As the e-commerce industry continues to grow, so does internet fraud. Most people aren't aware that the fastest growing segment of internet fraud isn't identity theft but rather online auction fraud and it's not just buyers who are being ripped off but sellers as well.

eBay sales may have grown 51% last year over the previous year, but general online complaints jumped by 66.6% over the previous year to some 207,000+ complaints in 2004. The Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3), a partnership between the FBI and the National White Collar Crime Center (NW3C), stated in its yearly report that 71.2% of all complaints received pertained to auctions.

Online fraud is a growing problem on the internet and the auction segment is far from immune. The IC3 reports that most complaints consist of late or no shipment of products, items that don't match advertised condition and bogus payment or escrow services .For more details visit o www.auction-entrepreneur-kit.com. If you decide to offer "all items to be shipped within 24 hours", make sure you keep your word, and go to great lengths to honestly represent and describe the item in your auctions. Your bidders will appreciate your honesty and it will eventually show up in your feedback.

As consumer fears increase, there are a number of common sense ways to help protect you from fraud, as well as enhance your reputation as a trustworthy seller and set you apart from the crowd.

Watch Out for Bad Checks, Money Orders and Cashiers Checks

Years ago I had a buyer who complained rather loudly when I didn't ship an item as soon as I received the check in the mail. In hind site it was a good decision to hold the shipment since the check ended up being fraudulent. Bad checks, money orders, and cashiers checks are rampant in ecommerce today. The simplest way to offset the danger of bad paper is not to ship the auction item until the check, money order or cashier check clears your bank for payment.

Overpayments

Never accept any overpayments for any item. One of the more popular scams today is for a buyer to send a cashiers check for an amount that is higher than the agreed upon final price. They then claim it was in error and ask the seller to kindly return the overage when the item is shipped. Off goes the item, the overage amount in good money, and the defrauded seller finds out too late the cashiers check was fake.

Use an Escrow Service for High Priced Items

The primary purpose of escrow services is to protect buyers and sellers from fraud. Basically what they do is to accept the money from the buyer and hold it until the buyer receives and approves the merchandise. Please note that fake escrow services are increasing on the internet. If a buyer contacts you after a sale and recommends an escrow service you are not familiar with BEWARE. At present eBay only recommends one escrow company.

Records, Records, Records

Keeps a copy of every transaction detail from the original auction listing to the last email? You will need that kind of proof to validate your claims if you should find you need to file a complaint.

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