Hanoi City Police have just announced a scam when participating in the Dropshipping business model, when recently, a man was robbed of nearly 10 billion VND. Besides the convenience, people participating in this business model may face unpredictable risks.

Simply put, participating in the Dropshipping business model, you are a seller. You have the right to post the supplier's products at any price and market that product. When a customer buys, you pay the supplier at the listed price, the order will be shipped directly from the supplier to the customer. Then, you track the order and wait to receive COD (cash on delivery service).

Meanwhile, doing business in the traditional model, the seller needs capital, business premises, knowledge, etc. Online business is somewhat "easier", the participant works more and earns more, has autonomy over time, financial freedom, and buyers can also easily access the seller's products.

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A Dropshipping business website. Screenshot.

Although the Dropshipping business model has many conveniences, it also means that there are many financial risks because this is an online business environment. Recently, there have been continuous scams through this business model.

According to information from Hanoi City Police, Mr. X. (living in Hanoi) listened to the introduction of friends and participated in distributing goods on a website. According to the regulations on the website, Mr. X. is allowed to post 100 products, with a profit of 20% on each order.

On the first day, Mr. X. sold 1 order and earned the promised profit. He immediately bought an advertising package worth 10 million VND with a commitment to sell 8 orders/day. The subjects introduced Mr. X. to upgrade his store for 12,000 USD to enjoy the policy of 20 days without having to pay for orders and a profit of 30% for each order.

After 20 days, Mr. X. withdrew money from the system and was asked to pay 35% of the profit, equivalent to nearly 1 billion VND, to withdraw the money. Realizing the unusual signs, Mr. X. did not pay the money and went to the police to report. The total amount of money that Mr. X. had been embezzled was 9.7 billion VND.

According to the Department of Cyber ​​Security and High-Tech Crime Prevention, Hanoi City Police, there were victims who were scammed up to 12 billion VND when acting as intermediaries for this model.

Ms. H. - a victim said that she was introduced to online sales by someone and they boasted of making a profit of 80 million VND after selling 2 watches through an application. Seeing the big profit, Ms. H. downloaded this application to do business.

When a customer places an order, Ms. H. must send a payment order in USD on the app and convert it into Vietnamese currency to transfer to the subjects.

After the customer receives the money, Ms. H. will receive the principal and 18% interest. For the first order, she received the full amount of goods and interest.

After that, she continued to place 46 orders, withdrawing money from some orders. When the deposit amount for the order was 12 billion VND, the subjects blocked Ms. H. from contacting her and did not allow her to withdraw money. At this time, Ms. H. realized she had been scammed and went to the police to report.

On online forums about the Dropshipping model, an account named Huy Dao shared that this is a sell first, buy later model. The business participant will market the product first, when the customer approaches and buys the product, you will place an order with the manufacturer.

In particular, the product will be shipped directly to the buyer without going through an intermediary. However, the limitation of the Dropshipping business model is that it requires a large amount of capital to market the product.

Where there is demand, there is supply. When the demand for marketing is high, many people consider this a lucrative "piece of cake" to scam. They will offer sellers fake marketing packages, such as guaranteeing that after marketing, they will sell 8-10 orders/day.

With the characteristic of indirect trading over the internet, these subjects also launched many fake product websites to trick sellers into receiving product deposits with the purpose of appropriation.

Sharing with VietNamNet, marketing expert Tuan Ha (Chairman of Vinalink Media), said that Dropshipping fraud is a very common and sophisticated phenomenon in Vietnam as well as in the world . The subject will use a fake account with an eye-catching interface (usually pictures of handsome men and beautiful women) to attract, after a while they will interact more closely and then start offering work.

To participate in business through the Dropshipping model, the expert noted, users should look for reviews about that page on social networking platforms, avoid websites with scams, check the domain name and see if the channel is registered by the owner or not.

"You should work for reputable companies like Shoppe, Lazada, Alibaba,... instead of sites of unknown origin," Mr. Tuan Ha recommends.

In particular, users should not work on sites that often invite people to deposit money. For example, the subject will ask you to deposit from 1,000 USD to gain prestige, thereby receiving 5,000 USD in return. Users should be careful with invitations to run ads to sell for profit or deposit orders, because it is easy for bad subjects to take advantage of and block communication.

"So first, never "play" on unreliable sites. Second, never deposit money, only withdraw money, that's the principle," the expert emphasized.