I'm about to be scammed on ebay.

RoyaleMale

I sold a mobile phone for about £100, the buyer is claiming it is faulty and has provided photos of the phone with the problem.

The pictures he has sent me are 100% not the phone I sent him, I can tell.

Where do I stand, what's the best way of dealing with this? If he sends me a different phone or a brick, will I be protected?

My paypal account has gone into negative, do I need to pay this off straightaway?

theonlywayisup

How can you tell the photos are not of the phone you sent - I am not being pedantic here, but asking if there is a clear way (ie did you sell a XYXZ phone and the photos are of an ABC phone).

Has the buyer opened a PayPal or ebay dispute?

RoyaleMale

The phone I sent him had a noticeable mark, which are not on his photos, he has opened an ebay dispute.

I just have this feeling that if I tell him to return it, he will send me something different.

theonlywayisup

Should the mark be clearly visible on the photos he has sent? By that I mean if your published photos show the item at x angle and he shows the same without the mark, you may win a challenge. Can you be more specific.

RoyaleMale

I'd say from my photos and his you can see a difference, especially if I highlight the area. I am rather reluctant to offer a return, maybe let ebay decide.

Is there a way I can report this guy to ebay?

theonlywayisup

You can report the buyer. There will be a link in the resolution centre.

If you want to challenge the return I would suggest adding your photo with his identical photo and a red paint mark showing the anomaly (assuming you can do that).

Just to be clear in case you don't appreciate the challenge -

1. You can accept the return and pay the return postage and refund the original amount paid on return.
2. You can refuse the return. eBay will make a decision. This is likely to go in the buyer's favour unless you provide exceptional evidence and even then....the buyer may be given the item and a refund.
3. You can refund without a return.
4. There is always the possibility that you refuse the return and supply enough evidence to convince the rep that either the buyer is a scammer (case closed in your favour) or the return is too complicated (closed and neither at fault).

Josh_Milner

Obviously you put pictures on eBay to sell the item so my question would be can you see the obvious marks on the eBay listing pictures if so I’d advise you to put both the listing pictures and ones he has sent you side by side point out the differences to PayPal and explain you are being scammed. Hopefully PayPal will put it in your favour but if not tell them once you have received the phone you will refund it but it might be worth noting in future put things like imei numbers in the listing on pictures so should they send it back you can cross reference these and be covered.

Brooker_Dave

RoyaleMale wrote: »

My paypal account has gone into negative, do I need to pay this off straightaway?

After this nightmare, are you planning to use ebay again?

theonlywayisup

Brooker_Dave wrote: »

After this nightmare, are you planning to use ebay again?

What Dave is asking is do you ever plan to use ebay or PayPal ever again?

Dox

This is probably a daft question, but did you make a note of the IMEI number before listing for sale? If so, it is very easy indeed to be sure if it's the same phone.

Info (for you and anyone else selling a mobile): https://www.immobilise.com/help/registermobilephone

RoyaleMale

I do have the IMEI number but even if the buyer did switch the phone, I can't help but feel ebay will still automatically side with him.

I do actually plan on still using ebay as I sell quite a few items. If I were to to say not refund the guy and open a new paypal account ignoring the one that has gone into deficit, I wonder if I could get away with that.

At the moment there seems to be two genuine options to me, accept the return and get a dodgy replacement or fight my corner to the bitter end to which ebay will probably refund him and he'll keep my phone anyway.

It's a lose/lose situation.