Bought Phone Off Craigslist Now Reported Stolen

[Kaloudtu]

Yeah So Before buying this I had a fear of this. the phone is blocked from the T-mobile network.But I think I'm not much at a bad spot because when I bought it from the seller he told that the phone was his sister's phone that she bought for him as a gift but he said he didn't need it and so he wanted to sell it. I took a picture of the full receipt(Retail Instalment Obligation) which has the original buyers name,phone, and full address on it. My question is what can I do now?

 

[kate]

Sounds like the seller reported it stolen for insurance, or stole it themselves. You could ask the seller what's going on, or go to a T-Mobile store and see what they say.

In the future when buying, meet the seller at the phone store and have them verify it's not stolen. Then have the phone transferred into your name while the seller is still there, after that they can't report it stolen.

 

[Kaloudtu]

I called T-Mobile customer service about the phone they said They can't do anything until the original buyer take it off reported stolen.

 

[Sept1967]

Go get your money back from who you bought it from

 

[lunatic59]

Go get your money back from who you bought it from

Easier said than done, i'm afraid. It's a common scam to sell a working phone and then either stop paying the contract or report it stolen for the insurance. By the time the phone is blacklisted, the seller is most likely long gone. Even places that check imei numbers can't guarantee that in the future the phone won't stop working.

 

[Hadron]

Isn't this why people often recommend doing the handover in a carrier's store, so they can check the status of the phone before you hand the money over?

(Sorry, redundant, was going to quote a source for this advice but see that @kate had already posted it above!)

 

[ChristTheSon]

I tell people all the time you need to meet seller in store if u buy off craiglist. Too many scams! Someone got me but thank God for swappa.

I purchased a 6s off craigslist as the person "didnt have a car to meet at tmobile".

Anyway long story short i took it in tmobile after i purchased and they said it seemed good on there end but they couldnt tell if it was paid off due to no access to the persons accout.

It worked for 2 weeks then stopped working. I took it in to tmobile and they said the payments werent made on the phone and to turn it back on it would cost 400$.

I sold on swappa and gor my money back lol, but long story short...meet in store with seller!

 

[Mayhem]

I tell people all the time you need to meet seller in store if u buy off craiglist. Too many scams! Someone got me but thank God for swappa.

I purchased a 6s off craigslist as the person "didnt have a car to meet at tmobile".

Anyway long story short i took it in tmobile after i purchased and they said it seemed good on there end but they couldnt tell if it was paid off due to no access to the persons accout.

It worked for 2 weeks then stopped working. I took it in to tmobile and they said the payments werent made on the phone and to turn it back on it would cost 400$.

I sold on swappa and gor my money back lol, but long story short...meet in store with seller!

So you sold a known blacklisted phone on Swappa? Wow.

 

[ChristTheSon]

People do all the time for parts. Yes i did.

 

[Clementine_3]

I hope you listed it as a blacklisted phone and sold it as 'parts only'.

 

[ChristTheSon]

Yes sir i did

 

[batvette]

This is a big scam on ebay, CL, even swappa and amazon. They use stolen identities to buy phones for just the down payment on a 2 year plan, then sell them. By the time t mobile bricks the phone its too late for the buyer to get recourse from paypal or ebay or even leave bad feedback to alert other buyers attempting due diligence. I really feel t mobile is being completely irresponsible by not offering a free IMEI check that would reveal past due balances owed on phones for would be buyers who do not want to be part of a market defrauding t mobile.