Our office will be closed on Monday in observance of Memorial Day. Thank you to all the brave men and women who serve this country!
We will be open during normal business hours on Tuesday starting at 8am.
Be sure you call your ads in early Friday or Tuesday to make this Thursday’s paper.
Here are some tips to help you notice scams and fraud in classified ads and across the Internet.
Only deal with people in your area.
If you want to make sure you’re doing everything you can to avoid scammers, then only deal with local folk who you can meet face to face. Scam artists will try to contact you from other countries and ask for you to ship your goods to them.
Don’t wire funds (Western Union, Money Gram, etc.).
If someone responds to your ad and wants to pay you using a wire transfer, then DON’T DO IT! You’ll likely never see the money or your item again.
Beware of fake cashier’s checks and money orders.
Scammers will sometimes send you a fake money order that is valued above your asking price. The scammer will ask for you to wire the over-payment back to them. Once your bank realizes the check is fraudulent, you’ll be on the hook. The scammer will get to keep the overpayment you sent them and you’ll feel embarrassed that you fell for it.
Beware of identity theft. Don’t share your private info.
Never ever give out your sensitive personal information to anyone without careful consideration. Identity theft can end up costing you a lot of time and money.
Use caution when accepting relay calls from the hearing and speech impared.
Many people actually have hearing and speech disabilities and need to use relay calls. Unfortunately scammers will often use this method to contact you, pretending to be deaf. Remember it is always better to deal locally and meet face to face.
Avoid shipping and escrow.
There are scammers out there who will use fake, online escrow services, so be careful.
Avoid deals that are too good to be true.
If a deal seems too good to be true, then it usually is! Always use caution with anything that seems too good to be true.
Please understand that OurThriftyNickel.com is a service to help buyers and sellers find one another. OurThriftyNickel.com is not involved in any transactions and can not police the actions of our many users.
Thrifty Nickel tech team (not actual photo)
Heartbleed is the nickname for an internet security bug that began receiving public attention last week. The details are pretty involved, but in a nutshell there was a potential vulnerability found in OpenSSL encryption, which is currently used by about two-thirds of all sites on the internet.
The bug is serious business. Fortunately, our tech team (left) is serious about security, too. Our systems were patched and upgraded to new certificates before even the giant corporate sites had a chance to react.
We’re also proud to be one of the growing number of secure sites utilizing something known as “perfect forward secrecy” — a way of preventing unforeseen future vulnerabilities from decrypting past transactions. You’ll hear more about it in the future as more and more sites step up to the plate to protect their customers.
Just keeping our little corner of Texas as safe as we can!
Image credit: Jeremy Schultz, flickr.com/photos/tao_zhyn/442965594/
Pot of gold?
Who would want a pot of gold?
For one thing: heavy. I mean seriously heavy. There’s next to zero chance you could get that home without some kind of herniated disc. And then how would you spend it? On medical bills, that’s how.
I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking about all of those people waving “We Buy Gold!” signs in front of shady-looking local shops. But there’s no way that would work. They’d take one look at that much gold and then just call up their friends to rob you. Then you’d be left there, alone and penniless. With terrible back pain.
So, I’ll tell you right now, here’s what’s better than a pot of gold: a brand new Thrifty Nickel website. You’ll have to create a new account, because everything is new. Even you. But don’t worry — it’ll be worth it.
Go check it out at OurThriftyNickel.com.
We’re still sorting everything out and wiring it all up, so please bear with us at first. If you notice anything amiss, we’d love a heads up at feedback [at] ourthriftynickel [dot] com.
