Ebay - sending item to different address than the one on the ebay/Paypal account

Tunstallstoven

Funnily enough I sent that link to the rep in live chat, and quoted that exact same passage. But he/she still insisted it was fine. In fact, I think the rep was starting to get annoyed with me for questioning their wisdom...

soolin

Seagull27 said:

Funnily enough I sent that link to the rep in live chat, and quoted that exact same passage. But he/she still insisted it was fine. In fact, I think the rep was starting to get annoyed with me for questioning their wisdom...

Customer services are notorious for not reading their own links!

Tunstallstoven

It's appalling really, but there we are.  

With regards to cancelling the sale, do I still lose out on the PP fees?  Is there a way to cancel whereby I don't?  If not, that's pretty appalling too!  More in principle I guess, as I can afford the couple quid or so that it'll be.  Imagine if it was a high value item.  Why should someone end up out of pocket through negligence on the buyer's side.  And to think I can't leave feedback either.  Very frustrating that people can mess you about like that, pay no penalty, and YOU end up out of pocket.  

OTOH, I've had some great help on here and really do appreciate that.  

hermante

I refunded an item for INR in November and only lost the 30p but not the 2.9%. Not sure why but not complaining.

soolin

Seagull27 said:

It's appalling really, but there we are.  

With regards to cancelling the sale, do I still lose out on the PP fees?  Is there a way to cancel whereby I don't?  If not, that's pretty appalling too!  More in principle I guess, as I can afford the couple quid or so that it'll be.  Imagine if it was a high value item.  Why should someone end up out of pocket through negligence on the buyer's side.  And to think I can't leave feedback either.  Very frustrating that people can mess you about like that, pay no penalty, and YOU end up out of pocket.  

OTOH, I've had some great help on here and really do appreciate that.  

hermante said:

I refunded an item for INR in November and only lost the 30p but not the 2.9%. Not sure why but not complaining.

Yes the fees are lost, you won't see them as they are taken from the paypal balance, that's why many sellers don't believe they are being charged. 

Tunstallstoven

Hi

Turned out to be quite a long winded affair, but ultimately (and predictably) resulted in me refunding.  Some buyers on eBay can be very frustrating!  Still, Facebook Marketplace tends to be worse for timewasters.  And I gave up on Gumtree a while back. 
  
I just wanted to come back though to say that as per my other refund - and @hermante 's above - it definitely seems as I only lost out on the 30p element of the PP fee.  In the main Activity page, the original payment shows as +£33.68, whilst the refund shows as -£33.98.  When I click on the refund to open it up, it says:

- Total refunded to ####:  £35.00
- Fee reversal:  -£1.02  
- Total Paid by You:  £33.98

So I'm scratching my head over this but I can't see it in any other way than me having only lost out on 30p rather than the full fee.  

Paypal used to show transactions on a single Activity page with a running balance down the side; much like a bank statement.  That helped no end with these kinds of things but it doesn't seem like that's available anymore.  Shame.  

Anyhow, I thought I would update and if it is still the case that I may have lost the whole fee I'd be very interested to hear how I am missing it.  I appreciate it is only £1 odd, and tbh I'm not so worried about that (except in principle!).  But this could happen to me again or anyone else coming across this thread in the future, and if it happens with a far more expensive item there would be larger sums of money involved.  So it would be good to get some clarity.  

Cheers

jsmith9

There are two things here - ebay and paypal.

ebay: yes you can post to the different address that the sender messages to you. In case of INR, ebay can look at the message and match it to your proof of posting.

BUT

the buyer then goes to paypal, who care not one whit about ebay messages. They will simply ask you for proof of posting to the paypal registered address, which you won't have because you posted it to the different address. Paypal will then uphold the INR claim and refund the buyer.

It is a well known and rising scam.

soolin

jsmith9 said:

There are two things here - ebay and paypal.

ebay: yes you can post to the different address that the sender messages to you. In case of INR, ebay can look at the message and match it to your proof of posting.

BUT

the buyer then goes to paypal, who care not one whit about ebay messages. They will simply ask you for proof of posting to the paypal registered address, which you won't have because you posted it to the different address. Paypal will then uphold the INR claim and refund the buyer.

It is a well known and rising scam.

eBay will not automatically close an ebay case where messages show a change of address has been requested, and no seller should ever gamble that they will do so. As was posted above eBay actually state in advice to buyers that sale must be cancelled and item re purchased https://www.ebay.co.uk/help/buying/postage-delivery/changing-delivery-details-purchase?id=4028

Tunstallstoven

It's such a farce.  But I guess I feel a little better about it today now that I know only the small portion of the PP fee is lost (30p).  It's not ideal to lose the sale, but I'd be a lot more peeved if I were to lose a sale and a fee (a potentially large one if the item was valuable).