Often I will remind you about particular types of scams I have described previously because they continue to victimize many people.  Recently I was contacted by a Scamicide reader who had listed two burial plots on Craigslist for sale. In response he received the following email.
“Thanks so much for your email and the Address sent to me. The check of $4,950 Dollars has been mailed out to you. Do please bear with me with this My client owing me mail out the check of all the total is was owing me.Once you get the check do take it to your bank and have deposited and it will clear the next day. Once it clears do deduct the amount for the plot which is $2000 dollars and deduct additional $100 for your running expenses and wire the rest of the fund to casket man details i will provide you once you have the fund. i am going to pay for the transfer deed charges at the cemetery office
Do i entrust you with the wiring of the differences to my casket man?
Awaiting your email asap.
Thanks for your understanding.
Stay Bless”
The check sent by the scammer looked legitimate. Unfortunately, the check was counterfeit. Often in these circumstances the check will appear to be a bank check or a certified check, but it is just a forgery.  Sometimes, the sellers will think they are being prudent by waiting a few days for the check to clear only to learn later that it can take weeks for a check to fully clear and the provisional credit that you are given by your bank after a few days does not mean that the check was legitimate. Once the check is discovered to be a forgery the provisional credit is taken away by the bank and the victim of the scam has lost the money he or she wired to the scammer from his or her bank account. Fortunately, in the instance of the Scamicide reader, he recognized that this was a scam and did not deposit the check or wire the funds requested.
TIPS
Whenever you are paid for something that you are selling by a check for more than the amount that is due and the payment comes with a request for you to send the difference back to the buyer, you should consider this a sign that this is a  scam.  Also, anytime you are paid by a check you should wait for the check to fully clear before turning over the sold goods.  Even if the check appears to be a bank check or a certified check, it may well be a forgery so you should contact your bank to make sure that the check has fully cleared before you consider the payment to have been made.  Regardless of the excuse that may be given to you as to the reason for payment by way of a check for more than what is owed, you should be suspicious.  Finally, always be wary when someone requires you to send payment by Western Union or wired from your bank because once those payments have been made, it is impossible to get the money back.
In this particular case, the poor grammar is another indication that this is being sent by someone whose primary language is not English and is most likely a scam.
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