There is no buyer.
Notice how the scammer doesn't call what you are selling by name? He uses the generic word "item", that is because he sends the same stock copy/paste email to anyone selling everything that he can find and he has no idea what you are selling and doesn't care.
There is only a scammer trying to steal your possession, your electronic item, name brand clothing or jewelry.
The scammer isn't interested in your identity or bank account only in convincing you to ship your possession to him without him sending you a penny.
The next email will be from another of the scammer's fake names and free email addresses pretending to be "Paypal" saying "kindly send the tracking number and we will release the funds".
Paypal does NOT send such emails, ever. Paypal does NOT have escrow or money holding services like that scammer describes. Paypal does NOT demand you send a tracking number before money is sent. EVER. No exceptions.
Now that you have responded to a scammer, you are on his 'potential sucker' list, he will try again to separate you from your cash. He will send you more emails from his other free email addresses using another of his fake names with all kinds of stories of being the perfect buyer, great jobs, lottery winnings, millions in the bank and desperate, lonely, sexy singles. He will sell your email address to all his scamming buddies who will also send you dozens of fake emails all with the exact same goal, you sending them your cash via Western Union or moneygram.
You could post up the email address and the emails themselves that the scammer is using, it will help make your post more googlable for other suspicious potential victims to find when looking for information.
Do you know how to check the header of a received email? If not, you could google for information. Being able to read the header to determine the geographic location an email originated from will help you weed out the most obvious scams and scammers. Then delete and block that scammer. Don't bother to tell him that you know he is a scammer, it isn't worth your effort. He has one job in life, convincing victims to send him their hard-earned cash.
Whenever suspicious or just plain curious, google everything, website addresses, names used, companies mentioned, phone numbers given, all email addresses, even sentences from the emails as you might be unpleasantly surprised at what you find already posted online. You can also post/ask here and every scam-warner-anti-fraud-busting site you can find before taking a chance and losing money to a scammer.
If you google "cragislist buyer scam", "fake paypal email scam", "ebay escrow fraud" or something similar you will find hundreds of posts from victims and near victims of this type of scam.
Check out the one and only official paypal website, read up on what paypal does and how it really works.
SCAM
Report the buyer ASAP to Ebay. You NEVER give any buyer on Ebay your full name or Paypal email address for any reason. That's why you use Ebay - to protect your Paypal account. If they were a real buyer they would just pay through Ebay's checkout page and Ebay would transfer the money to your Paypal account. You NEVER give this info to any buyer for any reason unless you want your account hacked
Also you NEVER ship anywhere but a verified address, NOT to West Africa. As soon as you ship anywhere but the buyer's verified address you lose all protection from Ebay and Paypal
What scammers do is pay you with a hacked Paypal account hoping you send the phone before the real account holder discovers the theft. When they do they contact Paypal to report their account was hacked. Paypal and Ebay will ask for proof of delivery to the buyer's verified address and you won't have it as you shipped to Africa so Paypal debits the money from your account and you have NO way to get your phone back from africa
With anything electronic like an iPhone be sure your settings show that you DO NOT ship internationally for any reason and state explicitly in your listing that you will ONLY ship to verified addresses or you are going to continue to be targeted
I'm willing to guess you have fewer than 10 sales on Ebay. Scammers specifically target newbies who might not be familiar with how Ebay works
Tell him you're willing to only ship the item to his address specified on his paypal account and no others. He will have to look after shipping it to West Africa himself. If you ship it to Africa (West Africa? He really said that - not an actual country?!) then he can easily claim that he didn't receive the item (which is true - it wasn't shipped to him) and get his money back.
I'd wait for another buyer instead of chancing it. This has scam written all over it.
That's a Scam. Don't bother replying just cancel the transaction and even he offers you money via paypal or etc..dont accept it and never send a parcel out of your country!
It's a a scam!
this is what he said,
Thanks for your swift response, well i'm getting this item for my inlaw in West Africa as a birthday present coming up soon. I'm pretty sure he's going to love it since the item is in a nice condition.
I'm also willing to pay ￡400.00GBP including shipping via Royal Mail int'l signed for and insurance fee to West Africa.
Kindly get back to me with your full name and PayPal email address for me to proceed with payment as soon as possible.
Thanks
