I won an auction for an electronic device for $200 on eBay. The retail price for a new one of these things is about $700. The seller claims that the unit is in mint condition, and that he paid $500 for it brand new. He’s had it for only a short time, and that he’s getting rid of it because of financial trouble. I sent out my payment via PayPal, and sent an e-mail to the seller confirming payment. His response: “yah okay thanks”.
Ten days pass. I haven’t heard anything from the seller nor have I received a package. I send the following e-mail:
No response for two days. I look up his e-mail address on Google and find that he owns a company on the other side of the country (which incidentally seems to be doing abysmally). The e-mail address that I’m sending correspondence to, and the eBay account, are registered in his coworker/girlfriend’s name. (The eBay account is obviously his girlfriend’s name – analogous to Barack Obama’s handle being something like ObamaBH420.) His own personal e-mail address is listed on the company website, but I find that it is defunct. I send another e-mail to his girlfriend:
He responds:
I am not happy, considering that I paid him an additional amount of money to be set aside specifically for shipping and handling. I look up the weight and dimensions of the unit and plug the data into the USPS shipping calculator, and I underpaid him about $2, which I can make by walking to the Chevron down the street and washing some windows. Furthermore, as I scroll through his past auctions, it turns out that the unit is not brand new, and he did not pay $500 for it. He paid half the amount for a refurbished unit with a 90 day warranty. Now, I know that refurbished units are typically of decent quality, but I was not given any information about this or whether the warranty would (or could!) be transferred. I call him out on the false description and lack of professionalism (rather snarkily, I’ll admit), and question where the shipping and handling money went, and if I’ll be transferred the warranty protection. He responds (edited):
Saturday. Another week until he ships this thing. He also makes no mention of the warranty. I know PayPal will refund my money in total, but am I contractually obligated to complete this transaction? The shipping lag I could have dealt with if he had informed me without my incessant prodding, and I would be more sympathetic to his financial problems if he didn’t call me “man” and use AOL chat speak in a correspondence about a financial transaction. However, I don’t think I’ll be getting what was described in the auction. Can I back out of this?
edit: I should also add that, after I paid him, he left feedback claiming that he would send the unit out the following day. Ugh.
Sorry to hear you’re having such problems. I guess even 100% can be misleading sometimes.
I would wait until Saturday and see if he sends the tracking information. If you don’t get anything, then I would contact paypal and back out of it. I don’t know what Paypal requires to do this, but I would imagine copies of all the correspondence between the two of you would be helpful. Sounds to me like you won’t have a problem getting your money back because the item wasn’t accurately listed, and the seller seems to be dragging his feet with no apparent intention of shipping the item anytime soon.
If you are fine with a refurbished unit, I would wait until it arrives (if he sends it on Saturday) and then check to make sure everything is there. From there I would go directly to the computer to destroy him on his feedback.
Was there any mention in the item description of a shipping time-frame? I’m not sure, but I think eBay requires sellers to give one. Regardless, waiting over two weeks for an item to be shipped seems pretty sketchy to me, on top of the fact that the account isn’t his own. It’s possible it’s his girlfriend’s and she’s letting him use it… It’s also possible that it’s his ex-girlfriend’s and he’s trying to make a quick buck and trash her reputation in the process. Or maybe it’s a complete stranger’s that’s been compromised.
PayPal has a certain time limit in which you can open a dispute, which if I’m not mistaken is 30 days. At this point, if I were you, I’d wonder if he was trying to string me along until the deadline passed, and then walk with the money.
Regardless of his intentions, you’re well within reason to ask him for a refund and to forget about shipping the item. If he refuses, I’m fairly sure you could easily dispute it through PayPal and get your refund.
If I were you, I’d make it clear that if you don’t have a tracking number by Saturday evening, you’d better have a refund pending.
I’ve actually had to go through the process recently. Copies of the correspondence may be helpful, but they just ask for a quick summary from both parties. It may be different if the item hasn’t been shipped, though. I had received something that was broken. Most of the time, PayPal rules in favor of the buyer, though.
Isn’t there a time window after which you can no longer initiate a PayPal dispute? Make sure he doesn’t string you along until that opportunity has elapsed.
I was going to say that you could kick off a dispute now and cancel it with no fault on either side later, but that could be another pitfall - if you start a non-delivery dispute and he sends it, that will close the dispute in his favour, but if the item then turns out to be sub-standard, I think you could have problems raising a not-as-described dispute subsequently.
Whatever you decide to do, don’t accept an endless string of excuses. Draw a line and stick to it.
I would contact Ebay immediately since he didn’t disclose that it was a refurb. It has procedures in place for just this sort of thing. The seller’s form has a place where you disclose whether it’s new, used, or refurbed. And contact Paypal also.
eBay dispute claims almost invariably support the buyer. Follow procedure, send eBay all your correspondence when they ask for it. It will take them awhile but it should work out in your favor. I recently “won” a claim on half.com (an ebay company) for a broken PS2. In my case, the seller also had a good rating but poor communication skills. The fact that it is an undisclosed refurbished is in your favor too.
I still think you’ve got to be careful at this point…
If you raise a non-delivery dispute, the seller can dismiss it by sending the item (in whatever condition).
If you raise a significantly not as described dispute, it might be difficult to provide evidence that it is a refurb item.
PayPal is not likely to accept the assumption that his recent purchase of an item of the same description is necessarily the one he is selling you, and they’re not likely to accept email conversations you’ve had with him where he has admitted or implied that it’s a refurb.
Without the actual item in your hand, I’m not sure you can convince them it’s not what it was advertised to be.
If it is possible to do a SNAD dispute following a non-delivery dispute, then there’s less to be concerned about, but I don’t know if that is the case.
I’d rather have hard evidence than circumstantial evidence. I contacted the company (an eBay company) from whom my seller bought the unit asking if they have a record of anything unique like a serial number that I can cross check. I’m crossing my fingers that they’ll get back to me, but they seem to do a lot of business so my e-mail get lost in the shuffle. I also asked if the warranty can be transferred to me.
PayPal’s deadline is 45 days after the auctions close, so I’ve got time. I guess I’ll wait until Saturday and see what happens then.
Heck, at this point, I’d probably level with the seller in a frank way.
"Look, you described the item that it was new when you bought it. It wasn’t. I paid for shipping, but you claim not to have the money to ship it. You neglected to answer my emails for days. You have also not shipped the item in over 10 days and will not ship it until Saturday at the earliest.
At this point, you have violated eBay’s rules and my trust. I do not want the item if it does not match your description, and as you have not shipped the item within a reasonable timeframe, I see no reason not to receive an immediate refund. I will give you 24 hours to return my money or I will file a dispute with PayPal and a complaint with eBay."
Then do it. No reason not to dispute with PayPal; they generally side with you, and if the seller can’t prove it’s been shipped, you win.
This. Anytime someone tells you that they don’t have the money to ship despite receiving your payment you’re dealing with a flake who is floating on your money. IMO you need to pull the plug ASAP.
If you’ve heard nothing from the seller in 10 days, you should immediately go to PayPal’s Resolution Center and open a dispute. Get the ball rolling right away. The seller will be required to respond. Hopefully you paid by credit card on PayPal so that the charge can be reversed if the seller fails to come through.
You should have been talking with Ebay as soon as you learned the Email address was not actually his.
There’s no reason to not be in contact with Paypal now. I don’t know how far you can get with the “refurbished” issue as I don’t recall any indication that the object was “new” just “mint” and “mint” could easily be refurbished.
But the contract was essentially voided when he didn’t ship on receipt of the payment. He was not out of money, he had the money you paid him. Part of that money was for shipping costs. If he spent it on something else before completing your contract, he’s at fault.
Get your money back asap. If the item shows up, return it.
I wanted something cheap that I could take to beach / desert events / Burning Man and not be too concerned if it gets sand in it and dies in a year.
His words: “This unit is in MINT condition and I pd $500 for it brand new”
Looking through his feedback, he went through a binge of electronics purchases about a month ago, hit some sort of crisis, and is now putting them all up for sale.
Since you don’t know that feedback on Ebay can’t be long, I’m not sure what else you know about Ebay.
Have a talk with the seller saying you want a refund. Ebay sellers are usually very good about such things, because they don’t want to get screwed with bad feedback. I’m sure he even suspects that he could have sold it for more money than he did.
Maybe, but in some cases now, Paypal puts a hold on funds until after (sometimes surprisingly long after) the item has been delivered to the customer. I think there are probably legitimate cases where this could put a crimp on someone’s cashflow, particularly if they sell a lot of expensive-shipping items all at once.
That’s not to say this is one of those legitimate cases - because it doesn’t feel like one based on what we’ve read so far.
I have sold over 1500 eBay items and the only time PP has put funds on hold to me as the seller is when I get an “echeck” which takes a week or so to process. My main red light is the seller’s excuse that he can’t ship because he doesn’t have the money to pay shipping. Besides the obvious aspect that he has your money there are apparently more important things (to him) he wants to spend it on than delivering your paid for merchandise. You have effectively become his bank.
Possibly I’m getting cynical in my dotage, but almost without exception the people I have dealt with in life who have knowingly taken my money or my services and/or merchandise, and then made excuses about not being able to pay or deliver are people who are extremely likely to screw you one way or another before the transaction is completed. Hoping for the best as the deal gets squirrely is a very poor bet.
Pulling the rip cord on these deals as fast as possible is the only solution for me.
This is correct. I think they may only do it for items in specific categories, but I could be mistaken. Positive feedback, 3 days after confirmation of delivery, or 21 days after the transaction has closed. Essentially, making sure the buyer receives the item, and giving them enough time to raise a complaint in case there’s something wrong with it.