It wouldn't have happened if my brother didn't talk to the security officer who happened to be a partner of this large chain. Also, they don't just have one store. They have 40 all across Poland.
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No money up front. It's all the Europeans money. Just like Amazon (but without the middleman). You pay before you receive product.
Oh now it's a large chain? I thought it was a Pole and another Pole or a Pole and a security guard. This should be a book.
I'm going to hold you to that bet.
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His logic: "
it's not breaking contract if they don't know." But yes, I have told him. Also, he talked to a store manager in the back room at an Apple store near us. Don't know what they talked about.
Your brother seems to think that ignorance equals innocence. He knows this is sour. You know this is sour. It's unravelling in this very thread.
We'll be it the fact that the goods are no longer in Apple's possession, I'm going to guess its already gone. I still can't wrap my head around this. Sees money in account, JUST bought something with the account, ships goods, gets the rest.
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He just bought something on the account (iPad for that matter) and it went through. I don't know.
Then why the **** are you even bothering to "consider" getting in on this? It sounds like you are in it and just don't want to admit it now that you see how incredibly stupid it is.
Welcome back.
Would be a bit frivolous in his mind but I see where you're coming from.
Either way,
he's liable. Especially if he's violating Apple's contract, not only would he be sued, but wouldn't have any support or case if he is scammed.
This is where you need to stop. Somehow you have unravelled so much in this thread that you finally realize he is liable. Now that you finally realize this, I don't get why you continue to rationalize this "deal".
Please make sure he reads this.
Stop the shipments and - at the most - send one and see how it goes.
I'm sure the money will somehow turn out to be illegitimate, and your brother will end up legally liable for the whole thing.
Otherwise, why would they not simply buy the goods themselves with their own bank account, which could be set up here, and have them sent to your residences... and then pay your brother $20K to ship them? Why did his name need to be involved? Answer: it didn't. He's there to take the fall. His name never had to be on the account at all.
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It doesn't matter, since he'll end up liable for the whole amount, which will turn out to have been fraudulently deposited.
WB JSW.
There has been a ton of great advice here but this needs to be considered in conjunction with the post by
SlovakApple
I'll definitely run that by him. When I tried talking to him about it earlier though, he didn't want to hear it.
That's because this was fishy from the start and now a pack of strangers are telling him it is fishy but he is too deep into it to get out.
If money was deposited, spent (he was dumb to spend some on an iPad), and goods were shipped cross state lines, there is no turning back now.
After reading this through, I decided to post .
Yes, Apple stuff is more expensive around here, but I cannot imagine that after sales tax in the US, polish VAT, transportation fees, your brother's profit and the Poles' profit, the final price would be lower than what you get at the official sellers in Poland. There is only one scenario, where it would create a good profit for the Poles...
And a 40 stores chain in Poland? As someone has written, what is the name of the chain? You think that "entrepeneurs that big" in Poland (or Slovakia for that matter) are such amateurs, that they have to rely on "security officers in high schools" to do business?
Thank you for this!
I happen to know that for me to ship something from the U.S. to the UK is vastly more expensive than it is for someone in the UK to ship something to me. In fact, I think the cost was nearly 3x more to go from the US to the UK than it is from the UK to the US. Something like that. There seems to be a small profit margin and why would this two-man operation who suddenly now owns 40 stores waste a bit of profit on this American kid? It seems $20k is the profit, so why would it be wasted on some kid who only gave his identity away.
This is what it comes down to for me. I think your brother was purportedly paid to hand over his ID so a bank account could be opened. The bank account was funded with a supposed deposit that may or may not be legitimate. Your brother has nothing else to do. For $20k, he sold his identity to these guys and probably won't see the cash. The only gain he could have from this is the iPad he decided to buy, which was very very dumb.
Sarcasm aside, my concern would not be how the goods will be shipped and when, it would be what these folks will be doing with my identity for years to come. Even if he makes out with the $20k, they have his identity and they can and likely will do what they can with it before they stop.
There is a term used in real estate for this where the end game is the same. Get the ID of a viable victim and run with it.
It's too bad this was done before it was really researched. Unfortunately Squilly, it appears that both you and your brother are super into get rich quick schemes which is what these acts of fraud are founded on. Poeple like you who would rather make $20k overnight than actually work a real job. I have no pity for these folks in this day and age. I will pity the amount of time your brother will spend fixing this.
