As brick-and-mortar stores continue to move towards the fringes of everyday shopping, the online marketplace expands into the shopaholic’s dream space. And it’s not just conventional shopping either. The weekend garage sale signs that once sat on neighborhood street corners are soon going to be — or already are — replaced by giant QR codes waiting to be scanned and redirect shoppers to some website. Convenience is king, and selling stuff online is a lot less fuss than lining your driveway every weekend.
Online second-hand marketplaces have been around since the early days of the internet. However, Craigslist and eBay aren’t the only players in the game anymore, and some newer, more modern-looking platforms are starting to take over. One such website is Mercari, where you can buy or sell pretty much anything that can be shipped. But, as with seemingly all things online, you do have to watch out for scammers.
What is Mercari?
If you aren’t familiar with Mercari, it’s an online marketplace that functions pretty similarly to an online thrift store.
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People list things they want to sell, and rather than discuss a meetup with some stranger like on Craigslist, people simply add what they want to their cart and buy like a traditional online shopping experience. Then the seller ships it (Mercari offers insured prepaid shipping labels to sellers) and you’re all done. No going to the ATM, no finding a meetup spot where you don’t have to worry about getting robbed, and best of all, the whole country is your buying/selling area of operation.
Beyond secondhand (and secondhand “new”) items, Mercari also offers a “handmade” category, which acts as competition to Etsy.
How Does Mercari Work?
As touched on above, Mercari works very similarly to conventional online shopping spaces when it comes to buying: search, add to cart, and checkout.
Because you’re buying from people rather than a company, there are some slight differences. First, many listings on Mercari have a “Make Offer” option, where you can send in a price offer below what’s listed. Another difference is that some sellers can offer local pickup, in which buyers are given the option to ask for pickup if they are located within a certain distance of the seller.
Mercari also offers buyer and seller protections:
- Buyer protection: Per the Mercari website, “Mercari does not release payment until the item is delivered and the buyer confirms it is as specified or 3 days pass from the delivery date. If an item received is not as described in the listing, the buyer may request a full refund within 3 days of receipt of the item.”
- Seller protection: Mercari offers prepaid insured shipping labels, which means if your item is damaged or lost in transit, the seller is covered for up to $200. They also try to protect sellers from dishonest buyers who claim their items never arrived or were damaged upon arrival. For these cases, you must alert Mercari that the item was never returned, or was returned in a different condition than when you sent it. This can turn into a bit of he-said-she-said, so always be sure to photo-document any goods you are selling.
Is Mercari Legit?
Yes, Mercari is a legitimate and widely used online marketplace. While it’s a great platform to buy and sell online, you still need to be on the lookout for scammers.
Common Mercari Scams
While Mercari is by and large a safe and widely used platform, it does leave some windows of opportunity for scammers to try and rip off a quick buck. Many of these are present in almost any marketplace, but these are the scams you’re most likely to encounter on Mercari.
1. Dishonest Sellers
If you’re a buyer, the biggest issue you can often run into is dishonest sellers. Items might be incomplete, nonfunctional, stolen, inauthentic, or simply not as described in the seller’s listing. While you have 3 days to make a claim with Mercari (payments are not immediately released), if you miss this window, you’re often out of luck.
2. “Let’s Take This Off-Site” Scams
When a buyer wants to move communications off-site, immediately discontinue communications. Scammers will come up with all kinds of reasons why they need to move communications to a different forum (phone, email, DMs, etc.), but no matter the reasoning, never leave Mercari. The reason is that once they get you off Mercari, they’ll offer some payment method other than the standard Mercari-supported methods, and that payment method inevitably fails to materialize.
3. “Received Damaged Goods” Scams
As a seller, one of the things you have to watch out for is sellers claiming they received defective goods. In this case, they report the supposedly damaged goods to Mercari within their 3-day window in order to receive a refund. They then never actually return the item(s). There are seller protections through Mercari for this type of thing, but it can often be an annoying process that isn’t always a sure thing.
4. Dropshipping Scams
Dropshipping scams are a growing problem for sites like Mercari and Etsy, where sellers offer items in their shops — often pretending the item is unique/handmade/limited — when in reality they are slightly boosting the price of some cheap Ali Express or Amazon item, and shipping it directly from one of those marketplaces to the buyer. Not only does the upcharge allow for decent selling margins, but buying it for less and directly shipping it means the seller has no inventory or storage costs. While dropshipping can be a legitimate business model, people often stretch the truth with dropshipped items on Mercari and Etsy, and it quickly becomes scam-y.
5. Fake Customer Service Scam
This scam is sadly becoming common for pretty much any widely used business. Scammers create realistic email accounts and contact you about some issues with your Mercari account. Typically a link will be included in the email, which is inevitably a phishing scam. Never click links in unsolicited emails, and if you want to be sure, go find the authentic contact information straight from their website and reach out to them via that email/phone number.
How to Stay Safe on Mercari
Outside of staying vigilant when it comes to scam attempts, there are a few things you can look out for on Mercari to help keep yourself safe when buying and selling.
- Look for verified users. It’s not surefire either way that verified/unverified is a scammer or not, but generally speaking you’re less likely to run into problems when working with a verified user. That’s because becoming verified requires users to confirm their email, phone number, and most importantly, upload a valid copy of their government ID. Obviously, there are still ways to game the system, but the verified shield checkmark on a profile is always a positive sign.
- Look for the Mercari Authenticate badge. When buying any item that has a higher likelihood of being fake (such as designer items, sneakers, jewelry, etc.), look for listings with the Mercari Authenticate badge (it looks like a diamond). This badge indicates that the seller paid the fee ($5 or $10 depending on the item) to have an independent third party inspect and authenticate/certify the item.
- Photo and document everything. This applies primarily to sellers, but take and keep photo documentation of everything. Up-to-date photos of the item, photos of the undamaged and properly packaged box you shipped out, and anything else that can provide evidence against any false claims made by dishonest buyers.
- Immediately Alert Mercari of any issues. If you receive an item that’s damaged or not as promised, immediately report it to Mercari. You have a 3-day window to report any issues, at which point the Seller will have an opportunity to make your order correct, or Mercari will issue a refund.
- Look for Sellers with reviews. While scammers can fake reviews, the more reviews/selling history a user has, the higher the likelihood that the seller is legit. Most scammer accounts get flagged after scamming someone, so most scam accounts will be fresh accounts with little to no transaction history.
The Bottom Line
Is Mercari safe and legitimate? Absolutely. That doesn’t mean there aren’t scammers on the website, however. As with any marketplace where you deal with non-company sellers, approach interactions with a certain level of vigilance. Stick to the information above, and your experience buying/selling on Mercari should be smooth sailing.
Should you ever go with the local pickup option, or get nostalgic and use Craiglist, try using a people search tool like Spokeo to check out who you might be meeting with. If you aren’t sure of their full name, but they give you a residential address, you can look that up too, just to confirm there aren’t any details that are seemingly out of place. Shop safe!
Cyrus Grant is a writer from Southern California with a background in law and dispute resolution. When he isn’t writing he can be found deep-diving into the latest technology trends or simply spending time at the beach.