Australian banking laws to overcome being scammed?

[goose20]

Anyone know what the current laws are in Australia with respect to investigating/reversing a payment made into a bank account?

I agreed to purchase 2 BTC for $200 and deposited the cash straight into the sellers bank account.
He states that he has sent the BTC but its been over 24 hours and still nothing. He also will not provide sending address or transaction id so that i can check the blockchain to verify. So i am thinking that i have been scammed.

Any advice would be most welcome.
Thanks

[Unluckyduck]

Have you contacted your bank?
That is definitely the first step.

[leigl]

This is what middlemen are for.

[Unluckyduck]

Oh and i assume you were using local bitcoins?
If so only ever trade with people that have reputation and allow automatic escrow.

[jmutch]

Depends on your bank. I would definitely call them ASAP to see if the transaction is still in progress.

One funds are in the other account it gets much harder.

you can issue a "trace and recover' which is basically a formalised request for refund. This can have a fee so tell them you have been scammed and they may waiver the fee.

Call them now though if you haven't!!!

[jmutch]

this can be a bit of a pain in the ass though. so try get in before the 2 business day wait that most banks have.

[goose20]

Thank you all for the advice. It originated via Gumtree.

I figured since it was going into a bank account, i would have a trail confirming that the funds deposited were mine, and since they were for a purchase that never eventuated (ie the seller cant use the excuse that product was lost in the mail) given they wont provide transaction details to verify; the banking system being so strict and anti-fraud here it wouldn't be all too difficult to retrieve the funds. Lets hope so.

I'll contact the bank tomorrow and progress.

Thx again.

p.s. oh, there is no way that the transaction would take so long would it?
Their last reply to me in relation to me asking for further details was "Once it's gone it's gone, I can't see anything more. It's in your hands now"??

[Birdy]

If he is a valid seller he could easily give you the transaction ID, so you can look for yourself that the transfer is in progress at blockchain.info .

[goose20]

Yeah exactly, he was full of talk until i asked for those details then he went silent. So i know that he's scammed me.

Disappointing more than anything. My partner is in early labour right now and we could be off to the Mater any minute for the birth of my son (our first child). The 2 coins were for them, 1 each. You read so much about bitcoin, believe in what it was designed and stands for and all that...get excited to acquire 1 for your boy to have when he gets older etc etc, just to have scammers use it to rip people off.

Lesson learnt, but i still believe in BTC. I guess there will always be lowlifes out to make a quick buck

[Birdy]

Yeah exactly, he was full of talk until i asked for those details then he went silent. So i know that he's scammed me.

Disappointing more than anything. My partner is in early labour right now and we could be off to the Mater any minute for the birth of my son (our first child). The 2 coins were for them, 1 each. You read so much about bitcoin, believe in what it was designed and stands for and all that...get excited to acquire 1 for your boy to have when he gets older etc etc, just to have scammers use it to rip people off.

Lesson learnt, but i still believe in BTC. I guess there will always be lowlifes out to make a quick buck

Yes, esecpially when new things like Bitcoin come up. There are lots of people that are new to this and thus are easily scammed. That's why there are so much scammers here :/