Can I keep the items?

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foxiejigg

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A friend of mine recently had their credit card information scammed. A few items were purchased and sent to my friend's other address. The items made their way to me today. My friend had just moved out and I signed for the items in order to mail them to my friend. However, when I called them, they told me about the fraud and that they had already gotten their money back. What can I do with the items? Can I keep them? Or do I have to send them somewhere? Nobody has asked for the items back yet.
 
This smells bad on so many levels. Why would someone "scam" your friend's credit card information and send the goods to his address? Did your friend notify the credit card company about the received goods, as he might have the responsibility to do? Based on the sketch you've provided, I would wonder whether you are in possession of stolen goods, or an accessory after the fact if you fail to report the receipt of the goods. The credit card company might have the delivery information and be interested to know who the recipient of the fraudulent transaction was.

Ethically, I would think you should report your receipt of the goods to the credit card company. They're the ones bearing the cost of the fraud. That cost is ultimately borne by all credit card users. The credit card company can determine what they want to do with the goods, and if they've already written them off, so be it. Enjoy them in good conscience.
 
My friend notified the credit card company when he noticed the charges on his bill. The good were received about a week later. I am not sure about the address however. My friend used to live in the a dormitory, so I think the person who scammed the items sent it to that location and was planning on picking them up after they were left at the door. However, my friend had put in a change of address notice so when the goods arrived at the dorm post office they were routed to my address where my friend lived up until a month and a half ago.

When the UPS delivery person brought it to my house I told them that my friend did not live here anymore and they told me that I could sign for the items and pay to ship them to my friend as they wouldn't forward the packages on, or send them back to the shipper. I told them to come back tomorrow after I spoke with my friend to see what he wanted to do. I wasn't able to get a hold of my friend that night or the next morning and in the afternoon when the UPS delivery came by I told him I'd sign for the items. When I got in touch with my friend that night he then told me that he didn't have any packages sent and those might have been what was ordered from his credit card. One of the boxes was ordered from QVC, maybe they automatically ship to the billing address? I am not sure. My friend said he didn't want the boxes so I asked him to ask his bank what to do if the boxes show up, I don't know any of his information so I didn't try to track these things down myself. So I guess I will do whatever the bank or company wants me to do with the items. I think if my friend was the one doing the scamming he would have just asked me to forward the items on to him and not mentioned having his credit card scammed.

With the items being fraudulent, I am wondering why they were not just stopped in transit or before shipping because there was a pretty good time period to be able to do that and the items were tracked via UPS. I wonder if they weren't already written off at this point. Do the companies write stuff off pretty quickly or does it usually take a while?
 
This still smells bad. Frankly the circumstances could give someone reason to believe that you and your friend are involved in the scam. My advice remains the same. To be completely circumspect, notify the credit card company immediately that you received the goods.
 
You can't keep stuff that isn't yours.

It is called stealing.
 
I don't know which credit card company. I have to get that information from the friend. Haven't been able to contact him today yet.
 
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