Shipping Skis via USA2Georgia, Ltd

[jimbrake]

Hey ballers. I put a D3 EVO up on SIA and a buyer from Georgia (the country, not the state - you know "and Georgia's always on my mymymymymymymymy mind.") bought it. Anyway, buyer wants me to ship the ski to a shipping service called USA2Georgia, Ltd. at an address in Delaware. Whole thing smells phishy and the phone number to the facility in Delaware goes to some BS recorded marketing drivel with no mention of USA2Georgia, shipping, etc. There's a website for the company with no mention of the facility in Delaware. Uh huh. Buyer sent money via PayPal, but I'm suspect. Any of you get any similar buyers that wanted to use this same service? Thanks.

Jim

[rfa]

This past week I sold a ski on SIA. Going to Singapore. Buyer provided me an address in Portand, OR. Paid for ski and shipping by PayPal. He took care of Portland to Singapore leg, but not sure what he used. So far, so good. Good luck.

[Horton]

@jimbrake if the money has cleared your Paypal account who cares? More importantly why haven't you entered the cash prize?

[jimbrake]

@horton - bank told me to wait to make sure funds from PayPal are legit (??). This whole thing seems scammy. I may just refund the buyer and sell the ski in the North America, which I should've done in the first place. I'd like to ski in the tournament, but my skiing.....is a huge work in progress.

[oldjeep]

Looks like a legit freight forwarder

 

Right here they describe the addressing

https://support.usa2georgia.com/index.php?/Knowledgebase/Article/View/58

 

[jimbrake]

@oldjeep - yeah, that is their own description. There is a lot of description of scam purchasers of items through PayPal and eBay using that shipping service. The shipping service itself might not be the scam, they may just be used by the scammers.

[oldjeep]

Well, not sure what you should do - other than don't sell out of the country if you don't trust that sort of arrangement. Even shipping things to canada many people will use washington state addresses so that the shipping is cheaper/easier and the seller doesn't have to deal with customs/declaration paperwork.

[jimbrake]

@oldjeep - I have sold out of the country before without any issues, but have never been asked to use this type of service. A little initial digging turned up nothing but red flags. I certainly could be mistaken on this, but it just looked sketchy from every angle. I refunded the buyer.

[Andre]

There was the same situation few years a go with peoples selling a lot of ski to south Korea as the sport started to grow there.Not a lot of used skis to buy over there.

I know there is a ski scene in Georgia as one of @Luzz coach in San Gervasio is from Georgia...

[oldjeep]

Virtually everything I have sold out of the country has used a forwarding service.

[rayn]

Help me with understand. Somebody can send me money by PayPal and then it is taken back as fraud?

[ForrestGump]

I've sold all sorts of stuff out of the US using freight forwarders such as this. I wouldn't hesitiate to do a deal like this if the funds have cleared.

[jimbrake]

The scam as I’ve read about it is that you send then they say they never received or received damaged then claim a refund from PayPal. I reached out to other skiers to see if they knew of Georgian skiers but that yielded no info.

[DonT]

@jimbrake - I also just put a ski up on ski it again, and rec'd a response for shipping to DE. What ultimately happened with your transaction? It does smell a bit funny.

 

 

Update: Sorry - just re-read the thread - guess you just decided to not go forward.

[brhartw]

I shipped ski overseas by a similar company in LA area. I agree, it seemed suspicious but funds were secure and they provided all shipping and handling fees. It was local so I just dropped it off and they took care of the rest.

[mike_mapple]

Freight forwarding company, unfortunately you can track when it gets to them but then you get no info, and they can go to eBay/ who ever to report it was not delivered, I would beware of it.

 

 

[immikerowley]

Should normally be ok. I live in South Africa and our stockists don't normally ell all the top end skis and cool stuff you have. So I import directly. I use a freight forwarder based in Florida called MyUS.com.

 

Agree you could be at risk if they claim never received.

[jimbrake]

I refunded the buyer. I think many probably use the forwarding service for a legit purchase and shipment, but I think some are using it to run a refund scam and you don't get your item back. I couldn't confirm legitimacy of the transaction and just felt too skeptical, so I backed out. I may have been wrong, may have been right.