I've been ripped off - advice please?!

foxmeister

To cut a long story short I bought some Take That tickets on ebay and paid £600 sending the payment by paypal immediately.
Seller had a couple of positive feedback so was I quite confident all was ok.
The following day I received an email from ebay stating that seller had been suspended for reasons they would not go into so obviously I filed a dispute with paypal straight away.
The strange thing is I had a conversation with him on a landline telephone number prior to the email from ebay and he seemed a nice bloke but the number has since been disconnected and he will not respond to emails.
I have just received an email from paypal stating that they have 'managed' to recover £320 from his account but reading between the lines I don't think I'll be getting anything else from them.
The email I received when I won the item contains the sellers postcode tf7 5pf his name is supposedly Paul Penfold ... but who knows whether it is correct??!! As it is 150 miles from where I live I am reluctant to travel down there and knock on every door on the street ... for the time being!!!

The advice I need, possibly from other 'victims', is do I report this to the Police, small claims courts, etc.
I've contacted paypal asking them to provide me with his registrations details but I'm not holding my breath ...
Thanks for looking and hopefully helping,
Foxy.

littleoldme_2

if you paid using your credit card you could give them a call and see if they could get the remainder back.

foxmeister

Thanks but unfortunately the money came from my bank account.

smartie1976

if it's any consolation, BT number finder confirms the details and the person are actually correct! So there's a very good chance he does live there.
I'll not post them here for obvious reasons.

arushofblood

Just posted this on another thread !

I sold a PDA once for £150. They paid by cheque, I posted the item via Special Delivery. The cheque then bounced, they wouldn't get in touch with me about it. I was upset and angry but thought I'd just have to move on and put it down to experience.

However, I woke up one morning and thought... HOW DARE THEY !!!!

I stormed off down the police station with all the Ebay, Paypal and Royal Mail 'paperwork' I had to complain. Two lovely policemen came to interview me and assured me that their colleagues, over 200 miles a way would be knocking on this guys door !

Sure enough, the little !!!!!! coughed up and I got my money !!

So, please try to keep your chin up at least for now !

greeneye

You got £320 so I'm assuming there was no buyer protection i.e if there was Paypal should be giving you £500. Check your emails for the transaction to see if there was buyer protection.

If paypal have managed to secure £320 that means in theory there was £320 sitting in his paypal account when you opened the dispute.Which if he is a scam artist is surprising.
He may have got suspended from ebay for a minor infraction that had nothing to do with selling tickets. Also if he plans on starting using his paypal account again you may find a payment for the rest of your balance comming to you in the future - I got £170 last week from a paypal dispute from over a year ago.
But obviously I wouldn't hold your breath.


On the bright...ish side if he hadn't been suspended by ebay you never would have filed a dispute and would have been filing a claim next November/December by which time if he is a scam artist his account would undoubtedly have been empty.And the 45 day limit for paypal disputes would have long since expired.

What you need to do know is set a search up on ebay for tickets for the night/block you originally booked and add it to your favourite searches you will then get a daily email informing you of any new listings and see if you can't get your tickets for £320.

Prices are going to fall significantly for these gigs they always do - the trick is not to buy in the first few days when everyone is panic buying.

Now some advice for buying the second set of tickets with your £320 ;+)

If you have a credit card use it (i.e fund the paypal payment from your card not your paypal balance) - but check with your card supplier how long after a payment you have to make a claim.

If you don't have a Credit Card - borrow one - but if you can't then to be safe you need to be only buying in the 45 days before the gig - although these tickets are supposed to be arriving 10 days before the gigs so you could buy a little earlier.
And only buy from sellers that have the £500 buyer protection logo on their auction listings.

As for going after the guy via the police / small claims it's a lot of hassle and you may win a moral victory but it's unlikely you'll ever see your cash again.
EDIT - Although Arushofblood seems to have had some luck - but given the usual tales of woe on here results like that are few and far between.

Anyway good luck - but I am pretty confident you will be able to get comparable tickets for £320 later in the year.

kriss_boy

Yea thats what I instantly thought too... £600 was well steep... if the gig isnt for a good few months then you'll easily get cheaper tix and believe it or not, you could end up better off having been ripped off in the first place!

pseudopensioner

considering top ticket price was I believe £45, then its going to take an almighty good deal for him/her to actually be better off.!

Something on the lines of Take That inviting them up on stage and refunding their ticket money:D

Dreaming I'm only dreaming, tra la , la la la.

pinkgem

i think kriss_boy means if the OP can buy tickets for less than £320 closer to the date of the concert then they will end up with some spare money that they would not have had if the £600 tickets were received

pseudopensioner

But surely they are still already down £280.

Or am I being a bit thick... I know I probably am:o

pinkgem

£600 was used to buy take that tickets

got £320 back, lost £280

they now have £320 to buy take that tickets

if they can buy tickets for say £200 they will still have £120 that they would not have had if they had received the tickets they paid £600 for

i think that's right, i'm confusing myself now, and i'm not very good at explaning things