Farmers from multiple states have lost thousands of dollars
Federal authorities are warning producers about ongoing scams related to farm and heavy equipment.
“Scammers posing as farm equipment businesses are selling (fake) farm equipment to farmers, who end up empty-handed,” the Federal Trade Commission, the consumer protection agency, said in a Sept. 15 consumer alert.
This alert comes after multiple farmers from multiple states fell victim to the fraudulent operations.
Most of the incidents follow a similar pattern.
1) A buyer inquires about a piece of equipment
“They had exactly what I wanted, (a) John Deere 310 backhoe, and it was priced in the neighborhood that I was looking for, which was around $20,000,” Steve Hunt from El Paso County, Colo., told Fox 21 News about his dealing with Platte Machinery Group.
2) The scammer sends a purchase agreement and invoice, requests a wire transfer, and schedules a delivery date.
3) The delivery never shows up, and scammers make excuses or cease all communications with the buyer.
In Hunt’s case, the backhoe was supposed to arrive on a Thursday in March.
“I called him Friday morning and asked him about the delivery on the backhoe. Their answer to that was there was a mix-up when they were loading it,” Hunt said. “It just wasn’t going to be there today, on Thursday or Friday evening. But it would be there over the weekend. Monday rolled around, no backhoe.”
Americans in other states have suffered similar fates.
On Sept. 18, for example, a person from North Charleston, S.C., used the Better Business Bureau’s Scam Tracker to report losing $44,000 to Bedford Farm Equipment.
And in July someone from Round Rock, Texas, lost $24,000 to DFF Equipment.
“They sent a fake FTL or LTL load with pallet and weight numbers,” a report says. “When delivery day came no pieces of equipment were dropped off and (the) phone was disconnected.”
Police have been successful in catching some equipment scammers.
At the beginning of September, police arrested Bogdan Alexandru Gherghevici, who faces federal wire fraud charges for scamming Georgia farmers and others through a fake farm equipment business.
He and a co-conspirator allegedly defrauded Americans out of more than $600,000.
It’s possible scammers are using AI to create the fake sites.
Farms.com prompted ChatGPT to create a farm equipment sales site with equipment listings using fake equipment names.
The AI tool created the site in less than a minute.
Fake farm equipment listings created with ChatGPT.
The HarvestPro 8800 combine, for example, is 40-ft. header ready and boasts 450hp.
When doing business online, it’s important to protect oneself.
Farms.com created this checklist in February 2025 to help ensure any online transaction is safe and secure.
And anyone wishing to purchase or list farm equipment on a legitimate platform can visit Farms.com’s Used Farm Equipment pages.