eBay

circuit484 · ‎12-17-2014

This is no way is the seller's fault and I do not blame them at all.

Today I received a package but it was not MY package. My package is in Australia. I am in Canada.

This is my first experience with eBay's GSP and it will be my last and here is why.

Item shipped December 10, 2014. I tracked it through the usual nonsense then it was transferred to CANPAR and I was given another tracking number. On Dec 15 this tracking number said my package cleared customs Dec 15 and was to be delivered Dec 16. I was wondering what CANPAR's policy was if no one was home during the delivery attempt. I emailed their customer service. 12 hours later they replied that my package did not clear customs yet. I replied that their tracking is telling me different and they should look at the accuracy of that and that this response did not answer my actual question at all. Another 12 hours and I received the reply to the original question.

Today, Dec 17, a package shows up. I open it to find the contents all over the box and that this is NOT my package. The package in my possession is someone else's who lives in Australia. I contact the seller and now I have to ship this package to the other person and they are supposed to ship mine to me across half the planet. It turns out after examining the package that whoever received the packages at the depot cross labelled them. After peeling off the CANPAR label the Australian address is plain to see. How stupid do you have to be?

This is the quality of companies that eBay has partnered with to ship us our items? As a result I will no longer trust the Global Shipping Program. It seems to me that the partners are the lowest common denominator shippers in the world seeing as they can not even track their packages let alone label them correctly. Sending my package half way around the world is in no way acceptable. If this was some $10 item I wouldn't care as much but this is a unique item valued over $700. If it is in any way not in perfect condition when I finally get it I would start a claim but them I punish the seller for something out of their control. eBay, you need to have better quality controls on who you partner with.

And of course in all this is the shipper, who through no fault of their own are now on the hook to make it right. They are making it right but where can I give eBay's Global Shipping Program negative feedback without punishing the seller's 100% positive feedback?

In the end, who actually cares? Guess we will find out.

eBay, I'm disappointed to say the least.

circuit484 · ‎12-22-2014

I was already promised that a GSP "specialist" was supposed to contact me within 72 hours. That has passed. I'm not screwing around here. I am no longer concerned about the seller. They took the risk of using the GSP. I want my money or my phone. I do not require that I get someone else's phone for free. If that means the seller gets to keep this phone then so be it. I require a phone to replace the one I did not receive. Either that means I go and buy one or I get the one I ordered. If I see progress I can become more cooperative but I see nothing but lies and lack of communication now. I don't know these people and they don't know me. In this world there are too many asshat scammers to trust anyone without a prior history. I gave that chance. No more.

All I want is what I ordered or my money back as soon as possible so I can either have my phone or start shopping for another one. It's that simple.

circuit484 · ‎12-22-2014

@maggiebvintage2010 wrote:
It is amazing how many times good advice can be ignored in favour of time-wasting ill-advised actions, like speaking to an eBay CS rep. You have been given the wrong advice by eBay CS, and the right advice, several times, here on the board. I hope you will listen to the advice from "afantiques" and "pjcdn" and open an Item Not as Described Case. There is no need to waste your time speaking to anyone from eBay - you open it through the Resolution Centre - that is what it is for.

I looked for that link. That goes to PayPal and according to their terms if I open yet another case with PayPal they cancel all claims according to their terms. I called eBay CS at the same time I called them the first time therefor there was a ticket open with eBay. That means, as I read it, I can not start another claim for the same issue or they cancel all of them. Is this not true?

So what, specifically, should I be doing right now? If I open this "Item not as described" case will that make them cancel everything and I'm stuck with someone else's phone? If you can guarantee that then I'm all for doing as you describe.

circuit484 · ‎12-22-2014

Nevermind. The eBay CS today did as I asked. There is an "Item not as described" ticket open on the purchase now. I am not an idiot and did take into account the advice given here.

circuit484 · ‎12-23-2014

Full refund. Just got the email.

This must happen so often that it doesn't take them long to figure it out.

Still didn't get what I paid for but now I didn't pay for it so <shrug>.

Also, I will never buy from a seller who uses the Global Scamming Program ever again. First and last time was this time and look where it landed me. Never again.

afantiques · ‎12-23-2014

Where it landed you is with a $700 item for nothing. Not a bad result. Much of your frustration was due to your trying to hand make a solution instead of going through the prescribed motions for this type of event.

I'm not saying that this is your fault, because that's what you'd be expected to do with a non GSP purchase and the GSP process is simply to go straight to a formal claim, which is usually productive of a reasonably prompt result.

Assuming the Australian buyer was also refunded, that little mess cost the GSP about $1500.

Now you and the Australian can go ahead and swap your free phones.

circuit484 · ‎12-24-2014

The "full" refund was not exactly the "full" price paid plus shipping but it was close enough. As you said, I now have a $750 phone for $20-$50. I am not complaining. I reached out to the other buyer through eBay's message system. We will see what happens. I feel I have to put a time limit on how long I will wait until I consider the phone in my possession "mine" so I will wait until Jan. 3rd to hear from them. I hope they do but if they don't I guess they get a phone with my name on it and I get the one I have.

Thanks for your advice. The only reason I did not follow it exactly was because in my concern over the (significant to me) amount of money involved I already talked to eBay CS before I read anything on here. I am impressed with there being a decision within a week of the incident. I did have multiple angles going with Twitter, eBay CS, and this discussion forum.

At least eBay eating $1500+ is a small pinch in eBay's bottom line. I'm sure they don't really give a **bleep** about it or it wouldn't still be this way for the last few years. Now that I won't use GSP there isn't much left for me to order. Guess no more eBay'ing for me.

I also hope that the original seller did not get dinged for any of this as well. I can not give him feedback now because I will not lie and I can not give more than 1 star on things out of their control.

The bottom line is that your information was correct and I would direct anyone with the same issue to follow them to the letter.

Thanks again.

pjcdn2005 · ‎12-25-2014

I'm glad that you got that part of it settled. But I wonder why they did not pay back all of the money...which portion did they keep?

afantiques · ‎12-25-2014

The US$ to Canadian dollar exchage rate may have altered a little since the purchase was made.

micaylah · ‎12-27-2014

I wonder what would happen if everybody started complaining directly to Pitney Bowes. There would be hundreds of complaints a day! Could they handle that and fix the problem or just create a dumping ground that these complaints would go into.

Can you imagine the Community Board there??? LOL

______________

One does not simply buy. One eBays!

circuit484 · ‎12-27-2014

@afantiques wrote:
The US$ to Canadian dollar exchage rate may have altered a little since the purchase was made.

^ this

foxwood51 · ‎03-06-2015

Thanks to the "Global Shipping Program" an $11.00 USD item cost me $23.42 USD to get it to my front door. The only word I can think of that describes this situation is "bull**bleep**". The program is complete rip off!! I have received nothing of value from Pitney-Bowes of E-Bay for the additional $12.42 I was charged.

I suspect and it appears to be confirmed by several other posts to this forum that complaining to E-Bay is a complete waste of time.

Unfortunately, the seller is blameless and also victim. I'm not sure the seller ever understood what the "Global Shipping Program" is and how much it costs to use.

circuit484 · ‎03-06-2015

After my experience I find myself no longer using eBay to purchase anything. Everyone is defaulted to the GSP. As soon as I see that I pass. After the first couple of weeks I stopped using eBay to look for things and have found alternatives even if it will cost me a little more.

I agree that eBay themselves do not seem to give a **bleep** about the negative effects of their partnership with such a borderline fraudulent company to do their shipping.

sprinthead · ‎03-17-2016

My experience with the GSP may not have been as bad as some of you have experienced, but here are my observations on my first time using a seller that used the program.

I bought an item from a seller just outside of Portland, Oregon. I live just across the border, about 50 miles east of Vancouver, British Columbia. In past I have bought stuff from as far away as Texas, had it shipped via the US Postal Service and had it in 4 days !!! That is phenomenal !! Kudos to the US Postal Service !! How efficient and speedy !!!

This time, using this *wonderful* GSP, my purchase was sent to Portland, then to Cincinnati, Ohio, then to Erlanger, Kentucky, then to Toronto, Canada, next to Vancouver, British Columbia and then out to where I live !!

Driving distance from where the seller is to my place is a little over 300 miles. The route my purchase went was OVER 5,000 miles !!! Are you freakin kidding!?!?!? How painfully inefficient is that!?!? I can't believe that in this day and age we waste resources in this manner !! Absolutely pathetic !! I figure if my item was sent via USPS, I would have had it in about 3 to 4 days, as opposed to the 12 days it did take for it to arrive !! I thought we were all supposed to be trying to REDUCE our carbon footprint ( not that I really cater to this line of bunk... but w/e ! ) and show mother earth some loving!!

eBay really needs to seriously look at another way of dealing with their customers needs via better shipping, or lean REALLY hard on PB to open a West Coast shipping facility !! It simply makes no sense whatsoever to ship something where the distance is 16+ times the distance.

Even though my stuff arrived ok and undamaged, in future, IF I do make any purchases thru eBay, I'm going to be looking for sellers either in Canada only, or US sellers that DON'T use the GSP !!

femmefan1946 · ‎03-18-2016

It's called a hub and spoke distribution system and is commonly used both by freight forwarders like Pitney Bowes and FedEx (did you see the movie Castaway? There was an explanation of it there with their single central shipping plant shown), by most postal systems like Canada Post (viz the Gateway Plant in Mississauga) and above all by airlines.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spoke%E2%80%93hub_distribution_paradigm

marnotom! · ‎03-18-2016

To underscore Femmefan's point, Sprinthead, consider that I live in Vancouver Island. If I mail a letter to someone across the street from me, it first goes to Vancouver to be sorted before making its way back to my neighbourhood.

circuit484 · ‎03-19-2016

I found I no longer use eBay at all now. My experience laid out in this thread pushed me away from using eBay as a source for anything. The phone I got for "free" works great. I bought a skin to cover the back so I don't see anything except it tells me "Hi Michael!" when it reboots.

So in the end I got a $750 cell phone for $20 and about 2 years off my life from stress and eBay lost me as a customer.

karrie2839 · ‎09-08-2016

I had a similar experience and ebay is NOT HELPFUL at all. So I bought something on ebay and it said clearly that shipping would be 12.07 Canadian. When I looked at what was charged for shipping it was 20 dollars Canadian so I contacted the buyer. He said it was not him that charged but ebays Global Shipping. I said but YOU were the one advertising the price of shipping that was incorrect. He said contact ebay. STUPID CHANGES MAKE IT A BUREAUCRATIC nightmare getting any help. Now you cant just open a case you have to call. So I waited and waited. The first guy was openly rude and unhelpful and said it was the seller and nothing to do with ebay. He sent me to billing and the guy tried to make excuses about why it was 20 and not 12 which half of what he said made no logical sense. He told me I paid 19 dollars when it was 20 and tried to tell me import charges were 8 dollars on a 20 dollar item that they just tacked on without telling me. It didn't say anywhere on the website when I bought that they would do this. The guy then told me EBAY would call me within 2 days and nobody ever did. Instead of the seller or ebay taking responsibility they just keep pointing the finger at eachother. COME ON EBAY. You have sent me up the chain and passed me along to save 5 bucks American. I will not ever buy from ebay again. They have become a scam with the new way they run the show and their terrible Global Shipping Program which is super expensive. I would think for a multi billion dollar enterprise they would be more customer focused...as they used to be. NOT ANYMORE! BEWARE OF EXTRA SHIPPING, BUREAUCRATIC , AND THE RUN AROUND BLAME GAME FROM EBAY NOWADAYS!! I put in a complaint to the "non resolution centre" and they denied a refund with no explanation.