Fraudlent Orders

[BearyNiceDesignsAU]

Hi All, I am getting a heap of fake orders. I know they are fake as the names and addresses are just letters such as "afafafa" or "sdsdsdsds". Etsy have cancelled some of them but I keep getting more. I have had at least 20 of these orders in the last 3 days and I cant seem to cancel them.  Has anyone else had this happen?

[NanaLetha]

Why can’t you refund and cancel?

[GieseDeseiGns]

Are they are still pending?

[BlackCatTheory]

If they aren't in pending status, and are indeed an order - and you can't cancel - I would say this is some king of Etsy glitch. I would reach out to Etsy.

[shellworkskauai]

Never in 11 years has that happened to me. 

[dayspringcollectible]

So?

[BearyNiceDesignsAU]

1. I have contacted Etsy with no reply as yet. 2. most of them are pending, 3. when you click on their profiles it says user not found. I have been with Etsy for years now and this is the first time this has happened. There is something dodgy going on and they are NOT real orders. I have some of the same profiles purchasing the same thing over and over, and if I try and contact them it says account is closed or user not found. The "user name" looks like its in Arabic or something and have fake addresses, as I said just letters like "sfsfsfs" followed by Australia and some fake postcode that does not exist. Don't treat me like I'm an idiot!

[ThePurplePuppy]

As long as they are still pending, then no you cannot cancel. Etsy will likely  cancel them before they have processed. those you can ignore. You should be able to cancel those that appear as completed in your "new orders".

As for the fraud part--if these are inexpensive items chances are  they are "buying" tracking numbers--it is a very convoluted scam but basically they buy something very inexpensive so that once you ship they have a tracking number for a much more expensive item they have sold--that does not exist.

Yes, you would be most wise to just keep cancelling any that you are able to while you wait for an answer from Etsy--if ever!

[ThePurplePuppy]

The other possiblity that comes to mind is they are testing stolen credt cards to see if it is an active card. IF active the sale will go thru--if not (owner has already reported card stolen) then Etsy will not finish processing the order.  I think this is probably the most likely case. There was a thread here in the forums a couple days ago exactly like yours and we all came to the conclusion  these "buyers" were simply testing stolen CC's.

CANCEL any that you can!