ebay alert

[ttaylor508]

So if I am understanding you correctly, you found the bike for sale on Ebay and started the purchase process through Ebay and then the guy asked you to go around the Ebay payment methods and send $$$ to him directly? Did you contacted Ebay to notify them of this seller/scam. Even if they can't do anything about it, they may be able to add this scam warning to their site so others don't fall for it as well. So are you out the money or do you have some recourse through your bank to track the "rat"?

Update:
Here is a couple of links showing this is a pretty common scam:
http://www.scams.flipshark.com/westernunion.html
Also, if you scroll down through this message board, this scam has been going on a long time. The last post on the message board has a link to the IC3 where you can file a complaint against cyber crime: http://www.scam.com/showthread.php?t=2483

Hope this helps and very sorry this happened to you. Hopefully your warning will help others avoid the same scam