Refunded Ebay buyer for non-delivery after 10 days, next day RM delivers! What next?

Miser1964

Any suggestions on this one?

4 Aug - RM collected from my doorstep a £50 Ebay item send by Tracked 48, I have email recording the collection
13 Aug - Buyer informed me no-delivery, RM track'n'trace showed 'In Transit'
14 Aug - Item still 'in Transit' so I refunded buyer via Ebay and made a 'lost' claim to RM via website
15 Aug - RM track'n'trace updates to 'Collected From Your Customer Service Point' then 'Due to be delivered today' 

I almost looks like my 'lost' claim prompted RM to hunt about for the item! 

Any suggestions on what my options are to avoid me being left £50 out of pocket?

the_lunatic_is_in_my_head

Best bet is to message the buyer and ask if they'd like to keep the item and repay (perhaps with the P&P charge knocked off due to the delay) or if they'd prefer for you to book a collection to have the item back to you. 

They aren't entitled to keep it for free but enforcing this if they don't engage might be more trouble than it's worth sadly.

If they want to return it you can book a label here:

https://send.royalmail.com/

with a free collection and have RM bring the label when they collect. 

Miser1964

Just closing the story. I had a long online chat with Ebay, their view was I should have asked the buyer to raise a non-delivery case and refunded against that. Having a case opened would have possibly allowed Ebay to help out more.

I took the suggested approach and asked the buyer to repay me £40 directly to Paypal which fair play he did. I'll still pursue the delayed Tracked 48 delivery with RM. The buyer said he'd been asked by RM to pay a surcharge to release the item for delivery, which I don't understand. 

tightauldgit

Miser1964 said:

Just closing the story. I had a long online chat with Ebay, their view was I should have asked the buyer to raise a non-delivery case and refunded against that. Having a case opened would have possibly allowed Ebay to help out more.

I took the suggested approach and asked the buyer to repay me £40 directly to Paypal which fair play he did. I'll still pursue the delayed Tracked 48 delivery with RM. The buyer said he'd been asked by RM to pay a surcharge to release the item for delivery, which I don't understand. 

I had the very same thing happen on one of my items except it was good old 2nd class rather than tracked. 

I suspect it was classed as over-sized or over-weight hence the surcharge. 

martindow

I think you need to also reduce the money that you are asking for by the surcharge that was paid by your buyer.  You could ask the buyer to send details of this and query it with RM if you are sure that the weight and dimensions you used were correct and that no surcharge should have been applied. 

the_lunatic_is_in_my_head

Miser1964 said:

Just closing the story. I had a long online chat with Ebay, their view was I should have asked the buyer to raise a non-delivery case and refunded against that. Having a case opened would have possibly allowed Ebay to help out more.

I took the suggested approach and asked the buyer to repay me £40 directly to Paypal which fair play he did. I'll still pursue the delayed Tracked 48 delivery with RM. The buyer said he'd been asked by RM to pay a surcharge to release the item for delivery, which I don't understand. 

Glad to hear the buyer paid you OP

I don't think Royal Mail offer any compensation for delayed Tracked 24/48 as I believe the service is outside of the requirements for the regulator and they basically don't have to (well they should perhaps refund the postage costs as the service didn't meet the description but it's not enforceable due to the low amount). 

When I had one take a month to reach a buyer they flat out refused anything. 

KxMx

the_lunatic_is_in_my_head said:

Miser1964 said:

Just closing the story. I had a long online chat with Ebay, their view was I should have asked the buyer to raise a non-delivery case and refunded against that. Having a case opened would have possibly allowed Ebay to help out more.

I took the suggested approach and asked the buyer to repay me £40 directly to Paypal which fair play he did. I'll still pursue the delayed Tracked 48 delivery with RM. The buyer said he'd been asked by RM to pay a surcharge to release the item for delivery, which I don't understand. 

Glad to hear the buyer paid you OP

I don't think Royal Mail offer any compensation for delayed Tracked 24/48 as I believe the service is outside of the requirements for the regulator and they basically don't have to (well they should perhaps refund the postage costs as the service didn't meet the description but it's not enforceable due to the low amount). 

When I had one take a month to reach a buyer they flat out refused anything. 

I agree, Tracked is excluded from late/delayed claims. 

[Deleted User]

the_lunatic_is_in_my_head said:

Miser1964 said:

Just closing the story. I had a long online chat with Ebay, their view was I should have asked the buyer to raise a non-delivery case and refunded against that. Having a case opened would have possibly allowed Ebay to help out more.

I took the suggested approach and asked the buyer to repay me £40 directly to Paypal which fair play he did. I'll still pursue the delayed Tracked 48 delivery with RM. The buyer said he'd been asked by RM to pay a surcharge to release the item for delivery, which I don't understand. 

Glad to hear the buyer paid you OP

I don't think Royal Mail offer any compensation for delayed Tracked 24/48 as I believe the service is outside of the requirements for the regulator and they basically don't have to (well they should perhaps refund the postage costs as the service didn't meet the description but it's not enforceable due to the low amount). 

When I had one take a month to reach a buyer they flat out refused anything. 

That's appalling - especially as it happens often, certainly in these parts 😡
No wonder the other courier companies are picking up their slack.

I had this same scenario, as a buyer, during the last month - i contacted the seller, explained the details, they, very kindly, sent me out another one and told me to just keep the other one if it turned up .... it never did.
I kept in contact with the seller and they'd had several other items, in that time-frame, do the same thing, lost and held goodness knows where.

If sellers etc not being reimbursed for their postage costs i can understand more businesses/sellers giving the option which courier company to use..... which i experienced in the past week - i chose the non RM group as their, delivery, services are increasingly inept.