Buyer filed payment dispute?

moonpenny

Spoke to ebay again and the upshot is I have had to accept  the £7 98 refund or it would have cost me £7 98 plus £14 dispute fee.  They said as it is a Bank dispute then it is out of their hands

Apparently the "seller protection" only kicks in with tracking so i was in a no win situation.
I suppose lesson learned - only ever send tracked!

the_lunatic_is_in_my_head

moonpenny said:

Spoke to ebay again and the upshot is I have had to accept  the £7 98 refund or it would have cost me £7 98 plus £14 dispute fee.  They said as it is a Bank dispute then it is out of their hands

Apparently the "seller protection" only kicks in with tracking so i was in a no win situation.
I suppose lesson learned - only ever send tracked!

Sorry to hear Sending everything tracked depends upon how much you sell, if it's only the odd item here and there then it can make sense but paying for Signed For would cost you more if you post say 10 items and only lose £7.98 in refunds. 

@moonpenny are you able to post back at a later date and let us know if you end up paying the dispute fee? It's £14 plus VAT (so £16.80) and eBay says

When you are found responsible for a chargeback or other disputed amount as per eBay's policies, we charge a £16.80 dispute fee for each dispute.

They also say when you accept and refund that

eBay may still choose to challenge the dispute on your behalf, and in this case, you won't be charged a dispute fee.

So it's unclear whether the fee is due (CS aren't great at giving correct info). 

It is worth messaging the buyer to request they pay you back, does the buyer appear to use eBay a lot?  

soolin

Then this is something that was overlooked when we changed to managed payments. With paypal sellers were fully covered against bank chargebacks with proof of postage- now it seems we cannot protect ourselves at all. Signed for on a large letter is very expensive , my most used LL is 2nd class under 100g at 96p , signed for under 100g 2nd class is £2.36 - £1.40 dearer, there is no way I am adding that to my postage costs, I'd never sell a thing.

Despite this being low cost I would still persue the buyer. I have gone overboard before now where I thought someone was cheating me and would certainly make an effort to at th every least worry the buyer.

moonpenny

CS said I had 2 options  - to accept and lose the £7 .98 or dispute it and (because I didn't have tracking) and pay the extra fee.
I was annoyed at the principle of it that anyone can do that and get away with it. 
There was still the red flag about buyer not asking for full amount . 

Item should be delivered today or tomorrow but who knows?
When I looked at buyers feedback she had 2 good ones but noticed she joined ebay on the same day as she bought my item.
Just a thought, would she have got feedback so quick when she had just joined? 

I had sent buyer a message asking what the problem was on Wednesday night and no reply so I doubt if she is going to respond to another. 
soolin I agree what you say about messaging but am worried it might annoy the powers that be and I will be charged the extra fee.

I will post any outcome

steviebabes

Funny how the current eBay advert shows a lady just putting the item in a post box so no POP or tracking.

Archergirl

Maybe a partner bought something on the account or they don't understand how Ebay works, have they not replied to your message? If not message them again.....

soolin

I know it is over the top but I would also be tempted to write to the address you posted to with a very polite letter - absolutely no accusations, to say that you are an ebay seller and sold something that was being sent to this address - and your money has been reclaimed. You will therefore need to go to the police to report a fraud that has occured and will need their assistance for the report. Keep it friendly, ask them to let you know if anything did arrive, perhaps they would hold on to it and warn them that they absolutely must not hand this over to anyone who knocks on their door with a story about a mis directed item.

Explain that although this was low cost it is important that both sellers- and those people with hacked bank accounts co operate with the police and any other official body to try and stamp out this sort of thing.

I'm not good with language, but make it sound like you and them are in this together and have both been defrauded- but make sure they realise you won't be letting this drop. I did somehting similar once and also said I would report this to Royal mail as address fraud (I can't remember the actual term but it is a thing) and I was warning them in case it impacted future deliveries to their address.

In my case buyer suddenly 'found' that someone else in the house had placed an order on their acocunt and stopped the claim.

moonpenny

I think it is too late to send a letter as you suggest soolin as my 5 days (to reply to dispute) is up on Monday.
I sent her another message last night but still no reply.

Another strange thing when I checked her account, she had only opened it the same day she bought my item she already had 2 feedbacks from items she had bought. On checking these I found 1 feedback on sellers account at the bottom of 2nd page and the other feedback was not on sellers account at all.

On the wider implications of this, does it mean that ebay will only recognize if you have a tracking number for any and every dispute and not the actual dispute i.e.Bank problems? 
 So as long as you have entered the tracking number then it really doesn't matter what the actual issue is.  This had nothing at all to do with whether the item was posted/received but the buyers Bank Account -not my problem, or so I thought.

I have just checked my Bank Account and the full amount for the item is there.  Is that how ebay does it? and then take the funds later.  The message i got from them said "it was on hold"

Sorry for ranting but am incensed that ebay has no regard for sellers doing everything by the book and still no leg to stand on.

moonpenny

Update - had a small sale last night and under "pending payments" ebay have knocked the £7.98 off this sale.
This morning had email that this sale had gone into bank minus the £7.98 but no separate confirmation of this.

I suppose I ought to be thankful ebay haven't  taken the other fee mentioned - yet!

moonpenny

Update on above issue.

Success!  Had e-mail this morning to say that ebay have found in my favour for the dispute a buyer made and case is now closed.

However, the £7.98 (the buyer tried to con me out of) was taken by ebay out of the next sale i had  although it was showing as witheld on my "payments" page.  How do I get this money back as there is no mention that ebay now owe me?

Has anyone else had this issue?