Common Trading Post Scams and Tricks
Written by Mystique_

 

Trading Post Scams are one of the emerging scam trends in Neopets. While Neopets is riddled with fake login pages, scammers who lurk around the dank undergrounds of the Chat Boards, a few users soon discovered an alarming new scam. Now becoming more common than the original login pages and I-have-a-neopoints-generator-but-I-will-need-your-username-and-password, the Trading Post has become a place of mystery, intrigue and suspicion, where users never feel safe. Curse those buggers! you say. Of course, with a little careful analytical skills and careful gut instinct, you can blast those trading post scams back to Hawaii with a Vodka Martini and umbrella inside, shaken not stirred of course. Mystique_ brings you the 911 on all the newest scams in relation in the Trading Post this month in PPT's Featured!


Hi, my ppt username is Mystique_ and I have been playing neopets for 2 years. Today, I like to write an article rounding up all the common and not-so-common trading post scams that I have come across. I hope those newbies who get to read this will become better at protecting their neopets properties and handling trades. Another reason why anyone should learn about these scams is that, unlike fake login pages and scam-mails, there is no clear evidence against such scammers. You can only curse your luck for buying an overpriced item or underselling your item

I shall start out with some of the most common trading post scams:

Item Switch Scam
The scammer will put some expensive item up for trade at a cheap price to lure victims, then remove the trade for whatever reason they claim and set up another trade with a cheaper look-a-like item and ask the victim to bid again.

Signs: If the person remove the trade and neomails you, it is 99% scam alert even before looking at whatever he/she put up afterwards.

Split Trade scam
This type of scam makes use of a player's inherent trust in another player. Normally the trade involved is more than 600k (max np trade in TP). The scammer would ask you to bid 600k on a junk first before accepting another np offer for the actual stuff you want. OR if you have the item he wants, he would ask to bid 600k on your stuff before bidding the balance on some junk u put up. In any case, such trades are 80% scams. It makes it easier for the victim to be scammed if he is a fanboy of the scammer, thinking he/she's too rich/famous to do so, only to realize the mistake.

False Info scam
This type of scam comes in lots of variety. It may be an unheard of item that sounds like another item type (eg. cannon fodder is a golden dubloon food, but at one time, scammers are passing it off as bd item), an item that looks like a HT item (golden ivy leaves as earth faerie leaves, super U-bend as u-bend of great justice). Whatever it is, the scammer will try to twist facts and lie about the item type and function to entice you to buy it.

Some more e.g. This weapon does 9-13 icons (when it does 3 or 6), passing of a dino snapper (a cheap tyrannian food) as a petpet, golden dubloon food (those strangely rare food that don't count as gourmet food item and items which feature in ANY faerie quests) as super rare (r99) item.

Advice: don't buy an item if you aren't sure of the info.

Tricks to look out for in the Trading Post

Now, there are some tricks used frequently in the Trading post that we cannot classify directly as scams but are still, in every way, dishonest. After reading what I write next, everyone should know that the price of an item is really the price you value it at, not the prices stated in the Trading Post. These dishonest traders are mostly very rich neopians. Here are the most common method used.

Price Manipulators:

Have you ever seen an item that is asking for a very cheap price in the Trading Post and yet, is never sold? Chances are, it is the work of a price manipulator. The rationale behind this trick is simple: The majority of traders referred to the price of an unbuyable from the other lots' asking price. Thus, the guy will say, put up a few lots (let take cool negg as an example here) under different usernames, asking for 250k for his cool negg (cool negg cost 300+k) now. Basically, there will be bids but they will be ignored. Then under the apparent impression that cool neggs really sell at that price, he would be bid on other's cool negg at 250k under another username. Sometimes, he will even neomail the seller that he saw other lots selling at that price. If the price manipulator wants to hike up the price of an item, he simply does the same or get his guild members to help. One best example is the hypno helm. If you observe the price of a hypno helm, the price drops at one time, to 400k after the war and recently jumps to 500k and above. The same case applies to paintbrushes (especially faerie and mystery island ones). Now, although these 2 tricks fall under the same category, I feel that tricking fellow traders to sell their items cheaply is more unethical then hiking your items up, which is acceptable to me.

Unwanted/Hard-to-sell rares tricks:

Oh, these tricks can catch even the experienced traders off-guard. there are mainly 3 three excuses which they uses:

"I am on a Faerie Quest":

The trickster will put up an attractive lot (eg moltenore) and say he needs an item for Illusen/Jhudora Quest (eg.bag of sand or any hard-to-sell). As these quests have a time limit, he will say he need it fast. the item he asks for is always hard-to-sell rarity 99s or an unpopular retired item like Felrum Jelly cube (if not much players know it's retired). Then, under a different username, he will put up another lot (with the bag of sand or hard-to-sell). As the attractive offer only last for a 16min, this will drive players to make fair or attractive bids on the unwanted item. (attractive enough to buy the bag of sand, but not attractive enough for the moltenore, in this case). After, the trickster sell off his unwanted item, he would close the attractive lot and left the poor soul with another hard-to-sell item. Now, what is worse about these dishonest traders, is not just their dishonesty, but also greed. They can also sell it cheaper if they really want to sell off the hard-to -sell item. However they want to sell it at a high price as well to make a clean profit.

Selling multiple copies of hard-to-sells:

One example I can think of is vacuum orb. I remember vividly I saw this lot putting up a faerie doll, asking for 10 vacuum orbs only. vacuum orb is a quest item for Spyquest only and is almost useless except as a collectible. the trickster will, as usual, have loads of these vacuum orbs (obviously in another account) in his shop selling for the cheapest on the wizard by say, 10k. Unsuspecting rich neopians will, of course, out of sheer greed, buy up all those 'cheap' orbs and gleefully bid it on the faerie doll, only to realize that the offer was rejected. Now the victim is left with 10 hard-to-sell junks.

"I only want this item":

I fell for this one, although not without suspecting and I feel it is best if I describe my experience here. One day, I saw a moltenore for sale at 1.6m on the trading post. As I had been looking to buy one for a long time, I contacted this seller whom I shall call "Alpha". "Alpha" said that she wants to trade only for a super sand grain (a hugely hard-to-sell and expensive one use bd item). Being the fair trader that I was, I said that I don't have one but is willing to trade a zumagorn + 400k for her moltenore. She persisted and I was of course, frustrated. I was persuading her to sell, when she mentioned that she saw another user with a super sand grain and ask if it is ok if she swap with that person. Not wanting to lose this trade and not wanting her to be on the losing end, I said that my offer was more attractive and that I can add more stuff if she wants. Still, Alpha persisted and left with little choice, I told her that I would buy the super sand grain and trade the super sand grain + 400k for her moltenore (still not wanting to rip her off). Alpha declined politely and say she only want the sand grain. At this point, I got suspicious but nevertheless contact this person whom I shall call 'Beta". Beta wants 1.2 m for her sand grain and I offered to swap my zumagorn. she wants zumagorn + 200k and not wanting to haggle too much, I accepted it (since I got the zumagorn from restock anyway). As I expected, after I got the sand grain and bidded on Alpha's moltenore, she ACCEPTED ANOTHER OFFER!! She said that she did accept my offer, but I told her she did not. At this point, it was confirmed that Alpha and Beta and probably whoever she sold off the moltenore to in the end, are probably the same person, just operating on different accounts. Of course, I was miffed but I know I can do nothing about it and can only blame myself for disregarding my instincts out of sheer desire to own the moltenore. Luckily I managed to swap the super sand grain for a bag of sand later and included the bag of sand in a deal for a mortog.

After reading my article, there are generally a few advice I would want to give to those traders, scammers and tricksters:

1. Always sell your item at the price you want, depending on how fast you want to sell it.

2. Always be patient. Your item may stay there for days without purchase enquiry but there will be interested parties. there is no need to resort to dishonest means to sell off your unpopular, hard-to-sell stuff.

3. Only trade for the item you have in hand and try to negotiate a deal with them. Buying items to meet the demands of the seller is not advisable.

I hope, by reading this, there will be less players scammed and more honest traders around the trading post.