For those of you who do not know, I am a retired engineer. For the last twenty-plus years, I worked as the Engineering Manager or Research and Development Engineer for a plastics company that mainly does rotational molding. This should show that I am computer literate and intelligent. I have training in recognition of spam and phishing schemes in emails to prevent the spread of various types of malware. All of this leads me to the focus of today’s blog. I fell for a scam!
I decided recently that I would like to try kayak fishing on some of the local lakes. I started looking into different kayaks and thought I could get one for a low price, particularly if I could get a used one from Facebook Marketplace or Craig’s List. The friend I have who does kayak fishing enjoys it a lot and even offered to let me borrow his kayak. However, I thought if I got my own, it would be more fun to go with him and he could show me how he does it. He got his Lifetime kayak at Walmart for around $200.00 a few years ago. I checked around and found that I could get a similar kayak for less than $300.00 today, but I still watched the listings on Facebook Marketplace every day looking for a deal. It wasn’t long before I came across a glossy advertisement selling Pelican kayaks on inventory clearance for $99.99. This was a lower price than the Lifetime kayaks at Walmart. I thought, wow, what a deal even with shipping I would get a better kayak for about the same money. I pulled out my credit card and ordered one. I received an email order confirmation stating I would receive a notification when the item shipped. The purchase price shipping also included shipping with delivery in 3 to 5 days. Sounds too good to be true, and it was.
Three days later when I did not receive any further information or any notification that the kayak shipped. This puzzled me since the ad stated there were only five left in stock. I started looking more closely at the ad and the company. The ad from the company no longer appeared on Facebook, but similar ads from different companies did. I also could not find the company website. While looking at the original ad I viewed various products and all were legitimate, but all came directly from the actual Pelican Sports website. Further investigation into the company suggested it was a scam and the product would not arrive. The email address on the order confirmation was an individual’s name with a gmail.com address and not a company address. These clues led me to believe they scammed me. I immediately called my credit card company and reported the fraudulent charge. They issued a provisional credit to my account and later sent me a questionnaire regarding the transaction. It’s been over two weeks since I ordered the kayak, and I still haven’t received the kayak or any communications even though I didn’t cancel the order.
When I decided it was a scam, I immediately contacted my credit card company. They provided me with a provisional credit for the charge against the card and sent me a questionnaire regarding the transaction. I also canceled the card and had them issue me a new card with a different number to prevent further use of the original card. Now I must update all my automatic payments, but at least my card number is not floating around out there. The moral of the story is: If it looks too good to be true, it is not true.
I am still looking at fishing kayaks but have found the low-priced kayaks probably are not a good fit for me since I weigh in at 210 lbs. With gear and everything else, the 275 lb. weight limit is too low. To get a kayak with a 350 lb. limit just costs more and I am not sure, at my age, I want to spend that much. Of course, my wife says the kayak would be like soccer. I watch it and think I can still play, but if I run and try to play, my knees hurt, and my hips hurt. I am just too old.
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Carol Jones
Very good.