John Joseph Benares

I HAVE BEEN SCAMMED. NOW, MY PAYPAL HAS A SIX-DIGIT NEGATIVE BALANCE.

I have been working in the freelance industry since 2017, and this is my first time getting scammed ( hopefully, the last). I want to share my story here to serve as a lesson for others and ensure that you don’t get to experience what I experienced.

July 29, 2022: I applied as a writer through Online jobs.ph. The job ad required me to send my resume and samples to someone named Jake (aka the scammer) on Skype, so I did. I didn’t receive any reply from him, so I continued with my job hunt.

Dec 5, 2022: Jake messaged me on Skype (I messaged him before, which is why I’m already on his contacts), asking me to write something. I already had a full-time client, so I turned down his offer.

Dec 15, 2022: Jake messaged me again, asking if I could work as his “PayPal Manager.” He promised to give me 10% of whatever amount he’ll receive, so I agreed. I think everyone knows where this will go — I’ll receive money from his clients and then transfer it to another PayPal account.

Side note: By this time, I wasn’t aware of PayPal Rak and the other scams on PayPal. I rarely use PayPal because my clients pay me thru Wise and Payoneer.

And so, I was receiving money from him and sending it to another PayPal account (the owner of this account is from the PH, by the way) from December 16 to 27, 2022. I think they were about eight transactions from different people.

After December 27, he continued to be active on Skype but no longer messages me about clients sending money thru PayPal. I received my first case on PayPal on January 6. Since then, the people who sent money on PayPal have filed lawsuits. I informed him about these cases and told him he’d “sort it out” and send me money through Gcash once all the issues were closed.

As of this writing, he has been inactive on Skype.

I am making this post for awareness. I don’t want other people to experience, such stressful situation. Grabe ang effect ng situation na ito sa mental and physical health ko. Umabot na ako sa point na hindi makatulog or maka trabaho ng maayos kasi worried ako dun sa cases. Yung tipong halos manlamig ka na dahil sa kaba, yung tulala ka lang most of the time. Sisingsisi ako about what happened. I was really disappointed in myself kasi na scam ako even though there were red flags. This has been one my lowest points in life. And to think, kakasimula pa lang ng 2023.

Jake’s Skype ID is: live:.cid. Please take note of this ID because he has been posting on Onlinejobs.ph. efe6ba32fcf24121 I’ve seen from the images sent by the buyers when filing for PayPal cases that he also has another Skype account, where he is “Bob.” Baka mag hire ng pinoy tapos biglang mag MIA na naman.

All of the money I received was sent to [email protected]. Look him up on Facebook. I don’t know if they’re working together, but according to this person, he has been with Jake for about a year. So maybe accomplice sila or hindi lang talaga niya alam ang gawain ni Jake? But I doubt the latter. 🙂