From "Blue" to SCAMMED....

It all starts with my sister. She was engaged to this guy. He "supposedly" had bad credit, and couldn't open a credit card to buy her an engagement ring. So she went with him, and opened one in her name, allowing him to purchase this ring.

Well, they had some trouble, and decided to break up. This guy was a real scumbag, because he left my sister with the payments of her own engagement ring. One she couldn't take back, because they had already had it for awhile.

Well, I have a few years of Ebay experience. Mostly buying experience, but I have sold a few things. My sister asked me to try and sell the ring for her. I posted it, and the end date was September 1, 2006.

I never had a bid on it, but I noticed I had 2 watchers. Once the item ended, one of the "watchers" came out of hiding, and told me he was still interested. STUPIDLY, I told him it was available. TRAGICALLY, I didn't relist with Ebay so he could buy it outright. If I had done that, my sister and I wouldn't be in this mess today.

Now, at the time, my husband and I were preoccupied with our upcoming vacation. I didn't think to research anything. This guy started talking about "escrow" and how safe it was, how it protected both buyer and seller against fraud. I took a look at the site he was referring to... http://www.trading-security.com/. It looked real enough. It looked professional, it even has a member sign in, and account information.

This guy said he wanted a 2-day inspection period. I thought that was reasonable.. you know, take it to a jeweler and make sure the stones were real.

So I set up an account, and started the transaction. A day later, the account told me that YES, he did indeed pay the money to the company.

Supposedly, this is how Escrow works. It is supposed to be a fraud deturrant to both sellers and buyers.The buyer pays the escrow site, they hold the money. Seller ships item. If buyer likes item, Escrow company releases money.

So while I am on vacation, my sister ships the ring off. (You'll notice in my emails, that he tricked us into not insuring, nor claiming the worth. STUPID US)

I start tracking this ring like a hawk. I notice it gets stalled in Spain. The FedEx site says Incorrect Address for 3 days.

3 days. We had our chance to try and reverse the shipment, for 3 days, and now its gone.

With relief, I realize that the ring was finally delivered on Sept 14, 2006.

I should have realized what was going on, when I never heard back from my buyer after the email with his address listed.

I sent out another email on the 16th, and as you can see, it bounced back and an illegal alias email. Now, I'm really scared.

So I write a support letter to the escrow company http://www.trading-security.com/ still thining that they are legit, and will help ASAP. Two days pass. I wrote another letter. A third day passes, a third letter.

No one is helping me, no one is viewing my "open support tickets."

With a sinking feeling, I finally do my research.

Fraudulant site. Scam Artists. Professionals.

Maybe working together, maybe one same guy, I don't know.

I am literally sick to my stomach. Now my poor sister is out $3000, with nothing to show for it. I spent a whole 24 hours on the computer, researching, writing umpteen letters, collecting umpteen phone numbers. The couple hours I did sleep, I could still feel the adrenaline pumping through me.

Except, Fed Ex won't help, since the undeclared state. They stated "they are only in the business of delivering packages." Ebay won't help, because technically the guy contacted me after the sale, thus it is not an Ebay auction sale. I can't seem to call these numbers on my cell phone, because they are international phone numbers.

My sister is going today to file a report with the police in the county she mailed the package. The real kicker... my sister is a county sherrif! I have found the phone numbers to the police, both local and national, in the city the ring was delivered.

I am praying for a miracle.

The moral of the story is, do your research. Take the time. Get your money first, or go through a reputable company like https://www.escrow.com/.

Hopefully I can come back and give you a positive update.

Any and ALL help or advice you can give is MOST appreciated, and I promise to follow up.

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I have started a second blog, Trading-Security.com Fraud . I have created this blog, to tell my story, and to hopefully inform others before they make the same mistake. My hope is thatwhile doing a search for the fraudulant company Trading-Security.com, this blog pops up in the search engine right near the offending company.