We contacted the pet owner and  committed to purchase the puppy and to let us know the next. Steps. While waiting to hear from her, I contacted the group administrator and asked for references. She highly recommended Ella Madison which was very comforting.  Within the next day or so the administrator, the supposed Mary Johnson, took over the purchase details. Seemed a little strange but not unreasonable as the admin and moderators all seemed to have a lot of interact.  We agreed on a deposit that was more than half of the total price and I was fine with that.
Still ok so far.
The next day, I was asked for the $400 to get the puppy ready to deliver. The admin said I needed to send the money via Zelle or Apple Pay. (HUGE RED FLAG!) I was out of the house at the time and wasn't getting Zelle to go through as I didn't have my account info with me.  When I returned home, she sent a message asking that I send a payment to a different and phone number. (HUGE RED FLAG!) Just a tiny flag went up as now I am on the 3rd person and phone number. I told her I rarely use the pay sources they were asking for and suggested PayPal. She agreed to accept money through PayPal via friends and family and gave me still another name and email address.  (RED FLAG!) When getting ready to send via "friends and family," I received a warning that payments made via friends and family are not protected by the PAYPAL safe sales policy . (RED FLAG!) I tried to send my $400 payment to the email address that was provided and received a message that " the email account was not receiving payments at this time. (RED FLAG!) The  little red flag in my head got a tiny bit bigger. Still, my heart and love for the puppy was leading the decisions that I was making.  Not quite sure  why all of my reasoning went right out the window !

I sent a message to advise Mary, of the message I received when trying to send a payment. I was asked to try again which I did and was met with the same results.  While this was all going on, I was trying to refresh my Zelle account and make sure everything was ok with my Apple Pay account as I needed to get a payment in their hands  so I wouldn't loose the puppy!  Both  Zelle and Apple Pay seemed to be working fine. At this point I wanted to talk to a real person! 

As all of my conversations had been via TEXT, I asked for a phone number to contact Mary. I was given another number for Mary ,(RED FLAG!)  this time a MN number,  so I called her. A male voice answered  and his speech was so broken, that I had a very difficult time understanding anything he said. he seemed to be speaking Spanish. About the only thing  I understood was that Mary wasn't  home and that he was her husband. In the background, I heard several  voices that sounded like it was a business of some type. (HUGE RED FLAG!) 

About 10 minutes later I received a text from Mary who said she was out buying food for the puppies. We discussed my difficulties trying to get a payment to her. 

 It was a Saturday and trying to get a payment sent for my puppy started requiring  a lot of time. I decided Apple Pay would get things rolling fastest so I told her I would send the $400 via Apple Pay which I did. She said it didn't go through and asked that I send it again. I checked my bank and it showed pending. She said that she didn't receive it so could I send a copy of the transaction. (HUGE RED FLAG! But still really wanted that puppy!)  I send a copy showing  pending at my bank. I was careful to crop the picture before sending so no identifiable information could be seen.  She  kept texting constantly  saying it still didn't go through so could I please send it again and if it accidentally duplicated she would refund the money.  So I did! Ok, now I'm still cooperating but my red flag is getting bigger! MY need to get my puppy is still driving me to keep going because I don't want to lose her.