When Pokémon Card Vendors Catch SCAMMERS In The Act!

At every show, Pokemon vendors have to deal with the worst people in the hobby. But sometimes, instead of a typical rude customer, these vendors catch scams taking place right in front of their booths. From fake cards and ridiculous prices, to entire fraud operations, here are the worst card show scammers ever caught in the act. Starting off with this buyer who thought he made the deal of his life when he bought this Poncho Pikachu from a vendor at a convention. But moments later, he decided to check the card more carefully and what followed surprised everyone involved. Not able to check the card's authenticity himself, he brought in other vendors to take a closer look. After spending a while examining it from every angle, they all reached the same conclusion. The Poncho Pikachu that he had just bought was fake. But these vendors weren't about to let the scam slide, so they tracked down the seller's booth and confronted him together. So I don't know where you got it from. The colors seemed off when I saw it and I asked my partner and he said it was fake and then I called my guy who sells these a lot and he's like it's 100% fake and then we checked made sure everything didn't show up it should have the hologram and it should it needs that so I don't know what you paid or if you know the seller but it also feels it doesn't feel the slab doesn't feel right if you hold this and hold that it just feels like light everything you see how it glows now look at this one right here that one doesn't glow no wow this is the first time I've ever had this card like I haven't yeah it's so hard because that's like the most faked freaking card so I don't I just I just want my money oh yeah you're getting your money back but while this buyer got his money back in the end the same can't be said for this victim because this vendor thought he just scored a great deal on a booster box buying it under market price after winning a coin flip all right this charizard is heads pokeball is tails all right I'm the come on baby tails oh it's tails it's tails however as he eventually found out the box wasn't genuine at all it had been completely resealed with darkness ablaze packs by the time he realized the truth the deal was already done and the scammer was long gone some people in the comments claim he had been caught scamming at other conventions too but no one knows for sure what happened to him now while scamming an experienced vendor is already awful this next victim was even more vulnerable because this kid thought he was making a normal deal with a vendor but had no idea that he was paying way more than he should have for this restaurant however it wouldn't be long before he found out the truth once he reached the right vendor i'm pretty sure i actually got scammed of course i think it was 165 some guys checked it out he said it's way under you know how anybody like can try to get my money back paid 165 for this and somebody else told you it wasn't worth 165 let me look up to see who in this story is we got the restaurant floor i think near mint this thing's going for like 90 bucks now you're asking how to get your money back i have no problem calling vendors out and this was objectively a stump thing to do but ultimately you also have to check the price just go up to him and just tell him give me 60 back well shoot for 70 if that doesn't work just start crying a little bit realizing he had been taken advantage of the kid went back to confront the seller and in the end he didn't leave empty-handed how much money they give you back he said no that looks that's fair for the price and i tried to pull up the lights and he said fine it took a little bit like the look at it and then just gave me some kids are out there getting scammed others try to become the scammer instead because this kid appeared to be making a simple card trade with this vendor but things were about to get suspicious really fast because just a few minutes later he came back claiming the card wasn't in good condition hey how you doing yeah yeah you're good what's up i didn't realize okay cool i kind of want to get back yeah yeah take your take your time with checking the cards it's okay it happens you know you're good you're good and to make things worse it happened again before the vendor finally realized he was being scammed big time i just want to do that okay just trade back okay okay it's okay i would say just be careful on what you get yeah yeah we're good thank you that's the second trade back you trade a card and then trade a bag and then trade another card then just trade back that's what i'm saying do you run into that a lot no i try not to but okay it's a weird thing yeah usually i don't do trade backs but you know i just hope it's not a different card that's the thing i didn't even think about that i mean it might be a different card honestly because it doesn't look like my copy i might have to where's he at i think he had uh we got the footage i do eventually the vendor tracked the kid down and confronted him about it but decided not to ruin his life over just a few cards hoping he wouldn't scam anyone ever again but sadly that's very unlikely and in the future he may even turn out like this next vendor who sold a fake card to an unsuspecting couple with no idea another vendor was about to blow the whole thing wide open hello get away from me let me take a look potentially a deck exclusive or potentially fake as soon as the second vendor took a closer look he realized something wasn't right and explained exactly what made the card fake uh why did you like buy it off some scummy i definitely think it's fake there's like a when you're looking at stuff like this there's a very evident tell on why it's fake one they've never done a hollow pattern like this which makes it fake two if you kind of look at the writing on the card it's too light it almost looks as if it's like blurry like you need to put your glasses on to be able to read it once the couple realized they had been scammed they went back to the original seller's booth only to find out that he wasn't just selling one fake he had an entire stash of them he has a bunch of fake cards is he claiming they're real but not all scams are about product see there are plenty of other ways to scam a vendor including stealing their clients right out from under them that's exactly what happened when this customer was in the middle of a deal when a scammer suddenly stepped in and while at first the vendor didn't realize what was happening it quickly became clear this wasn't just a harmless interruption because this scammer had his eyes on the customer's first edition blast toys what price are you seeing on that blast toys because some of my prices might might be a little outdated what are you i mean i mean i think i paid at least like 50 bucks for it i mean not terrible after interrupting the deal he made his offer and this happened how much 45 45 bucks no no no i was gonna pay i was gonna pay you like almost 200 for that let me see is that the first dead yeah yeah first the first dead is like 200 bucks dude look at dark blast toys first edition i just can't like said look right there it's like 200 raw every day yeah but 45 is is way way low i think that's kind of weird i'm not gonna lie but when the vendor stood his ground the scammer had no choice but to paint the honest vendor as the real scammer i priced all these cars i offered him a price this guy's just bumping in and for some reason he's trying to offer him like 30 of market for the dark blast toys first dead it's like 200 he was about to pay him 45 and i said wait wait wait don't do that and i was and i showed like he just said 650 for the whole lot that's crazy 854 for that and it's like how do you know how to let Kyle 650 he's trying to call me out on that that's shadowless that's not that's not first edition but yeah it is but it's shadowless you know what that is that is actually my mistake i did not actually notice that that was shadowless yeah i'm sorry hey look bro i just priced up like 60 cards bro but i'm just saying no no for sure i'm like you say i'm trying to rip them off and i'm like what's up then it's like that's crazy i never said you were trying to rip them off you said the app scanned it wrong i literally said i scanned it and came up to this no for the dark blast toys i'm talking about it was 200 i scanned this that's 850 yeah no i'm saying yes that is shadowless okay i don't know what your problem is man no because you are coming to me right no i wasn't keep moving man keep moving it's okay it's not it's not a big deal bro it's not a big deal luckily this customer was sharp enough to realize that the scammer's offer was only about 30% of what the card was actually worth and shut him down on the spot now this next woman thought she had made a totally normal deal for a box until she saw the same box at another vendor's booth and realized she had paid far more than it was actually worth how are you doing how's everything the deoxys yep how much did you buy the poster collection for 300 it's the gardevoir one what is it at and when this vendor revealed how much the box actually cost she got furious and went straight to confront the seller so this is what it goes for it is 208 so like i could understand if they were charging you like 210 plus tax which would be like 237 i'm the person you don't want to make upset i will throw a scene but just talk to him i know you're up here just see what they have to say remember it's shiny cardboard i'm a construction worker that's fair that's why i'm upset i feel you go talk to him first see what he has to say after getting her money back she came back to buy an ascended heroes box instead but the biggest twist of the day still hadn't happened yet so you would still like some ascended oh yeah okay okay so i don't have the gardevoir one but you can pick the lucario one that you think would be the better hit are you going to rip the box so i want you to pick your destiny for lack of better words all right there you go your money's no good here today that was a experience for you that's on us 100 that's this is your brother yeah he always comes in like he always comes and supported us since day one so you're in good company you had a really poor experience just take that and like make the best of it i'm glad that they give you your money back so now you can use that to go get something else now i know these scams have been ridiculous so far but make sure to stick around to the end because somehow they only get crazier from here this next scammer walked in with a bunch of hoping to land a big deal with the vendor but what he didn't know was that the vendor was already suspicious of his intentions the vendor played along negotiating as if he was genuinely interested while the seller insisted he had plenty of other offers but then the seller named a price that left the vendor completely stunned what was the highest i'm serious while the vendor saw through the scam immediately a bystander who didn't almost got scammed instead yeah i want to be honest with you it's hard to get heavies like knowing because if you don't know the booster box it's in they vary so if i were to buy i'd probably buy it unweighed okay i'll throw you a number i don't want to waste your time i'll be at 44 for these 10 and i appreciate you bringing it to me i just don't want to waste your time that's why i didn't buy it good but while some scammers barely know what they're doing and are caught instantly others have spent years mastering the art just like this grandma who came to a card show with her grandson to sell a pokemon card trying to sell this i can take a look very cool card it's okay if i take them out let me double check something okay so this card is fake this one fake yes as the vendor examined the card he quickly noticed something wasn't right and explained exactly why it was fake but the grandma acted like she had no idea what he was talking about the deal fell apart but that was not the end of it the same grandma and her grandson went on to sell that fake card to another vendor nearby yo what's up man can you check is this not real did they come to you and try to sell this to you they just sold it to my brother you didn't know i told them it was fake so they they did it knowing it's fake it looks fake it's fake no i told like i even told them it's fake so they still they still kept going trying to sell it i think it was a it was a grandma and a grandson so i was like the kid doesn't know obviously grandma doesn't know yeah they just pulled a fast one yeah yeah it was a grandma and a grandson together they both did because i told them both they did it together the fact that she was pushing her own grandson to sell a fake card now this next jealous scammer tried to pull a crazy move on this honest vendor because after realizing the vendor had just made a huge sale this guy tried to pin the blame on him for something that wasn't even his fault what is that not a scuff no that that is a scuff i think that's someone's case this is why people can't be setting things down on cases dude i'm sorry i didn't even notice someone did that was someone putting their case on there earlier this right here is the three inch scuff or issue that he is talking about here oh yeah well what's his instagram i'll message him he insisted the vendor was responsible for a crack in his friend's display case and kept pushing him to pay for the damage you talked to him okay got you so the zion dude okay got you i would just ask if you could do that because again i just yeah that's like what do you mean though what do you mean what do you mean you mean buy a whole new uh whole new lid just a lid yeah they're 95 bucks bro i didn't expect this is the actual crack i mean but come on i mean be fair with me man that doesn't make sense buy a whole new lid because i i have three cases at home i get scratches all the time yeah but that's not you know what i mean that's like actual like put me in touch with that guy and and i'll make sure what's right but when the vendor asked for the friend's instagram to sort it out directly the scammer suddenly had a change of plans so you're gonna buy a new lid for him yeah it's not throw away bad i mean i mean that's up to you and him for sure um i mean i'd be willing to reimburse you 50 for just renting it that's what i would do for these cases but like without damaging it i mean there's crack repair kits if i did this to your case i'd buy anyone just being straight up with you transparent i wouldn't ask that of you though i would genuinely i wouldn't i wouldn't i would not ask that of anyone cases get cases get damaged all the time he kept demanding the price for a new lid without ever handing over any real contact info so the vendor rightfully refused to pay for the damage that he couldn't verify eventually the scammer left empty-handed trying to make you pay for something that isn't even your fault is insane but this next situation goes even further because the cards being sold weren't even hers to begin with now this girl came in looking to sell a and at first nothing about it seemed suspicious mind if i show this to the camera just pull it out of the back pocket mega charizard holy are you selling any of these by chance yeah everything everything yeah i might be interested in a couple things i need this for my pc i might grab that yeah yeah of course take a look here take take this so you can do your trade and i'll take a look at this guy's stuff what's yeah um i'm just switching out like this gotcha so if i did this card and this i would have to add 75 on top for you awesome thank you so much with the deal eight percent i'm maintaining five on cash nice so i could show the camera if you want me to yeah make it a trade we're getting back the tina v star we are trading away the pikachu and how much cash and 75 cash the deal went through and the buyers decided to walk the convention floor with their new cards it wasn't long before they ran into the vendor who was actively looking for those exact same cards i don't know oh really yeah yeah like a binder you know what they talk yeah they took the gold locario in english and the zardess s-i-r from phantasm wait hold this holy i think i know what you're talking about there was remember the one um the girl who left her binder she had a the phantasm was it in a it was in a card cover too right yeah it was that girl i mean there's so many zardess they had the zard and that the gold car from mega yeah the gold one in their pocket they pulled them out their pocket i was like they could offer it to me we have cam footage we do have yeah we've been recording all day she threw the accident left her binder we could send it to you soon after the vendors posted about the theft on social media and the girl scared of the fallout came back to return everything she had stolen now this next seller isn't selling any stolen cards but he's definitely robbing anyone who buys from him because this guy tried selling damaged ungraded cards for psa 10 prices and kept trying to justify his asking price as he pulled more cards out of their rubber bands these are in good shape too yeah no none of those ones i'll pass on those it's perfect why wouldn't you want to just grade it and sell it online it's a 10 it's just because people use us to play so they're more playable cards so sometimes they would yeah i'll give these ones back to you and then let me check the prices on this stuff right here so i can take all this stuff and then all the prices you have are pretty accurate too so like what i haven't done is i haven't looked at price charting because i know like you know it's been fluctuating yeah so um i want to work with you so total for everything we're at uh 10 15 i'm gonna have to do it with you yeah sure this is what i would i can offer you 7 30 the vendor eventually offered him 730 bucks for a few of the cards but the seller kept refusing insisting they were already psa 10 quality that one was 27 1046 uh mine came out to 10 42 okay i'm just saying like for the average of a 10 on uh that's been sold 282 i think the best i can do is like 730 yeah the best i can do 730 some of them have a little warping on them because of the rubber band so yeah see like this one's damaged like if you take a look at it there's damage to some of this so i mean i i'm okay right now eventually the vendor had heard him enough and walked away from the deal entirely causing the scammer to curse him out on the way out i'm okay right now yeah okay okay back to you normally oh i mean it's not rude i mean everybody does this i mean it's cool i mean it's not that serious i didn't say i've never said that to you dude now this next scam is far more calculated using something as simple as a coin flip to trick vendors out of their money he would approach vendors with a coin flip challenge offering double or nothing and the second the coin flipped he'd call heads on the ground whatever that means to ensure a win no matter what the result was ready yep heads on the ground heads on the ground there's tails it's heads on the ground there's tails tails but it's heads on the ground some vendors didn't fall for it and made him flip heads i mean i guess yeah but as it turns out this wasn't his first time running the trick either he's already been banned from hundreds of conventions for it oh what happened they kicked the scammer out okay basically this guy he's banned from a lot of soft core shows and he would okay at first some people were like wait that's kind of cheating yeah the first time the guy was kind of confused but he let him have it he got a free membrane free membrane oh my god next deal my friend did like a zero or 12 000 and he lost all of it he's racked up like six figures oh my god so and he was here he was about to do it to this guy oh no it's not so exciting so i talked yeah we got him kicked out oh my god that's insane that's why you don't do coin flips guys you got to stay away from coin flips you know he's gonna keep doing it at other shows you know he only comes from here he'll go to another state dude he'll go to Atlanta or something yeah but while we've seen plenty of scammers show up looking to con a vendor it's time to flip the coin because scammer vendors are out there too and they're just as ready to prey on innocent collectors and that's exactly why this vendor came up with an idea send a student in undercover as a total beginner to see exactly who would try to scam her and expose them online so i went to like this flea market and i saw a bunch of pokemon cards i like picked them up and i don't know i think some of them are fake they came with like protectors check if they're real well i was just wondering like how much i could get i have like pop coming up so i was trying to like i put charizard pop i know like something there's more expensive one is obviously this i don't know if these are worth 360 for me those are ex and bs i usually do three for a dollar for a computer they're worth like 70 80 cents how much for these what those two will be 355 is as she moved from booth to booth these situations only got worse oh this one's worth quite a bit this one can i take them out real quick with the sleep it's not a 10 but it's in like light play condition i'll be interested in it buy it yeah sure is there a price in mind you want for all of them you got any offers on it yet this guy's worth a lot what would you say to 200 i mean i have to call an expert okay yeah let me know this one will work a lot all of these 200 the sheer number of scammers caught on this one video is disturbing enough on its own but it does not compare to our number one spot because once the deal is done there's usually no coming back and this vendor thought he had made a completely straightforward sale after selling his psa 10 venusaur all right guys we got the venusaur from ex crystal guardians going out for 4100 thank you baby bj hits thank you brother but then the buyer came back with an accusation that changed everything wow let me talk to you you stole me a fake thing maybe 4100 right now wait what's the problem hold it up the buyer demanded a full refund and even with proof backing up the vendor's position the situation kept escalating what's the problem what's the problem there's nothing to do with me no no this is our table yeah yeah no i'm just wondering yeah yeah hold it up what's the problem what's the problem i'm not trying to do all this right now if the comp is fake then of course we'll give you money back but what's the problem that's not a fake comp 1100 dollars you're you're you're comping look the picture you have is not this that's right he even tried to pull the vendor away from the table once he had noticed the camera and the crowd that had gathered but the vendor stood his ground and kept confronting him with proof but you're saying it's fake it's not nice right here i appreciate you however in the end it was all for nothing and the seller was forced to refund the entire value of the card just to avoid things spiraling further making this one of the craziest vendor scams ever caught on camera check out this video on screen next to see even crazier scammer moments trust me these are insane