A sale problem, my immediate expectation, followed by a reality check....

[ricarmic]

This was an instructive situation that I thought worthwhile to share.

Buyer buys a significant sized item (100s of $), used one of the gibberish new automagic ids and zero feedback. The id was created on the same date as the purchase.

A couple days after they received the item, I get a note from buyer saying they were returning the lot because the lot I shipped them wasn't the one they wanted to buy, they mentioned the name of the lot they wanted to buy but got this one instead. (the names were somewhat close to each other and the price was exactly the same)

I triple checked and they did buy/pay for the lot that was shipped, so immediately my mind, like I think we too often do these days, tended toward the evil. My assumption was that I was going to get a picked over lot returned (my style of bulk lots have 1000s of stamps in them easy enough to pick some stuff out, send the rest back).

However, I put on my professional hat and suggested to the buyer that if they purchased the lot they received by accident, if they could tell me the name of the lot they actually wanted, I would take it offline, hold it for them here and send it instead when the original lot they purchased arrived back here.

Then over the next day, I got 3 blank responses to my note to them.

This is when I decided it was time to call them.

It turns out the buyer was a very nice older person.

They were trying to buy a lot for their spouse who is disabled. The buyer is not good with computers, their son was over helping but they've been on their own since then and windows 10 has messed things all up (I understand that part, I had my own WIN10 problems!!!!).

Buyer was trying to use spouses ebay ID when the automagic ID was created for their purchase from me, so they didn't even intend to create a new ID! (I found this interesting, it might explain some customers I have who have a new gibberish ID every time they buy something!!!)

They somehow clicked on and bought the wrong item, no idea they had done that till the lot arrived.

They couldn't get the messaging system to work when they were trying to respond to me, that is what was causing the blank responses.

The buyer was so thankful that I had called, because they were very frustrated with their eBay/computer problems and weren't sure what to do to move the situation forward. (the buyer had no idea how to get my phone number)

It just goes to show that while our "seller minds" may tend to go toward the buyer intending to do us harm, here's a situation where what looks "bad" to us as a seller is just a combination of problems brought on by technology/site usage problems a buyer is having with no buyer ill intention at all.

I'm so glad that I made the phone call (and so was the buyer). It saved a lot of time and frustration, and it also preserved a good transaction, which is very good as I'm certainly not getting nearly as many "big" transactions as I did in the olden days.....

[faircrochet]

Thank you for sharing your experience. I think the anonymous nature of the internet leads too many of us (buyers and sellers) to immediately jump to the conclusion that they are being scammed. It's good to have a reminder now and again that there just might be a very confused person at the other end of the internet connection.

[rose-dee]

Thanks so much for posting that experience.  I personally don't hesitate to telephone a buyer if there is something that needs to be sorted out, but I suspect a lot of young sellers may not even consider it as an option.  

It's always amazing to me how much one can sort out in a 3-minute phone call that might otherwise take 5 or 6 back-and-forth email communications and still not be clear!  

I tend to try, as a first resort, to attribute the best intentions to my buyers, and I have to say I haven't been disappointed yet.  

I wonder if there was some sort of temporary dysfunction with the eBay Messages system the other day?  I had a buyer make an offer on an item with conditions that I needed to clarify.  I sent a polite message through eBay which apparently got through, but my buyer's message in response read simply "null".  That was the entire contents of the message. 

Had I been a knee-jerk type who tended to think the worst of people right off the bat, I might have thought this was some sort of smarmy, sarcastic response.  Instead, I sent a second friendly message, asking for further clarification.  My buyer's next reply to me got through the system, confirming very politely and apologetically that she had not sent the "null" message and didn't know why I hadn't received her detailed reply. 

In the end we got things sorted out perfectly, but had I jumped to an assumption that it was my buyer, and not eBay's system, that was the source of the problem, not only would I not have made an important sale, but my buyer would have left with a very sour taste in her mouth over dealing with eBay sellers.  

Moral of the story:  Politeness and professionalism is always the best first response.