Paypal Help

Sir_Osis_of_Liver

Hi guys,

Need a bit of advice on this one:

My housemate and I bought a car engine on eBay, which was sold as "All in good working order." We paid by Paypal, however the seller didn't include P&P in the price, then charged us £50 cash to deliver it.

The engine turned out to be broken.

We contacted the guy to tell him and his response was that it was "Sold as seen" so it was our problem.

We got in touch with Paypal, who investigated and then told us that we could have a refund if we returned the engine to the seller.

We have to provide Paypal with some kind of tracking or delivery information by this coming Thursday.

However, because the item is a car engine, there is no way we can send it in the post. We can't send it via DHL or TNT or anything because it's too heavy (it takes two of us to lift it) and they wanted to charge us over £500, more than three times the cost of the engine in the first place.

Therefore, we're going to have to take it back ourselves - a problem in itself because I have a car that doesn't work at the moment due to a dead engine, hence why we bought a new one in the first place, so I'm having to beg friends and family for help.

We've been in contact with the guy to arrange to return the item, but he's being very obstructive, saying he can't do any of the dates or times we've offered, he can't do weekdays, he can only do weekends, etc...

We would just dump it outside his house, but given his conduct so far, this would be a bad idea as he would simply deny all knowledge or claim that we had damaged it - I want to get a signature when we drop it off to say it has been received so I can prove to Paypal that we actually took it back.

What do we do now?

pcombo

How did you get the engine in the first place. What courier delivered it.

If paypal refuses a refund, contact your bank and explain the situation and make a chargeback claim on the paypal payment. Which you should get back.

adam.mt

Unfortunately, PayPal seems to be rather 'black and white' and in order to prove any delivery (or return) they require online trackable data. This means that returning in person and getting a signature WON'T BE SUFFICIENT! Many people have been caught out by this before (or when selling with the buyer collecting in person and then denying they've had the goods).

Obvious question is how did it arrive? Was it by courier or did the seller drop it off himself?

If the latter then although morally wrong you could have actually told PayPal that you've never received the goods and you'd have got a refund that way, since the seller couldn't prove delivery! Not that I'm suggesting you do such of course, and you couldn't now since you've told them that it's been delivered.

Regarding the unanticipated delivery charge was this not mentioned in the ebay advert? Or did it not at least say 'collection only' or imply shipping would be separate?

Suggest you try hunting around to see if you can find cheaper shipping somewhere? Perhaps a local small courier?

cyberbob

Sir_Osis_of_Liver wrote: »

We would just dump it outside his house, but given his conduct so far, this would be a bad idea as he would simply deny all knowledge or claim that we had damaged it - I want to get a signature when we drop it off to say it has been received so I can prove to Paypal that we actually took it back.

What do we do now?

For paypal a signature wont suffice it has to be an online signature.

[QUOTE-PC combo]If paypal refuses a refund, contact your bank and explain the situation and make a chargeback claim on the paypal payment. Which you should get back[/QUOTE].A bank wont chargeback on a Paypal payment if it was taken from a linked bank account as it is a direct debit not a direct payment to someone.

Even if you paid via credit card on paypal you cant do a section 75 chargeback as that only counts for goods or services not received.

Your only hope is to find someone to deliver who has online proof of delivery.

I'm surprised on a collection item that the seller accepted paypal it leaves him open to the oldest paypal scam around.

OlliesDad

The other option is to try and claim a refund outside of the PayPal system and go through small claims court.

If you were to do this, you would need to send a "Letter before action" giving deadlines (if you google the term you can get template letters). Then raise the claim on the MCOL website.

You could then claim back any costs that you have incurred. People often think that the paypal rules are instead of your statutory rights rather than in addition to the rights.

Sir_Osis_of_Liver

Thanks peeps. We funded the Paypal through a credit card, so I don't know if the credit card company will do something. If we don't get any joy through Paypal or the card company, we'll go down the Small Claims route - I'm not letting these people win!

unholyangel

Sir_Osis_of_Liver wrote: »

Thanks peeps. We funded the Paypal through a credit card, so I don't know if the credit card company will do something. If we don't get any joy through Paypal or the card company, we'll go down the Small Claims route - I'm not letting these people win!

Please be aware that asking the cc company to recover the money may result in the suspension of your paypal account as per their rules. Also, please be aware that it isnt necessarily covered under section 75 of the cca as it is a third party. See below:

When you buy through third parties. Travel agents, paypal etc. You’re usually unlikely to be covered when payments are made to a company that isn’t the one providing you with the good or service because the credit card company must have a direct relationship for them to be equally liable.

Sir_Osis_of_Liver

Latest update:

When I last spoke to the seller on Sunday, he said he could still only do weekends for returning the engine, but might be able to do this Wednesday (i.e. yesterday) and would let me know. He also told me he kept his phone on 24-7 so would always receive messages, etc.

Having heard nothing by Tuesday, I messaged him again via eBay, email and text, to ask him to either confirm that we would be OK to return the engine the following day or to give us a DEFINITE date and time that we COULD return it to him.

I gave him till 3pm yesterday to let me know.

Funnily enough, despite allegedly having his phone on 24-7, the guy hasn't responded. There's a shock.

I've contacted eBay, Paypal and, just for the hell of it, our local Trading Standards too. Yay.

Sir_Osis_of_Liver

One month on:

We finally managed to return the engine to the guy on 14th August, although with difficulty, because we arrived at his house and knocked and nobody answered. He then started texting us saying that he would not accept the return of the item unless we removed negative feedback against him and agreed to cancel the entire transaction so he could get his eBay fees back. We said we would do what we could to assist with those things and he then came out of the house, where he'd been all along.

We completed the return and both we and he signed documents to state the item had been returned in its original state. We gave him a copy, and kept the other two - one for us, one for eBay/Paypal.

We then contacted Paypal to say that we had returned the item.

A few days later, Paypal emailed us to say that because we hadn't returned the engine via a trackable method, they had closed the case (without issuing a refund).

We contacted them and explained everything. They then emailed the seller and said that because he had his item back, he should refund us within 3 days. That was on 17 August.

The last text we had from the seller was in the early hours of 18 August, saying that he thought the refund would be quite easy to do, but that we had to remove the negative feedback and cancel the sale. We contacted him back in the morning, when we got the text, and said that once we had confirmation of the FULL refund we would contact eBay regarding the cancellation and that if he wanted the feedback changed he would need to send us a revision request in order to do so (that's the only way it can be done on eBay). We haven't heard from him since. We did send him a reminder two weeks after the deadline Paypal gave him, but still nothing.

We are now going to pursue the following course of action:
Firstly, we'll try contacting my housemate's credit card company to see if they'll do a chargeback. If that doesn't work, we'll send the seller a final demand before court proceedings, wait for a response and, if necessary, go down the County Court route.

pcombo

just get a chargeback and be done with it all lol.

Sir_Osis_of_Liver

We are going to try that first (although it means we'll lose the extra fifty quid we paid cash for delivery), but I've heard CC companies can be iffy about Paypal chargebacks because they're effectively a third party...