Staying safe

Meeting safely

• Meet in a public place. A shopping centre car park, a café, a supermarket entrance — somewhere with people around.
• Go in daylight, somewhere well-lit with cameras. Most shopping centres and service stations have CCTV covering the car park.
• Take someone with you. Tell another person where you are going and when you expect to be back.
• Don’t give out your home address. Your listing only ever shows a suburb. Keep it that way until you have decided you are comfortable.
• Big items that have to be collected from home? Have someone else there with you, and agree the pick-up time in advance.
• Many people choose to meet outside a 24-hour police station. It is a busy, well-lit, camera-covered spot at any hour — that is the whole reason it works.

Paying and getting paid

• Cash or PayID, in person — once you are both standing in front of the item.
• Never pay a deposit to hold something. If a seller will only hold an item for a deposit, walk away. There is always another couch.
• Check your own banking app. Open it yourself and confirm the money has landed. A screenshot, an SMS or an emailed “receipt” proves nothing — all three are trivial to fake.
• There is no such thing as a “business PayID upgrade”. Anyone who says your account needs upgrading, or asks you to send money back before their payment will clear, is running a scam. Banks never work that way.

Warning signs

• They want to move off Everything Perth. A buyer who immediately asks you to continue on WhatsApp, text or email is usually trying to get away from a place where they can be reported. Keep the conversation here.
• They want to send a courier. Buy & Sell is for local pick-up. “My driver will collect it and I’ll transfer the money” is the oldest version of this scam.
• They ask for a code from a text message. A verification code sent to your phone is never part of a sale. Handing it over lets someone take over an account in your name.

If something feels off, stop replying and report the listing or the person from the ••• menu. You never owe a stranger an explanation.