Ebay takes shipping fees on an item even after you refunded the shipping back to buyer

[sodabottle123]

Hi there, so I just recently sold two items to the same buyer, but it happened in two seperate tranactions. They were made within minutes of eachother. The buyer paid for the shipping on each transaction. Me, being a decent ebay seller combined the shipping for him and refunded one of his shipping charges. I contacted ebay to have them fix what they take off of me on the transaction that I refunded the shipping to the buyer as now my final sale on that item was $22.00 and change less then it originally was. Ebay said that there was nothing that they can do and don't give partial refunds. How can ebay, basically steal your money. Granted its not much, but they nickel and dime you for everything else.

[darreadam-0]

That is why I expressly tell my customers to wait for an invoice. When it's an honest mistake from the buyer (becasue the request total option does not always work) I will take the small hit from refunding the extra shipping charge as a matter of building good customer relations (the first time). eBay could care less, they've perfected the nickel and diming of their sellers to an absolute science. Every single transaction is micromanaged completely in their favour.  

[sodabottle123]

I agree, I guess I will try the invoice thing as well. I even have my account set up where the buyers can combine the order into one, which would basically solve this problem. So I don't know why this was not done in this transaction. Again sounds like another Ebay issue that I'm sure they could care less about as it works to their advantage. I don't know if this is true, but I have read somewhere that if the buyer is buying using a pc, they basically have to open a brand new window to make the seperate tarnsaction for them to ba able to combine it. Anyways thanks for listening to my rant

[femmefan1946]

When you refund the buyer, there is nothing that says you have to refund every penny he paid.

You could refund not $22 but $19.36 or $19.99 or $19.00.

To further confuse the issue, if the item were listed on dotCOM in USD, your refund would likely not match the buyer's payment because of fluctuating currency exchange rates.

[sodabottle123]

This is true, I didn't have to refund the full amount to the buyer, but then again you would have to explain your actions to the buyer about why they were not refunded it all. Some may be understanding and some may not. Again possibly leading to a bad review. I don't care what Ebay policy is, they could just do the right thing and refund the money to all the sellers when the sellers don't actually collect on it. Its that simple. If they can instantly give buyers a refund when the seller submits a refund to them, then there is no reason why they can't give refunds to the sellers.

[femmefan1946]

I agree.

And as I post here all too often.

EBay is not your friend. EBay is your landlord.

All policies are for the benefit of eBay.