Overpayment scam
A scam in which someone pays you with a check for more than the agreed amount and asks you to send the difference on. The check is fake, and you owe your bank when it bounces.
The FTC describes the mechanism. A scammer sends you a check for more than they owe and asks you to deposit it and send money back to them or a third party, saying it covers taxes, fees or other costs. The usual settings are mystery shopping jobs, personal assistant positions, and overpayments on online sales.
The reason it works is a gap in time. The FTC says it can take weeks for a bank to discover that a check is fake, and that funds showing in your account does not mean the check is good. Banks are required by law to make deposits available quickly, so you can spend the money before the check bounces. The FTC says that by then the scammer has what you sent and you are left repaying the bank. Fake checks can look just like real ones, even to bank employees, and may carry a legitimate bank’s name or be stolen checks with forged endorsements.
The protection is to treat any request to send money back from a deposited check as a stop sign, and to confirm that the check has actually cleared, not merely that the funds show in your account.
Where it shows up
- Overpayment and fake cheque scams · You are paid too much, asked to return the difference, and then the original payment reverses.
- Job and task scams · Work that costs money instead of paying it, and sometimes makes you a money mule without telling you.
- Ticket and marketplace scams · Goods that were never there, and a seller whose only real skill is getting you off a payment rail that protects you.
Sources
- How To Spot, Avoid, and Report Fake Check Scams. US Federal Trade Commission. Accessed 2026-10-10. Supports: How the fake check scam and overpayment work, that it can take weeks for a bank to discover the fake, and who bears the loss.