Warning for possible scam for a fellow member

[RCorsa]

I nearly got scammed in the most unreal way when I was selling an older Daytona I never wore years ago I posted it on a forum (not this one) and got a guy saying he was from the Midwest asking to buy it. He said he understood that there were scammers and he said he would send a check from his Meryl Lynch brokerage account. He said he was heading out of town for a wedding but wanted the watch shipped to a close friend who was going to be meeting him in a week. He mentioned he understood it sounded odd and even said not to send anything until the check fully cleared in a few days.

At first I wondered if this was real but two days later I get a real check from ML. I tool it to my private banker at Chase who takes the check to a direct contact at BOA/ML who confirm the check is real and that the funds are legit and match the persons name. Then the guy sends me some email about shipping that seem a little “off”. I can’t explain but it was an odd syntax. Therefore I go back to my banker the next day and guess what, check had totally cleared. They say I’m “good to go” so my banker who is VERY senior says to go ahead and ship it.

Literally the next day as I’m driving to fed ex I get a call from a senior BOA VP that knows my banker and tells me “please tell me you haven’t sent your watch yet”

Turns out guy who is supposed to be buying my watch is traveling overseas for several weeks. His phone was stolen and somehow they accessed his banking apps. They were able to do a “bill pay” from his account to me this the real money. I tell the buyer and he goes off the rails crazy.

As the money sits in my account I start to worry maybe I’m the jerk and I screwed this guy but All the bankers tell me to just wait, once the guy gets back to the US he will file a claim and BOA will file a claim with Chase that will debit my account the 20k.

The money Literally sat in my account for nearly 3 months but eventually the claim comes in and thankfully I still had the watch! Bank said It was one of the most legitimate looking scams they had seen in years. Crazy stuff