Months ago, Korede* decided it was time to buy the PS5 console he had been eyeing for over a year. In this chat with PiggyVest, he narrates his experience with an Instagram scam vendor and the tough lessons he learned from the ordeal.
Could you narrate how this all happened?
I love gaming. What I mean is that I love FIFA or FC. I’ve owned every Playstation console released since the PS2. I had the PS4 for a while and have been toying with the idea of buying a PS5 since last year, but I felt it was a lot of money. Bringing out about ₦450k to buy the console in this economy did not sit well with me. But it was something I knew I would get eventually.
As $1 got closer to exchanging for ₦1k, I began to panic. As a Nigerian these days, it is quite common to regret not buying something early enough. You blink and the price has increased significantly. Every time I looked at the price of the PS5, it had increased.
You decided to go ahead and buy it anyway?
Well, I had been talking with different online vendors in September, hoping to stumble on a good deal. Honestly, I don’t know what I was thinking that this ‘deal’ would look like. But I was not satisfied with any of the prices I was told. A month of futile negotiations passed and by October, the price had increased to ₦550k.
Wow.
I decided to try my luck one last time. That was where I met my waterloo. I saw this Instagram page that should’ve outrightly looked like a scam page. But my eyes were clouded by desperation. I just wanted to get my PS5. I had even given out my PS4 console to my younger cousin because I was over it. If I wanted to game, I had to visit my friends. That was exhausting and a bit embarrassing. So, yeah, desperate was the word.
And scammers love desperation.
I understand that now. At first, I thought it was jazz.
Walk me through the ordeal.
Okay, I found this Instagram page selling phones and game consoles. I went through the page and saw a post for a new PS5 for 1TB storage for ₦400k; the 500GB version was ₦350k. My jaw dropped. My only concern was that the store was located in Benin, while all the other vendors I had contacted were Lagos-based. [Laughs] It really was so obvious.
I immediately hopped in the DM, by myself o! I asked them if the 500GB one was available. They assured me that it was. I could even get it as early as the next day if I paid immediately. They sent me videos and pictures. I was sold!
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It was a Saturday morning; my girlfriend was spending the weekend. She knew I was on the prowl for a PS5, and I wanted to surprise her with my “cost-efficient” purchase. I sent the ₦350k and told the scammer, “I’m trusting you to deliver early o”! To which, he responded, “Trust me, boss.”
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Ah! Trusting your opp.
That’s why I’ll never forget this tweet: “If someone explains Nigeria to you and you understand it, it means they did not explain it well.” I’m sure the guy would’ve been laughing with his guys, telling them, “Maga don pay.” He even sent a picture of the PS5 (which was not the same as the one he showed me earlier) strapped in the backseat of a car on the way to the car park for delivery.
I’m now just realising that they didn’t even bother to wrap it up like a package. [Laughs] Omo! I was just excited to tell my girlfriend about my smart purchase.
What happened afterwards?
I went to her. “Guess what, babe?” She was immediately suspicious, but she let me speak. It was at the moment I wanted to blurt it out, the words got stuck in my throat, and I realised I was about to tell her I sent ₦350k to a random IG page. But I mustered some excitement and said it anyway. Her eyebrows shot up. She said, “Let me see the page”. She buys everything online and knows how to clock a fake page from a mile away.
She took one glance at the page and screamed. One glance. I forgot to add that there was a CAC number, so I was convinced it had to be legit as it was registered.
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How did she know then?
Just the vibe of the page. She said scam pages love to plaster that CAC number everywhere to look credible. Comments were disabled. For a company that sold phones, the quality of the video “reviews” on the page looked like they were done with that Nokia Xpress Music phone. The reviewers even looked like they were hostages. The address did not show up on Google. The account had changed usernames almost ten times. Everything about the account was wrong. The account number wasn’t a business account. By the time she showed me all the signs, I had a migraine. My skin was burning up.
That must have been devastating.
Devastating is an understatement. I called the bank to see if something could be done. By that time, the recipient had already withdrawn the bulk of the money, and I had to involve the police or get a court order for the bank to take any action on the account.
I was deflated. Shattered. In a bid to save money, I threw it away. My girlfriend could only console me and advise me to let it go. I sha went to Computer Village a few days later with my leg to buy it myself. But that ₦350k haunts me to this day.
Did you hear from the scammers again?
I tried to follow up the days after, but it was just one excuse after another. Interacting with them was like rubbing salt on an open wound, so I stopped.
I’m so sorry. What did this experience teach you?
The signs are always there. Educate yourself about the telltale signs of fraudsters because they are everywhere and their tactics are endless. Nigerians are already poor; it’s heartless to further impoverish your fellow Nigerian because you don’t want to work.
I’m yet to understand it fully, but I believe there’s a demographic scammers target. They prey on either the ignorant or desperate. I was the latter. I fell hard. Going forward, I’m learning to be more discerning and less trusting of online vendors until I can prove beyond doubt that they are legit.
