protection against scammer buyers?

morganedge

Mainly just hypothetical, although I have been doing more Ebaying recently and am always concerned about getting scammed (even though, in my experience of around 300 sales, I've only encountered 1 or 2 dishonest buyers)

So, say I sell and ipad and send it. I'd obviously use special delivery with tracking.
What if the buyer receives it and falsley claims that I sent them a broken ipad or, say, just a slab of wood!
I imagine Ebay would always just rule in favour of the buyer who gets his money back and a free ipad?
What would happen to me?

I may have more hypothetical situations but that's the first one to spring to mind...

bartelbe

This is an issue I have thought about as well, if I were to sell a high value item. I suppose you could mark it in some way? Smart water, or maybe something less sophistication like a mark somewhere? That why if they try to scam you with a replacement item, you will have proof that it is fraud.

RFW

morganedge wrote: »

Mainly just hypothetical, although I have been doing more Ebaying recently and am always concerned about getting scammed (even though, in my experience of around 300 sales, I've only encountered 1 or 2 dishonest buyers)

So, say I sell and ipad and send it. I'd obviously use special delivery with tracking.
What if the buyer receives it and falsley claims that I sent them a broken ipad or, say, just a slab of wood!
I imagine Ebay would always just rule in favour of the buyer who gets his money back and a free ipad?
What would happen to me?

I may have more hypothetical situations but that's the first one to spring to mind...

It's a risk any seller anywhere faces. Ebay are aware of scams though and wouldn't always rule in the buyer's favour. It is as much a crime on the buyer's part as shoplifting, I think there was a case recently of a scammer who was prosecuted for doing it a few times.

Mindless_Clone

Most items have some kind of unique serial number that you could take note of, photograph as proof so if they try and return another one that is broken in return you can check.
Ebay will make a buyer send anything back if it's not as described so this will go some way to put off some scammers.

The bigger issue is going to actually get a genuine bidder to bid. My brother has had the devil's job selling his camera; listed it 3 times, twice sold as it turned out to people who were either scammers or had hijacked someone else's account, and then the last time to a genuine buyer who turned out to not be able to pay. :mad: meanwhile he's had at least 3 more messages from people offering him well above listing price to ship it to their fiancee who works for the WHO and is abroad at the moment... just trying to get a fully genuine bidder has been a struggle.

What you can do is minimise the possibility of the "not working" scam by taking (and posting) lots of photos from all angles, including some of it actually working. If you have the time and inclination, you could possibly also make a short video of it working / going through the functions which you could pop on Youtube and link to in the listing.
Not only will this help attract buyers who will be more confident that they are getting a good working item from a genuine seller, but it will put off anyone who might be planning on doing a swap out / not working scam on you.

And then, of course, at some point, you put it out there and take the risk on the understanding that there's a lot of honest folks out there as well.

morganedge

but even with lots of proof that show you are in possession of an item, it doesn't prove that is what was sent. I could film me demonstrating an ipad functioning perfectly, and the buyer could still claim that I sent a piece of fibre glass in the post.

No_Eye_Deer

morganedge wrote: »

but even with lots of proof that show you are in possession of an item, it doesn't prove that is what was sent. I could film me demonstrating an ipad functioning perfectly, and the buyer could still claim that I sent a piece of fibre glass in the post.

He can, but that would not win him a case on its own. Its what is sent back to the seller (in this hypothetical question) that would matter.

Most scammers would just get the item. Then send back a weighted box (or a different item to the one that's been sent). Which is probably a lot easier than trying to convince eBAy that fibre glass was sent in the first place.

Strapped

I've been wondering about this lately too, having recently sold an expensive used electrical item. I did security mark it but if I hypothetically got a different, not working item returned - which I could tell from the lack of security mark and the serial number - what's to actually prove that it's a different item to the one I sent? I took a photo of the mark, but what's to say that I then sent the buyer that item? It becomes your word against theirs. I think that it is a possible risk. But hopefully scammers contemplating this would be deterred by the fact that a pattern of returns would become obvious.

Crowqueen

You can't avoid people being allowed to return things, but as said above, things are getting better as regards eBay and scammers.

I wouldn't sell it online - postal issues might damage it in transit - but if you do go ahead take the risks into account when you do and make sure you know what you are also responsible for. Don't forget genuine buyers often have genuine concerns with items like this that do go faulty - which is a strong case for selling it to CEX or face-to-face to a friend.