Vinted removed money from my balance after making unfair decisions

pyrrhus80

Rantband said:

If you do not follow rules you end up in your situation, out of pocket and no where to go. Both Ebay, Vinted and any Court will just laugh at you for £14.

Not true. I took PayPal to a small claims court over £20 and won - plus compensation for my time.
The problem is that people like you allow compainies such as these walk all over you. It emboldens them to create unfair "rules" which have no legal basis. If more people stood up for their legal rights, it would be in the finanancial interest of such companies to act more fairly.

the_lunatic_is_in_my_head

Perhaps it's because this forum is a little quieter than the others but the atmosphere here always seems somewhat more pleasant and helpful, it would be a shame to see that disappear  

OP I've sold a lot of stuff online in the last 20 years and come across my fair share of dishonest buyers, it's very easy to let logic fly out the window and become stubborn in the face of feeling unjust, particularly if this is the first time you've come across something like this, but it's far better for yourself to take a more philosophical approach of you win some you, lose some. As with all things in life, when you are dealing with random people there will be good and bad, hopefully the scales are tipped in the favour of good. 

With these return situations you have to decide whether to bite the bullet and refund or suffer the cost of return (if the marketplace demands such) to get the items back. There is an argument that rolling over only encourages these people to carry on being dishonest but there also needs to be a logical balance of not paying out too much for the return compared to what the item is worth.

If you are posting for some solidarity, I fully understand the frustration  

pyrrhus80

I was posting because I believed people would be more sympathetic and helpful. I should have guessed it was actually all my own fault for not playing by Vinted’s autocratic rules; it’s not like a huge multinational corporation could possibly be treating their customers badly. I don’t know what I was thinking. [edit: the mods appear to have thankfully now removed many of the more trollish comments]

Seriously though, I hear what you are saying and I although I don’t disagree, I am definitely an advocate for people taking a stubborn approach with companies such as these. I have also been selling online for many years and I have lost count of the number of injustices I have faced on eBay. And yet, refusing to back down, I honestly cannot remember the last occasion that I was ultimately left out of pocket. This is through nothing more than continuing to pester them and making them believe that I am not going to give up. For what it is worth, I think eBay’s customer service and willingness to help has improved significantly  in the past year or two.

In contrast, these are my first negative experiences with Vinted.  Vinted is obviously a much smaller outfit than eBay and there appear to be far fewer avenues of appeal and methods of contact. Not only that, but their customer support seems to be largely automated. The approach I take with eBay will perhaps not work with Vinted.

I’m not going let it consume me (it’s only £14 after all) but I’m certainly not going to bite the bullet and roll over.

martindow

I've just noticed your user name, OP.  It seems that you were aware from the outset, that like your namesake a 'victory' could be pyrrhic. 

pyrrhus80

martindow said:

I've just noticed your user name, OP.  It seems that you were aware from the outset, that like your namesake a 'victory' could be pyrrhic. 

Touché. Quite possibly.