Buyer claims he received a different item

Tealblue

Geoff1963 wrote: »

Can you get your friend to obtain from the buyer, photos of :
The packing, in case that also is different ; and
The watch, showing any serial numbers ; and tell them to not touch it any more or clean it ?

Then your friend goes to the police with the details, and asks if it has been reported as stolen.
( This also pre-empts the buyer substituting a stolen watch for a phone, and reporting them for theft as well as fraud )

Your friend could tell the buyer that if the watch has his fingerprints, and it is found to be stolen, he is happy to serve jail time, and pay large compensation.

The police haven't got the resources to deal with this sort of thing, especially if (as if likely) it's a cheap watch from Argos or similar - and his local police won't have details of watches stolen elsewhere in the country unless they are exceptionally valuable, in which case the buyer wouldn't be complaining!

theonlywayisup

flowerofscotland wrote: »

You are making a number of assumptions here. My friend has been an eBay member for more than 10 years, buying and selling on an ad hoc basis as a private individual - the way eBay started. And also the way they still market themselves The "buyer" has only been with eBay for a few weeks but as a seller you don't know this until the sale is agreed. My friends has sold a phone in the past but it's more than 12 months ago and has also sold a few other items of relatively high value. But his exemplary record built up over a decade counts for nothing

I am not making any assumptions.

Paypal holds payments for all sorts of reasons and as I said, if your friend has sold a phone and that isn't his regular stock, that would be a flag. The fact he is a private seller is an even bigger flag. Whether he/she was a seasoned seller of crap from their garage is neither here nor there. Unless they have sold phones before, they are likely to be subject to a hold.

What is the exemplary record you speak of? I don't know of such a thing on Paypal....

flowerofscotland wrote: »

It seems to me that eBay and PayPal take the easy way out because looking into each case and taking into account the relative standing of each party would take too much resource


And the PayPal account isn't on hold, just the one transaction - he has been able to use his account because he had a balance before this "sale"

The transaction is what is held, no one ever suggested the account was such.

flowerofscotland wrote: »

It's like being mugged in the street and then told it's your fault for taking a walk with a wallet in your pocket

No it's nothing of the sort.

Clearly your friend hasn't acquainted himself with the T&C of the platform he is using.

But good luck to your friend with the return. I am out.