Return missing - do I open dispute?

Rotor

I bought an item of clothing which didn't fit so arranged to return. Sent on 4th december and no refund yet and the deadline is approaching.
I did not send it tracked so clearly I will lose a claim but do I open one anyway? either in the hope of an Ebay goodwill payment (reading another thread there seem to be a few of these at the moment) or to pressure seller to refund.
Clearly it is entirely possible seller hasn,t received it in the postal chaos but equally possible they have realised they could get away without a refund.
What to do?

pug_in_a_bed

Poss its the post, I haven't received stuff ordered on the 5th.

You won't win a claim without tracking unfortunately.

Rotor

I've got another 8 days to open one so it's not imminent yet. just wondered if there were any down sides to dispute process should those days pass without resolution

chancesare_2

Rotor wrote: »

I bought an item of clothing which didn't fit so arranged to return. Sent on 4th december and no refund yet and the deadline is approaching.
I did not send it tracked so clearly I will lose a claim but do I open one anyway? either in the hope of an Ebay goodwill payment (reading another thread there seem to be a few of these at the moment) or to pressure seller to refund.
Clearly it is entirely possible seller hasn,t received it in the postal chaos but equally possible they have realised they could get away without a refund.
What to do?

Have you emailed the seller?

Crowqueen

Rotor wrote: »

I've got another 8 days to open one so it's not imminent yet. just wondered if there were any down sides to dispute process should those days pass without resolution

If you did not send it tracked, then you will not get anything out of a dispute.

eBay "goodwill" payments tend to be arbitrary and the criteria for their being awarded are not generally known, so I would not personally open a return request which you cannot fulfil just in the hope of getting a no-fault refund.

Strapped

I guess it's worth a try (if it looks like you won't be getting a refund without opening one, although you probably also won't even if you do open one), but what I don't know is whether having a history of opening and losing disputes affects your eBay account in any way. (Anyone know this?) So long as you are clear that opening a dispute counts against the seller's performance, so you may be "punishing" a seller for something out of their control. Are they in communication with you? As I would be more inclined to if they are ignoring you - although I'd wait until next week when it's reasonable to assume that most sellers are back at work.

Crowqueen

but what I don't know is whether having a history of opening and losing disputes affects your eBay account in any way. (Anyone know this?)

I think eBay are looking at ways to do that, Amazon and Play both have strict conditions on opening disputes, so it would not surprise me if they were keeping tabs on that sort of thing.

On the other hand, I suspect it might not become public knowledge what those tabs are, given eBay's dislike of people being able to "game" the system.

Rotor

No i won't open anything till day 44 arrives just because of the problems the post has been having. I have emailed and they are looking into it although they say the office is closed till the 4th now which only gives a few days till D day.
Wanted to be clear in my head what my actions will be. Still a good chance it will be sorted so heres hoping. It's £13 so it won't ruin my Christmas but annoying all the same.