An eBay seller figured out how to send packages to his customers for a penny, but now he is paying the price. eBay seller Jack Zeljko Pasic pleaded guilty to defrauding the US Postal Service out of postage due on over 9,000 packages shipped from San Diego to eBay customers throughout the United States between April 2009 and October 2010.
Pasic ran an eBay business called Diavega from 2008 through 2010 and in 2009, he purchased a postal meter from Endicia to print postage labels.
Pasic altered the postage labels, however, to conceal that he had paid only $0.01 in postage when a larger amount of postage was actually owed, according to the US Attorney’s Office.
According to his plea agreement, Pasic also labeled the packages to falsely indicate that they were being sent from, and mailed to, the same address in an effort to ensure that the items he shipped would reach their intended destination.
In so doing, Pasic ensured the packages were delivered to the customers even when the USPS attempted to return the package to sender for underpayment of postage upon discovering that postage was due.
In most cases, the customers were required to pay additional postage fees to the USPS even though they had sent earlier fees to Pasic. In total, Pasic defrauded the USPS out of over $18,000 in unpaid postage, according to the Department of Justice.
The sentencing hearing is scheduled to take place on January 8, 2016.
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