would "be fixed with a new pane glued over it" by the time I got there. The other two wet drys were supposed to come with bio balls and overflows, but he said due to a shortage of those items he had sold them to someone else, but he would have me some that week.

I decided to back out of this "deal," and he then tried to sell me a 1500 gallon salt tank with everything (sump, skimmer, lights, stand and more), "as soon as it arrived from Indonesia."
He seemed sketchy and VERY pushy, needless to say I backed out and saved J-WS6 and myself the headache of broken wet drys.

[peterp63]

Re: WARNING!!! fluval303.......

This may be the same guy from craigslist who tried to sell me a 300 gallon.  He said the tank (and himself) was overseas in Indonesia and that he would send it if I paid half first (then $200, then $100...).  He insisted that I pay him using Western Union and that he could not access the money without certain other information, but talking to the people at WU this in not true.  He said that he had recently been married and needed the money ASAP.  The tank pics looked great for the price (this should've been a flag).  His gmail address was mushroombo@gmail.com and went by "mushroom boy"(screen name) and Charlie.  He even started Instant Messaging me that I needed to send the money since the tank was already on its way even though we never came to an agreement.  He used this website (www.indoexpressglobal.com) as the delivery service and I actually got a bogus email from them (him)... I could tell because the email was in horrible English just like in his emails/IMs.  Even the website has a lot of bad grammer, but other than that looks pretty authentic.  He even went as far as showing me some sort of scanned invoice and giving me a tracking number.  It was actually funny how far he was trying to go to get a few bucks from me!  There were so many questionable things about the whole deal there was no way I was going to fall for this scam.  If you've dealt with this sort of thing in the past PLEASE let me and everyone else know your story!  This sort of thing is ridiculous.... and kinda funny!!!  I was thinking about reporting this, but I didn't know who or what organization would listen.....

[DT44]

Re: WARNING!!! fluval303.......

We bought a RO unit from him and it ended up being a dirty nasty piece of crap.....every single filter was clogged and gross.......had to throw it away it was so bad.  We picked it up at his house in the woodlands.

[Tabeguache]

Re: WARNING!!! fluval303.......

This may be the same guy from craigslist who tried to sell me a 300 gallon.  He said the tank (and himself) was overseas in Indonesia and that he would send it if I paid half first (then $200, then $100...).  He insisted that I pay him using Western Union and that he could not access the money without certain other information, but talking to the people at WU this in not true.  He said that he had recently been married and needed the money ASAP.  The tank pics looked great for the price (this should've been a flag).  His gmail address was mushroombo@gmail.com and went by "mushroom boy"(screen name) and Charlie.  He even started Instant Messaging me that I needed to send the money since the tank was already on its way even though we never came to an agreement.  He used this website (www.indoexpressglobal.com) as the delivery service and I actually got a bogus email from them (him)... I could tell because the email was in horrible English just like in his emails/IMs.  Even the website has a lot of bad grammer, but other than that looks pretty authentic.  He even went as far as showing me some sort of scanned invoice and giving me a tracking number.  It was actually funny how far he was trying to go to get a few bucks from me!  There were so many questionable things about the whole deal there was no way I was going to fall for this scam.  If you've dealt with this sort of thing in the past PLEASE let me and everyone else know your story!  This sort of thing is ridiculous.... and kinda funny!!!  I was thinking about reporting this, but I didn't know who or what organization would listen.....

This isn't about aquariums, but still interesting...
My mom had a similar experience yesterday with someone selling a sewing machine on Craigslist.  The machine was very underpriced (by more than $1500) for being new with warranty.  The seller also went through a whole story about Western Union with some garbage about using false information on the WU form so she could pick up the money.  There hasn't been any contact since mom backed out of the deal, but I've warned her since reading your story.  Sounds like this may be a pattern of scams.

[CichlidFan]

Re: WARNING!!! fluval303.......

Pays to be informed....smiles

CF

[Tiapan]

Re: WARNING!!! fluval303.......

the scams are going around everywhere. it gives conartists a whole new arena to work with and people can be sooo trusting sometimes.

[peterp63]

Re: WARNING!!! fluval303.......

Yeah... especially when they've been looking for a large aquarium for quite some time and the deal of a lifetime drops in their lap.  (ME!)