Scam in this forum

[tanVincent]

This is quite a long story so you guys have to be patient with me...

I only started reefer not too long ago, and to think that I was being scammed all these while by a particular reefer.....

As alot of people know over here, I am a avid adorer of zoanthids. I would travel anywhere to pick up nice zoanthids. By this forum, I came to know this reefer. He offered some of his Zoanthids but at astronomical price. Being a sucker, I bought quite a bit from him over a period of time, amounting no less than 10 blue notes....

Recently, as I get to know more nice reefers and get to know more shops owners, I discover a disgusting truth. What this reefer claims as US imports are just hoax. I tried harder to dig more news from more reefers and here is what i discover...

1. I found some of the zoanthids claimed by this reefer to be US imports in GO, T95, Irwana and Ah Beng shop. After checking with these respective shop owners, they confirmed that this reefer bought a lot of zoanthids from them but none of them are from US.

2. I found out from another reefer that GO confirmed that he took used shipment boxes and packages from them, prolly as a decoy for shipment.

3. I found out from yet another reefer that GO had already issue a warning to this reefer, not to misuse their name by claiming something that did not happen.

4. I found out from alot of other reefers how they get themselves suckered in to buy common corals at exhorbitant prices from this reefer but never made it public.

5. After some time I realise that my stuff that i bought from this reefer are really all common stuff. Things like common red gonio is claimed by him to be purple gonio, rose hammer turns out to be common hammer when a reefer pointed out when he visits my place.

6. After my suspicion is confirmed, I receive a message from this reefer about a batch of new zoanthids. Upon looking at the pictures and double confirming with 2 other reefers, this batch of zoanthids is exactly the same as what Ah Beng is selling at the last shipment. Guess what, the price quoted by this reefer is more than 11 times what Ah Beng is selling

There are alot of other issues that confirmed my suspicion. I really dun want to point fingers, coz I already admit that I am a sucker and money gone is money gone for good. I just cannot tolerate this reefer going on eating up noob's money as I know the senior reefers will never buy things from this reefer....

I hope this serves as a reminder to new reefers as well as seasoned reefers that there are people out there who are trying to pull a fast one and they will really go all out to do so.

[tanVincent]

maybe if you have similar experiences, you might want to share it here....

[BFG]

Hey, can pm me his nick and name? Don't want to be cheated again. Already been cheated once during a bulk order session that never happen.

[tayhonglee]

woah, vincent post the name of the cheesepies leh. maybe in a slightly coded form or something

[Paul1211]

Pai sa to say but i'm also one of those newbie that kanna con. Together with my other buddy we bought from this guy some zoos claiming they were from U.S.

2 day ago my bubby found out that he is actually buying from LFS normal zoos n knowing that we are new to this hobbies claim that he imported them from U.S.

Another piece of advice to fellow reefer, this con man also claim to be selling high quality L/R, tonga etc... This buddy of mine actually put deposite to buy 100kg for his new tank, when he go collect the rocks my buddy feel that the weight does not seems right n ask him to do a weight check.

There is actually a shortage of about 20-30kg. Upon confronting him, my buddy manage to get back the actual amount but was not very happy with the quality. Some of the L/R r even dead (smelly).

As newbie we both thought this things happens so we did not think that he is out th con people. Thats why when he ring up my buddy telling him about the U.S zoos. we were both excited and jump right into his trap.

I hope that if there are others whom u know who we r refering to, voice up n let the con man cheat no more people.

[piero]

Thats bad. Cant you guys call the police?

[Paul1211]

Actually it did cross our mind but as the deal is made on verbal n trust, we r after all trying to help each others out in our common love for marine life. w

We do not have any black n white proof on the scam.

The reason i voice out is just to make known to other reefers inside this forum that there is such a person waiting for his next chance to strike.

NOTE: THE CON MAN IS ON-LINE NOW.

To the con man: If u ever see this, i know wat u r up to. My advice is for u to get out of this forum. U will get wat u deserve in due time.

[RX_GAN]

my suggestion to stop this is to write a petition in order to put a stop to his nusiance behaviour. one way i suggest is that both of u write a write up of wat happen and send it to the forum master or whosoever in charge. when one person complain, it lacks evidence.so when more of these happened, a good writeup may allow the in-charge to look into the seriousness of ur prob.

then we can kick him out of this place forever.

but one possible way he can come back is to register again.

but let's hope that he learn his lesson when he join us back. or else if more of this prob surface again with the same person. a collection of write-up from the victims can be submit to the police for proper handling.

internet scams are very hard to deal with in legal terms but with evidences collected from many individuals, higher chances can be expected.

it's good to share all these here as this is a community. we must all stick together in order not to get con again. that's why it's important to help the new ppl around. that's wat i'm trying to do too.

with an effort from everyone out there, crime cannot be prevented with better knowlegde.

but i view this as a small case considering those bigger internet scam out there.this is still a small nutcase. it can be solved if we stick together.

looking that he is stil lurking around the place is disturbing enough, there are advertising gimmicks and some gimmicks but a cheat is still a cheat. gimmicks are intended to catch attention, cheat is always a cheat. it really turns u off when u are into a new hobby.

[xiaochew]

Hello all,

I am relatively new to marine fish hobby, knew a lot of fellow hobbists

from this forum. We feel that the forumers here are very helpful and

warm and very glad to find this forum.

However, as naive as we are, we trusted one particular forumer and

bought quite a number of things from him, this is the mistake that we'd

made in not verifying details and being too trusting.

1. I started to know him when i was looking for rocks for my new

aquarium. I ordered a 100 kg worth of rocks from him. When collecting,

he filled a standard foam box with the rocks and told me that it's

100kg. Unbelievable, when he went away for a while, i tried weighing it

by myself, turn out it's only 50kg. I asked him again when he return, he

confirmed with me that the rocks in the box weighs 100kg. I asked him to

re-weigh them and no choice, got to top up with more rocks but only

until 80kg which he's willing to part.Thereafter, he came to my place to

do setup for my rocks, after everything, not sure whether he thought i'm

a pushover, he asked me to pay him for 100kg worth of rocks. I was of

course not happy and told him he only give me 80 kg, only then he took

the money for 80kg.During the setup, i realised that the rocks are

normal live rocks and some of them are dead rocks, which are so smelly

and filled the whole room with that smell. He told me that it's normal

to have that kind of smell and will go away after a few days. Which

apparently, does not happen. Fortunately, i took out the smelly rocks

and put into a pail and clean them with protein skimmer for about 1 week

plus for the smell to go away. I also realised that his rocks are not

cheap and cost me $5/kg for this kind of quality.

2. After a few weeks, he contacted me that he's clearing his corals (US

zoos and goinio) and asked if i'm interested. He claim that he's selling

other people at USD80.00 per pc but on goodwill basis, he wanted to sell

to me at SGD80.00 per pc, as long as he can cover his cost with other

buyers. So i went to his house, without knowing the difference between

US zoos and normal zoos. He told me he imports his US zoos himself from

USA and some of them are from GO. So i trusted him again and went down

to see the corals and decided to get some of his US zoos.

After about a week, i went to T95, i saw exactly the same kind of zoos

as what i have at home, the uncle there told me that they are local zoos

and cost only SGD20. I was shocked, but i tried to convince myself that

it's quite similar and might not be the same and mention it to my buddy.

However, recently i went to GO, after talking to the GO owner and asking

him about some coral knowledge (after seeing some of his zoos similar to

the one i bought) to my surprised, GO owner told me that those are not

US zoos and they are local zoos, there're a lot of difference between US

and local zoos. After i describe the US zoos i bought, he told me that

mine is confirm local zoos. After chatting for a while, he told me that

i'm about the 7th or 8th guy whom he came across being conned by this

man. This man is a frequent buyer of GO. He had already warned this man

not to misuse GO's name for his personal interest as GO do not import

anything for individuals, only for LFS.

I believe some senior reefers mentioned jokingly in this forum that new

reefers have to pay school fees. I wonder if this is the way as above

that the senior reefers are refering to. This is sickening, learning

things doesn't mean having to get conned. There're are other ways of

paying school fees like buying lunch, gifts...etc as i believe all we

ask for are basic courtesy and honesty.

For the man who know who you are, you should be ashame of yourself and

stop conning people. What goes around will comes around.

[BFG]

Guys, pm me his name and nick leh. Got hp nbr also good.

RX_GAN, no need to write a writ. Won't do anything good. Look at the bulk order section to find that thread.

[tayhonglee]

name name!!!

[Paul1211]

Hi BFG, this guy is smarter than that. He do it in the pasar malam section. small amount at a time than stay low or sell other staff.

[sky107line]

This is quite a long story so you guys have to be patient with me...

I only started reefer not too long ago, and to think that I was being scammed all these while by a particular reefer.....

As alot of people know over here, I am a avid adorer of zoanthids. I would travel anywhere to pick up nice zoanthids. By this forum, I came to know this reefer. He offered some of his Zoanthids but at astronomical price. Being a sucker, I bought quite a bit from him over a period of time, amounting no less than 10 blue notes....

Recently, as I get to know more nice reefers and get to know more shops owners, I discover a disgusting truth. What this reefer claims as US imports are just hoax. I tried harder to dig more news from more reefers and here is what i discover...

1. I found some of the zoanthids claimed by this reefer to be US imports in GO, T95, Irwana and Ah Beng shop. After checking with these respective shop owners, they confirmed that this reefer bought a lot of zoanthids from them but none of them are from US.

2. I found out from another reefer that GO confirmed that he took used shipment boxes and packages from them, prolly as a decoy for shipment.

3. I found out from yet another reefer that GO had already issue a warning to this reefer, not to misuse their name by claiming something that did not happen.

4. I found out from alot of other reefers how they get themselves suckered in to buy common corals at exhorbitant prices from this reefer but never made it public.

5. After some time I realise that my stuff that i bought from this reefer are really all common stuff. Things like common red gonio is claimed by him to be purple gonio, rose hammer turns out to be common hammer when a reefer pointed out when he visits my place.

6. After my suspicion is confirmed, I receive a message from this reefer about a batch of new zoanthids. Upon looking at the pictures and double confirming with 2 other reefers, this batch of zoanthids is exactly the same as what Ah Beng is selling at the last shipment. Guess what, the price quoted by this reefer is more than 11 times what Ah Beng is selling

There are alot of other issues that confirmed my suspicion. I really dun want to point fingers, coz I already admit that I am a sucker and money gone is money gone for good. I just cannot tolerate this reefer going on eating up noob's money as I know the senior reefers will never buy things from this reefer....

I hope this serves as a reminder to new reefers as well as seasoned reefers that there are people out there who are trying to pull a fast one and they will really go all out to do so.

Yo! Bro Vincent, Can P.M me the name pls? I believe this **s h*le won't go far

coz this country is ain't that big!!! Once, If his been hook on the bate by the time

I guess its a little too late for him to say sorry!!!

[escagort]

Just a hint to all bros n sis. This fellow always say he is decoming tanks n he stay in the west. I have talked to 1 of the LFS n he confirm that they also suspect him abt reselling their corals at a higher prices.

[Morpheous]

Hi Bro,

Its a pity that such a reefer is here to mess around with the interst of our hobby. I do see in the pasar malam thread selling zoos, as well as a purple gonio in the name of GO. Pls pm me if i hit the correct person.

[Achilles Tang]

Frankly, I have zero tolerance for cheats and especially one who preys on SRC members.

It's disgusting how they can think they can get away with it, especially when Singapore is so small!

I say you guys should contact him for a full refund and compensation if not you'll expose him publicly and see how he deals with the damage control later on!

Your time of deceit is up.... whoever you are!

[BFG]

This forum is provided free to it's member. No one should be 'paying school fee' to be a member, I know I didn't pay Achilles Tang any money to be here. But it's good to report the matter here to gauge how many member had been affected. I know he is also a member of another forum but not sure if there are more member there being affected too. Please inform the members there to watch out for this person. A cheat will not bring goodness to the forum. I've been cheated once here, I know how it feels like. No one should have gone through this ordeal.

[tanVincent]

Strange enough, I did not see any posting for sales from this reefer in the other forums, so just make sure whatever starts here, ends here...

[escagort]

Trust me he does. I was at the other forum n seeing me as a newbie he PM me abt his zoos.

[escagort]

We are hobbyist here to enjoy this not to make serious money out of it. If really want to earn money why not open a LFS

[ReDDeviLs]

i think i know whu liao!

[tanVincent]

well, in response to what AT says, if any of you guys feels that a confrontation is needed, please PM me and we shall decide from there....

[jervismun]

Just a hint to all bros n sis. This fellow always say he is decoming tanks n he stay in the west. I have talked to 1 of the LFS n he confirm that they also suspect him abt reselling their corals at a higher prices.

Emm... that rings a bell... I do know of a reefer who always have DECOM TANK SALE

[WaNeR]

Emm... that rings a bell... I do know of a reefer who always have DECOM TANK SALE

hmmm

dat and or his friend decomming tank?

[benteo36]

He is that someone who never seems to finish decomming his tank