Companies that say they’ll receive packages then forward them to people overseas, say, if someone wants to buy something from a US retailer ,or ebay, but the seller won’t ship outside the US. Or people who want to receive American magazines. Things like that. Is this a legitimate business? I saw an ad for an offer to be a part-time “re-shipper” and they claim there are no fees involved. They cover expenses like postage/shipping, then pay me for every package shipped. It sounds like a great job to do from home, but I’d never heard of this kind of service before, so I’m wondering if it’s a scam in disguise.
The ad is most likely a scam, involving merchandise purchased using stolen credit cards numbers. See here for details.
That’s exactly what I wanted to know. Thanks!
I saw the ad in the Chicago Reader, huh.
2nd edit to say, I didn’t give them any information. I wanted to research this first. I love the Dope!
Would such a service be legal to set up?
It’s certainly legal in Japan… There’s a few agencies (Celga, for example) that will gladly take a commission in exchange for buying items for you from Yahoo! Japan auctions. Another such company is JBox, which has offices both in Japan and the US for the purchase and resale of Japanese goods (including, as you mentioned, magazines).
Living in a country with no postal service to speak of, a P O Box in Miami that provides a courier service to the Dominican Republic is essential. It can sometimes confuse matters when buying online - they can tell from your IP that you are not in the US while providing a US mailing address, but most of the time it works well.
Ryden’s Store on Highway 61 is very useful when it comes to having a US package mailed to them for pick-up by folks from across the border in Thunder Bay who then bring the package up into Canada. For Canadians who do not want to cross the border, Rydens makes arrangements with a local delivery service/customs broker to take the package across and deliver it in Thunder Bay.
You could certainly set up a version of this type of business that is 100% legit but you would have to make the receiving party jump through hoops that satisfy your scam protection before they get anything. Many such businesses exist succefuly in a “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell Model”. They are popular with all kinds of people wishing to engage in illegal activity but they are also useful for people that want to hide there identity from the government and you would have to be well-versed in the rights of all parties before you reveal your client list. I have a books including “Hide All Your Assets and Disappear” and “Privacy: How to Get It and How to Enjoy It” that go into detail about using re-mailing services in legitimate, although ethically questionable ways.
There is an electronic version of basically the same thing called proxy servers on the Internet. They take information and hide the originator from the target server. Those aren’t illegal either but they are often used for nefarious activity in the same way. A good business model that you create yourself could certainly be a profitable business but it would take as much work as any other and might expose you to some serious hassle from law enforcement even if everything is legitimate. You could never reveal your client list except under strict court order or the whole model would go poof.