In facebook or in some forums, you might have seen some guys offering refund for your amazon products without returning the product, even after delivery of the product. Sounds interesting, right? I also went through a post in a facebook group where a guy posted that he will provide refund for Amazon products. He was asking for 30% of the amount as his commission once you get the refund in your account. The only condition was that the product must be delivered within 30 days of making the deal with the guy.
I knew that he would definitely do any kind of scam to get the refund because earlier also, people were fooling amazon saying that their order status shows delivered in the amazon account but they never got the product delivered to them and amazon was providing refunds to them without any investigation from their side.
I thought I should play prank on the scammer to know exactly what he is going to do with amazon to get the refund. So I contacted the guy and told him that I want to get the refund. He asked my user id and password. I gave him my amazon login id and password (I changed the password temporarily before providing it to him) and after a few minutes, I got an email from amazon support that the conversation was ended in between and I reported that the ordered item was missing in the box. After a few minutes, I got another mail from amazon that the refund for my order has been started and the amount will be sent to my credit card.
The guy who asked for the refund on behalf of me tried to convince me that he is going to provide me the refund, not amazon. But I got the "Trick" he was using to scam amazon and I told him that I'm going to report amazon about this fraud. (I told him that I'm a government employee and I can't be involved in this scam as it would ruin my career, lol, but later I told him that the whole process was actually a trap to expose the illegal practice he had been doing from long time). He tried threatening me that he is going to file a complaint against me in Amazon and then he deactivated his facebook account.
Well, the whole thing was funny for me but it is actually a serious issue for Amazon. These guys are causing loss to amazon and this is not a right thing according to me. I'm a customer of Amazon and it never disappointed me with its services so I thought I should be good for Amazon too. And yes, I sent the mail to amazon and sent a tweet to amazon to cancel the refund request for my order which they did before the payment was credited to my account, thank God! I'm uploading the single screenshot of the whole conversation with the scammer and the refund mail from Amazon.
Check the screenshot of conversation: https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B1WpxeCQzpcPTk5FRHdESUxmSlk (Zoom the image to see the text clearly)
This is the mail which let me know what did that guy do to request for refund. That's why I came to know that he said that he got the product delivered but the box was empty. Check the screenshot here : https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B1WpxeCQzpcPUWJsN3RfSENjUE0
In the previous mail, the immediate refund request was cancelled and the case was escalated to accounts or refund team, and surprisingly they processed the refund. See the screenshot of the Refund Mail: https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B1WpxeCQzpcPYVVhQU9jYThMVEE
I've seen some proofs that people got full refund for iPhones too using this scam. Just one request to amazon, please check the things before providing the refunds for the cases that claim "My ordered item was missing from the box" because it is very rare and there are 99% chances that the person who is reporting this kind of situation to get refund is a SCAMMER.
I hope amazon will improve their policies for the refund and will do the full investigation for these kind of fraud in future and will minimize the loss to their sellers and their own company.
***UPDATE***
I had a conversation with Amazon India team on twitter and on their chat support link and reported this issue and got the assurance that Amazon will work internally to look for this matter and will take action against the scammers. Today, some random guys shared the screenshots of mails they received from amazon. Looks like Amazon has started taking action agains the culprits.
I knew that he would definitely do any kind of scam to get the refund because earlier also, people were fooling amazon saying that their order status shows delivered in the amazon account but they never got the product delivered to them and amazon was providing refunds to them without any investigation from their side.
I thought I should play prank on the scammer to know exactly what he is going to do with amazon to get the refund. So I contacted the guy and told him that I want to get the refund. He asked my user id and password. I gave him my amazon login id and password (I changed the password temporarily before providing it to him) and after a few minutes, I got an email from amazon support that the conversation was ended in between and I reported that the ordered item was missing in the box. After a few minutes, I got another mail from amazon that the refund for my order has been started and the amount will be sent to my credit card.
The guy who asked for the refund on behalf of me tried to convince me that he is going to provide me the refund, not amazon. But I got the "Trick" he was using to scam amazon and I told him that I'm going to report amazon about this fraud. (I told him that I'm a government employee and I can't be involved in this scam as it would ruin my career, lol, but later I told him that the whole process was actually a trap to expose the illegal practice he had been doing from long time). He tried threatening me that he is going to file a complaint against me in Amazon and then he deactivated his facebook account.
Well, the whole thing was funny for me but it is actually a serious issue for Amazon. These guys are causing loss to amazon and this is not a right thing according to me. I'm a customer of Amazon and it never disappointed me with its services so I thought I should be good for Amazon too. And yes, I sent the mail to amazon and sent a tweet to amazon to cancel the refund request for my order which they did before the payment was credited to my account, thank God! I'm uploading the single screenshot of the whole conversation with the scammer and the refund mail from Amazon.
Check the screenshot of conversation: https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B1WpxeCQzpcPTk5FRHdESUxmSlk (Zoom the image to see the text clearly)
This is the mail which let me know what did that guy do to request for refund. That's why I came to know that he said that he got the product delivered but the box was empty. Check the screenshot here : https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B1WpxeCQzpcPUWJsN3RfSENjUE0
In the previous mail, the immediate refund request was cancelled and the case was escalated to accounts or refund team, and surprisingly they processed the refund. See the screenshot of the Refund Mail: https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B1WpxeCQzpcPYVVhQU9jYThMVEE
I've seen some proofs that people got full refund for iPhones too using this scam. Just one request to amazon, please check the things before providing the refunds for the cases that claim "My ordered item was missing from the box" because it is very rare and there are 99% chances that the person who is reporting this kind of situation to get refund is a SCAMMER.
I hope amazon will improve their policies for the refund and will do the full investigation for these kind of fraud in future and will minimize the loss to their sellers and their own company.
***UPDATE***
I had a conversation with Amazon India team on twitter and on their chat support link and reported this issue and got the assurance that Amazon will work internally to look for this matter and will take action against the scammers. Today, some random guys shared the screenshots of mails they received from amazon. Looks like Amazon has started taking action agains the culprits.
Amazon does not have to lose anything. It's poor sellers like us who have to take the hit. We get cheated by such buyers frequently. Even after raising such complaints Amazon turns a blind eye towards sellers. They are a customer centric company.
ReplyDeleteI understand. Amazon introduces itself as "Earth's Most Customer-Centric Company" but they should at least investigate the reports strictly. These refunds are easily processed because amazon runs its customer support through BPOs like Teleperformance, Convergys etc and the guys who are hired there think of their positive surveys only, as per my thoughts.
DeleteI hope amazon would tighten its refund policies and will take strict steps to identify and stop these scams.
I was also searching for it & finally i found your post.This post is very helpful. Very honest post.
ReplyDeleteI hope you won't try to misuse this information. I've informed amazon about this ongoing scam and they will fix it soon. :)
DeleteI also get trapped in their scam and I didn't get a single penny and a feel sorry to Amazon.But my product amount is just 1500rs.
ReplyDeleteI am very upset now.please don't misuse their support
I. Hope you see my comment and reply me sir how can I get your detiles
ReplyDelete