More eBay seller woes.........

phoebe1989seb

Hi all,

Just wanted to have a bit of a rant about eBay.......again

DH is registered as a business and rather foolishly back in March bought a job lot on his selling ID rather than on our buying one.

When the job lot arrived it was not as described and DH duly reported it as such to the seller - not registered as a business on eBay, but obviously is one by the volume of stock he has listed - who pleaded ignorance then reluctantly refunded after DH had returned the items to him. DH then added the seller to his BB list just in case of retaliatory action.

Fast forward to last month and DH sold an item (same category, but single quantity) to a buyer. It was a relatively low-value item (£15) so was sent RM 1st class. He thought nothing of it until last week they reported it as not received. Alarm bells started ringing as DH recollected the postal location (quite an unusual one) seemed familiar. Today the buyer has sent a message through the dispute resolution process asking for the tracking number, at which point DH decided to do some investigation, whereupon he discovered the buyer lives at the same address as the seller of the job lot We believe it is the wife of the original seller.....

DH has responded by offering them a full refund, but hasn't yet processed it.

DH may be being paranoid, but he is convinced this action has been made vindictively.......but I'm guessing there's absolutely nothing he can do but refund them - other than learning by his mistake and buying/selling on different IDs in future.....oh, and of course, I know everyone will advise sending everything recorded in future, but tbh with these lower value items DH would tell you he'd lose out on sales.

Neither of the two are registered as eBay businesses although both sell (same product as DH) in large volumes. I'm inclined to report them to eBay, but ebay's advice appears to be to report to Trading Standards if you suspect someone......

Question is, would they really do this just to *get one over* on DH after several months - and all for £15 plus p&p? Unless they're planning on leaving DH a neg - but DH didn't leave the guy any feedback when his purchase went wrong

I should add that the guy (original seller of job lot) appears to be a bit of a tool - as he has left rude follow-up feedback on the neutral/neg feedback received from other discontented buyers....

Like I say, just a rant really, although support/advice would be appreciated please

Strapped

No option but to refund. If he leaves neg feedback though, I'd get on to ebay and get it removed, if you can prove the connection and that you believe it to be tit-for-tat. I had a similar situation where an idiot in a certain location decided to get a couple of his friends to buy from me and neg me - fortunately he wasn't very smart, and had his Facebook account unprotected so I could prove the connection to ebay, and the fact that they all lived in the same group of streets. ebay removed the feedback and banned the idiot.

phoebe1989seb

Thanks Strapped Yes, DH intends to refund today - we'll see if a neg follows and take action from there. Think a neg would be totally unfair but some buyers (especially if it is tit-for-tat) don't take into account the fairness & prompt action of the seller to resolve the issue.

We had one buyer in the Ukraine a while ago who said his item wasn't as described, DH refunded immediately the item was returned to him, yet the buyer still left neutral feedback.....and going back further, there was a buyer two or three years ago who filed a SNAD, DH refunded without insisting on having the item returned - it was less than a fiver IIRC - and the buyer left him a neg :mad:

Will update when/if feedback is left. Thanks again......

porto_bello

phoebe1989seb wrote: »

We had one buyer in the Ukraine a while ago who said his item wasn't as described, DH refunded immediately the item was returned to him, yet the buyer still left neutral feedback.....and going back further, there was a buyer two or three years ago who filed a SNAD, DH refunded without insisting on having the item returned - it was less than a fiver IIRC - and the buyer left him a neg :mad:

Seemingly, that's not an unusual situation. Bearing in mind I'm an occasional, private seller and so are most of the people I know with eBay accounts, it seems we've all sold and sent a low value item to Ukraine and /or Russia and it's been promptly declared either lost or damaged!

...It's always a long, seemingly standard letter of complaint and usually the buyer 'hints' that they would hate the seller's unsatisfactory reply to 'force' them to put a blemish on the seller's fine reputation. You don't have to be a psychologist to work out a serial 'something for nothing' scammer at work!

I've now blocked everywhere within the entire former Soviet Union, South America except for Brazil, Chile and the Falkland Islands and the whole of Africa, (except for St. Helena which like the Falklands is a small British territory) . I certainly seem to get a lot less dramas now!

ballisticbrian

Might be worth watching both the husbands and wives accounts for them selling your item.

phoebe1989seb

ballisticbrian wrote: »

Might be worth watching both the husbands and wives accounts for them selling your item.

Yep, thanks ballisticbrian - we did think of that and had a look last night but nothing doing at the moment. Will keep a watch on both accounts though as you suggest

earthstorm

If they are selling a lot of joblots as a private seller you could report them to ebay suspecting they are actually business sellers.