LOOKING for a quick way to make some money before giving birth, this woman decided to fork out for some return pallets with plans to sell on the items.
However, her side-hustle scheme was over before it really started when she realised she’d been scammed.
Taking to TikTok, Lucy explained that she found an internet auction for internet returns and decided to place some bids.
The website, she explained, had 30 different lots available to bid on, but the image on each of them was the same – a large metal cage with a red Royal Mail bag over it.
“Inside that bag is Marks & Spencer, John Lewis, Amazon, Nike – Amazing,” NAME explained in the social media clip.
After seeing the brands included she was sure she could make some money reselling the items so placed a bid on lot number one for £1,050.
As the auction was drawing to a close, she found herself as the highest bidder – then another 10 minutes was added on.
“I’m absolutely seething,” she fumed.
But it wasn’t just the one lot she placed a bid on and out of the seven she went for, Lucy ended up winning three of them for £3,200.
But that number kept growing when she realised she needed to pay a fee to the auction house, VAT and even £500 on shipping.
All in all, the bidding war cost £5,100.
Things then went from bad to worse when the pallets finally arrived and Lucy noticed the code on the packages was from Shein, not the posh brands in the picture online.
Then after opening a selection of random boxes from the pallets, she soon realised all of the items were in fact from Shein, all 2000 of them.
The TikTok user then shared a clip of all the boxes in her garage, and sure enough the room was packed with Shein boxes, which she said would try and sell on Vinted.
After sharing her story fellow social media users couldn’t believe how much she forked out on the pallets.
One said: “This is exactly why people say not to make financial decisions when pregnant.”
“I think my husband would have divorced me,” a second wrote.
And a third chimed in: “I’ve been reselling for years and have never spent that much on stock at once! Hopefully you’ll have lots of sales.
Meanwhile, others were confused as to why Lucy didn’t try and return the pallets, but she claimed the auction house simply told her she should’ve personally came to look at the pallets before purchasing.
What is retail arbitrage and how does it work?
Retail arbitrage just means reselling a product on for profit.
It is completely legal in the UK, as, once you own an item, you have the right to resell it.
Using an app called BuyBotGo, resellers scan items they find in the supermarket, and the app tells them how much the products are selling for on Amazon, and how many times they have been sold in the past month.
The reseller will make a profit on the items by reselling them using Amazon FBA.
Amazon FBA is a service that online sellers can use, where Amazon takes care of the storing, packing and shipping of your products.
So all the reseller has to do is send the products off to Amazon and wait for the money to roll in.
