Does this sound like a scam? Is so, what?

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Hello I'm New here! Joined: 13 Aug 2010 Posts: 4

I am establishing a new lingerie brand, we have our catalogue, photos etc all ready to go.

I have been approaching some retailers online and offline asking them if they want to stock our products.

We have just been approached by a company who wants us to dropship our products for them.
They make the sale, pass on the payment minus 30% to us with the customer details and we ship it out.

They have an Australian based website, I looked into it appears to be only a month old.
The company that they used to register it was deregistered in australia in 2011.

What has alarm bells ringing is that they now want me to send some samples to india for "quality testing" (this was the first mention of india by the way)

I dug up a Facebook profile for the person that I am ment to be talking to, she is based in new york, it states she is associated with the company, she has friends in Australia.

However, she doesn't write like an Anglo-Saxon executive in the emails, she writes like it is her second language, the company also uses a gmail address and only has paypal on the checkout.

This is how she writes

For samples send us the **** collection samples as this category is the most sold on our website. You can send me samples which is your best collections. We have already received a good reviews for your response as some of our existing customers are interested in your products through a internal survey.

I will send you details of our Indian facility which will review the products.

It is all looking dodgey as hell. The only thing I can think they are looking to scam me out of is our designs which they could replicate and knock off.

What do you think?

Baiting Guru Joined: 27 Mar 2011 Posts: 21158

The message is rather dodgy but it would be hard to say for sure without more definitive proof. My advice would be just to follow what your gut is telling you and avoid them.

Posted: Sat Mar 16, 2013 2:03 pm

I couldn't say for certain based on this whether it is a scam, but I can make a couple of points.

-I have seen reports before in which company owners reported similar approaches that were simply intended to get free samples, sometimes (presumably) for personal use, other times so the recipient could copy/counterfeit the goods.
-If the company is not currently registered, then you have no real way to verify anything they tell you, and essentially NO recourse if they choose to cheat you, especially when you are dealing with people in other countries.

Personally, I wouldn't touch something like this.

Hello I'm New here! Joined: 25 Mar 2013 Posts: 3

I find it interesting that you would entertain the concept of drop shipping yet are concerned whether it is a scam.

That's like if I were concerned about getting a speeding ticket, yet the fact that I am traveling 120mph down a busy highway isn't of much concern.

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