IMFS And court

smallzoo2

IMFS and Court !

Long story but I have been in dispute with eBay for over a year because my car was stolen by an eBay Buyer and they would not support me..but took the charge anyway. I just checked an old email address which I almost never use and saw this from them ( I owe them £140 )

".....Failure to pay this amount in full within 7 DAYS or contact us on 0113 3507840 may leave us with no alternative but to recommend legal proceedings. Any additional costs incurred as a result will be added to the outstanding balance...."

Will they really take me to court for £140 and could I end up with huge costs ?

thanks

oddjobbpb

Ebay is just an advertising medium, same as auto trader. If you had advertised the car on AT and a 'buyer' stole it, would AT be responsible?

smallzoo2

I dont want to go into great detail but basically even though all the emails came from the guy through eBay and I showed these to eBay he said he didn't buy the car even though he picked it up and then cancelled his payment a few hours after buying it...long story but eBay were absolutely useless and totally for the buyer not the seller

soolin

smallzoo2 wrote: »

I dont want to go into great detail but basically even though all the emails came from the guy through eBay and I showed these to eBay he said he didn't buy the car even though he picked it up and then cancelled his payment a few hours after buying it...long story but eBay were absolutely useless and totally for the buyer not the seller

Cancelled his payment? Surely when selling cars on any venue you use a safe payment method, preferably cash on collection or take a wander to the bank after exchanging paperwork?

With the limited information you are giving it sounds like you didn't use a safe payment method as advised by ebay, so this issue would have arisen wherever you had sold.

smallzoo2

as I said I didn't want to go into the detail but he paid with PayPal then told PayPal he hadn't authorised the payment. Even though I sent them all the emails and messages from home and a statement from the person who he picked the car up from with a trailer they sided with him and then I realised how crap eBay and PayPal are for sellers... you only have buyer protection.. apparently this con is quite common which is why I will never use PayPal again

soolin

smallzoo2 wrote: »

as I said I didn't want to go into the detail but he paid with PayPal then told PayPal he hadn't authorised the payment. Even though I sent them all the emails and messages from home and a statement from the person who he picked the car up from with a trailer they sided with him and then I realised how crap eBay and PayPal are for sellers... you only have buyer protection.. apparently this con is quite common which is why I will never use PayPal again

I don't understand why you used paypal at all- did you not read the seller protection requirements at all? On ebay they recognise the fact that new selelrs may not understand the rules and that's why they remove the paypal as mandatory option from motor vehicles.

Paypal is as safe as any other money taking company, it never pays to use any of these though without doing a bit of basic research first. Yes this is a common scam, perhaps not so much now as it has been covered on TV, in the papers and on here (see the sticky postage thread) and not many sellers will fall for it anymore.

I am sorry for your financial loss, but please when dealing with anything financial do a bit of research first , 5 minutes reading would have saved you a lot of stress.

As for your initial question, it is unlikely that debt collectors will take you to court, no one so far on this or other UK forums has posted have posted reliable proof that anyone has ever gone to court. However, whilst you are happy never to use ebay or paypal again be warned that anyone connected with you will also have issues. Also, pop over to the bankruptcy board on here and read up about the rights these debt collectors have,if they start harassing you on your door step then knowing what your legal rights are will help you deal with them.

RFW

smallzoo2 wrote: »

Will they really take me to court for £140 and could I end up with huge costs ?

thanks

It's highly unlikely but not impossible. I'd say it's about as close to zero chance as you can get, especially from the wording of the letter.


You do get a chance to defend yourself in the extreme event it ends up in court.


The likelihood is that you'll receive a letter a month and phone calls. You can stop the phone calls by asking them not to call you.

smallzoo2

Thanks for everyones advice