Melvelo.com is a deceptive website that offers to buy items at extremely low prices. It may appear as a discounter, or as a marketplace for warehouse liquidation items, but it is in fact just a story to make you think this site is legitimate. After placing an order on this site, you will most likely get nothing at all, or, at best, poor-quality or counterfeit items.
In this article, I will demonstrate the red flags regarding the Melvelo.com store, the way this fraud operates, and explain how to detect similar scams. This will help you to avoid similar shopping deceptions in upcoming times.
Melvelo.com Site – Scam Overview
As I said, Melvelo.com may initially seem like a genuine discounter or the merchant of stock liquidation items. But a brief analysis shows a troubling amount of red flags that indicate clearly about this site’s fraudulence. Questionable advertising methods, unreasonably low prices, absence of user support and user testimonials – this site fulfills the fraud bingo right away.
| Website | Melvelo.com |
| Hosting | AS13335 Cloudflare, Inc. Canada, Ottawa |
| IP Address | 23.227.38.65 |
| Threat Type | Scam/Fraud |
| Scam Type | Fraudulent/Scam online shop |
Melvelo.com Scam
By purchasing on websites like Melvelo.com, it is improbable that you will acquire the items you’ve ordered. More often, it results in one of 3 situations standard for scam sites.
Counterfeit goods. Not the worst option, as you get at least something. But as it usually happens to fraudulent items of popular brands, the attribute will be inferior, to say the least. Eventually, the site may mention about that somewhere deep in the item description or “about us” page, but users rarely check them thoroughly. This is a especially often case when ordering from sites that offer baubles, small electronics and stuff the like.
Wrong item. To make the trade look more legitimate, but spend even less money on the actual item, scammers may send a incidental item they have on hand instead of what you’ve ordered. An old t-shirt instead of a branded one, a dented aluminum platter instead of a set of dishes – frauds may turn quite inventive in that case.
Nothing at all. This is the most typical scenario when ordering items from sites like Melvelo.com. Frauds take your money, promise the delivery, and then just vanish. As scams are not going to exist for a long time, rascals are not wasting effort creating even a remote semblance of legitimacy.
Melvelo.com scam – How does it work?
As any fraud, Melvelo.com runs a simple and well-proven scheme of operations. It commonly consists of 3 stages, with certain deviations from time to time.
Step 1 – Attract the Masses. Scammers post abundant amounts of advertisements on social media, particularly preferring Facebook, YouTube, Instagram and TikTok. Paid ads say the same things as their sites do: 90% discounts, free delivery around the world, hurry up to get the deal.
Ads of fraudulent shops posted on different platforms
As users deem ads on the mentioned platforms genuine, they do not suspect anything at this point. Ads become especially persuasive during major events that boost people’s interest in shopping, like Halloween, Black Friday, Christmas, etc. Sometimes, they disguise themselves as resellers of the liquidated stock of bankrupt retail companies.
Step 2 – Take the Money. Once users are on the site, swindlers do their best to make the individuals buy something. Impossibly good deals, additional discounts, free delivery, bright and blinking “Order Now” buttons that are just everywhere – they use every single method possible. And this works out – uninformed consumers stick to the offers and proceed to paying for the order.
Payments are done in a unusual manner. Instead of more classic options for online shopping, like Visa/MasterCard payments or PayPal, scammers offer using direct bank transfers, Venmo or CashApp. Thing is, the latter do not provide any refunds, regardless of the circumstances. Even when you can prove that the transaction went to scammers, “no refunds” is a part of their policy which you agree on upon registration.
Step 3 – Vanish. Once swindlers get enough money, or – what is more likely – there are enough complaints and user feedback regarding the site being a scam, they just disappear. Usually, this happens at around the 2nd or 3rd week of the site activity. Once enough individuals are aware about the fraudulent activity, the profits will dry up, leaving cheats with no reason to move on. Reporting the scam to the domain hosting speeds up the domain takedown.
Why is Melvelo.com a Scam?
Well, we just talked about the way the hoax site operates. Now, let’s see how to understand whether the site is deceptive without risking your money. Fortunately, fraudsters do not bother themselves with creating well-rounded disguises, so the same red flags repeat from one site to another.
1. Fake or absent reviews
Fraud sites aim to exist for 1-2 weeks, so there’s no reason (and way) to make any reputation with user reviews. Obviously, even benign shopping sites will lack client testimonials when they have just started, since there were only a few patrons yet. For that reason, this sign is not stand-alone and requires confirmation by other signs or indicators.
Definitely not generic comments generated by AI
However, once you face phishy-looking reviews that have no relation to what the site sells, that’s definitely not a good sign. Any unclear or nonsense reviews that may describe any item sold on the website should be taken with a grain of salt. And well, on scam websites you will get an entire saltcellar. Always search for reviews on Google – this may save your money.
2. Unbelievably high discounts/low prices
No merchants will sell goods at loss for themselves. 70%, 80%, 90% markdowns are not viable even during sales events such as the aforementioned Thanksgiving day. In some cases, dishonest sites have the initial price low without saying anything about discounts, but they will most likely be absurd, like $30 for a bed or $10 for a branded leather bag. Goods may be sold at a low price, but every sell-off has its sane limits.
3. No customer support.
That factor distinguishes deceptive sites from the benign ones, even newly established. When a site is about to defraud the clients, there’s no need to waste time on answering their questions. Check out the “About us” or “Info” page (if it is present at all) – the page will have no contact info at all.
Typically for fraudulent websites, the “About us” column is completely empty
When they offer an email, or even a phone to contact them, there is a huge possibility that these numbers and emails will be unresponsive to your request. This, or you will receive some generic text regardless of your question.
As frauds tend to reuse numbers and emails for specifying them as “support”, you can search them on Google. When they appear on a different site, be sure you’re facing a blatant scam.
A chain of scam websites that use the same “support email”
4. Payments via payment systems that does not support refunds
This scam indicator is complementary, as there are a lot of trustworthy services and shops using direct bank transfers, CashApp, Venmo or payment systems like them. Each of the latter has the same feature I’ve already mentioned above: they do not suppose any refunds. And this is what makes it so attractive to scammers – once you paid for the order, there’s no way to get the money back.
Some sites may also ask for payments in cryptocurrency, which is even less controllable than aforementioned payment methods. While crypto payments expand their presence slowly, they still remain a beloved bay for different scammers.
5. Items’ images are sourced from another page
As frauds most likely don’t have any goods, they cannot make unique pics. Thus their option is to steal these images elsewhere. When scammers sell the same items on different pages, you can find such pics on similarly-designed fraudulent pages. By reverse image searching on Google, you can prove the uniqueness of an image.
Image duplicates on another scam site, as well as on Amazon and Walmart sites
6. Design repeats the one of a different page
Scammers do not stop on stealing photos. As frauds may scam people on the same topic again and again, they reuse the same web design under the new web-address, and voila – a new scam site is ready to rock-n-roll! In some cases, reverse image search on Google advice from the previous paragraph may lead you to the identical copy of the original site. It makes uncovering such scams particularly easy, but crooks who stand behind them never aim at cautious users.
Example of scam sites that duplicate each others’ design
Is your PC infected?
There are cases when Melvelo.com website, along with similar scam pages, are promoted by malware. Adware and browser hijackers are malware types that aim specifically at such purposes. If you see excessive ads in your browser, have your search queries going in a different search engine and some random pages open time to time, consider scanning your computer with GridinSoft Anti-Malware. This will help you to get rid of annoying promotions and scam sites.
Remove malware with Gridinsoft Anti-Malware
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Frequently Asked Questions about the Melvelo.com Scam
Melvelo.com operates as a scam website that pretends to be an online store selling various items at low prices. However, it is involved in fraudulent activities and aims to deceive customers by sending counterfeit or inferior products or not delivering anything at all.
There are multiple indicators that point at fraudulent nature of Melvelo.com shop. First and foremost, Melvelo.com shop recently set up its online platform, which is a frequent feature of ephemeral fraud sites that rapidly evaporate. Second, the webpage lacks contact details such as a phone number, street address, or real-time chat alternative, making it hard to resolve matters or inquiries. Thirdly, it provides bogus company details, offering no authentic information about the organization behind the online platform. Moreover, this fraudulent scheme entices customers with unrealistic discounts and promotions, slashing prices by over 70% or even 90%. Moreover, Melvelo.com plagiarizes text and merchandise visuals from authentic online stores like Alibaba, Amazon, and Aliexpress, indicating a shortage of originality and credibility. Furthermore, despite asserting to offer trendy and stylish products, the webpage lacks any social media presence or links to social media platforms. Lastly, real customer feedback is completely absent, with reports of delayed or absent deliveries, inferior customer service, faulty or incorrect products, refund difficulties, and unapproved billing on credit cards.
No, it is not a legitimate or reliable website. The aforementioned red flags indicate that it lacks credibility and has been reported as a scam site. Customers have experienced receiving counterfeit products or facing difficulties in obtaining refunds or contacting the company.
Take the following steps if you have made a purchase on Melvelo.com:
- Firstly, immediately contact your bank or financial institution if you paid with a credit card or debit card. Request them to cancel the transaction and initiate a refund. Additionally, report Melvelo.com as a fraudulent site and urge them to block future charges from it.
- Promptly change your passwords if you have a Melvelo.com account or use the same password for other online accounts. Consider enabling two-factor authentication to enhance security against hackers attempting to access your accounts and steal personal information.
- Beware of phishing emails related to your Melvelo.com order. Treat any emails offering discounts or refunds as phishing attempts. Avoid clicking on suspicious links or downloading attachments that may contain malware. Delete such emails immediately.
- To prevent malicious ads, Trojans, phishing attempts, and other undesirable content, use a browser-based content blocker like AdGuard. This will complement your antivirus software and provide enhanced protection.
- If you suspect your device is infected with malware, scan it using Gridinsoft Anti-Malware to ensure your security.
No, Melvelo.com does not have genuine customer feedback or testimonials. The absence of legitimate customer reviews further indicates its untrustworthiness and potentially fraudulent nature.
