eBay

thecoinhunterca · ‎04-14-2014

To start off this is a seller's forum. Not only should it be used as help, an exchange of ideas and a venue to offer your opinion related to selling, but also as a voice of objection and improvement of the selling environment on Ebay. By now I'm sure familiar with the thread "buyer fraud" http://community.ebay.ca/t5/Seller-Central/Buyer-Fraud/m-p/222206#U222206.

It's disappointing to see that some of the comments/advice offered in that thread are both incorrect and defeatist. Providing advice to fellow sellers is not only about pointing people to existing methods of doing things but also identifying problem areas and collectively lobbying Ebay to change and or improve them. I believe the community forums are a legitimate venue to bring these things to Ebay's attention. Secondly, some of you may want to reconsider how and with what certainty you give advice. Undoubtfully it is very difficult to deal with the Ebay cookie cutter machine. But not impossible and at certain times common sense must prevail. If I were to listen to some of that advice, I would be no further ahead, and fraudulent user would still be defrauding sellers.

The issue with the above case was that Ebay was pigheaded about reviewing all the facts before making judgement on a case. That included automated account complaints and fraudulent activity with Paypal. After hours of conversations with Ebay and Paypal by myself and the other seller, both cases were won by both us using Paypal as the machanisml by us asking Paypal to initiate a review of the offending account. Both Ebay cases were overturned and both of us received our funds back, had DSRs removed as well as my negative feedback removed. (This is after both cases were escalated by the buyer and Ebay decided to rule in the favour of the buyer as well as award refunds back to the buyer), In the end Paypal is the one who took the initiative and discovered account discrepancies. Moral of that story is that if you think you have a good case and not dealt with fairly, you find ways to escalate your cause. Period!!!!

brandeentertainment · ‎04-14-2014

I don't wanna be the debbie downer here but everyone is stating the truth whether they are rude or ignorant or just saying something you don't like all it is is truthful..

The rules you are implying about have been in place for many years and will never changed based on the VERY little facts you presented in your thread...

I would rather ignortantly be told the truth then someone give me a false hope that leads be to waste more of my time ...

Although I believe you have spotted a scammer could you imagine if a court convicted people based on such small amount of factual assumptions or facts...

Nobody needs to bring this to the attention of ebay as they are VERY WELL AWARE ...

Your are a 10 year vet and post a thread like that you should expect it to be cut and dry answers because everyone reading it would expect you to know the rules are straight forward . No Tracking/No signature Confirmation .. NO PROOF ...

Although people have sometimes fought it and won the only reason a seller would ever win is just paypal trying to keep everyone happy no based on the assumption presented ...

Keep in mind 2 INR with no proof of anything on your end is not much for ebay to work with .. Honestly not being rude what proof do you have other then saying I did ship them... Maybe you did and maybe they didn't recieve or maybe they are impatient ..Most likely you are right but it still does not change that you have NO PROOF ... With only 2 INR cases that still is not a high number to set off ebays scammer radar .. Yes 2 for 2 is 100% for 2 in a world where there are millions is very tiny tiny tiny ,..

I get what your saying but maybe next time think of your post be posting them as you do not seem to like other opinions so maybe coming on here is not the best thing for you....

Judging by your post it would of just been something better dealt with directly with ebay instead of on here as anyone with 10 years experience posting something like that is sure to get some CAPTAIN OBVIOUS responses....

Cheers and hope you do win that battle I am cheering for ya

thecoinhunterca · ‎04-15-2014

As stated, the case was won by us. Again the point being made is that no advice should be that conclusive to any member and NO ONE should be told to roll over and play dead. If we did that in this case, the buyer would still be scamming. I'm not saying that a case decisions should be challenged in every instance, but if one feels they have a legitimate claim, they should consider it. All the buyer accounts are now shut down. Including the original Paypal account. How can you comfortably state that there is no way that someone can win something when clearly there has been precedent otherwise? The point I'm attempting to prove is that there is a deficiency in Ebay's resolution mechanism and IT needs to dig deeper in resolving certain unclear issues. If it takes more human resources, too bad. That's the price you pay for being a responsible corporate citizen. Working through this case, it was Paypal that finally uncovered numerous previous Ebay accounts tied to a single Paypal account that all requested refunds for non delivery at some point in the past. Although we were not privy to how many. This was something Ebay could have easily initiated. Especially when requested by the sellers with a compelling explanation. Bottom line is that proven fraudulent activity trumps Buyer protection, proof of delivery or not. Ebay is well aware that a very large portion of merchandise sold on Ebay is shipped without tracking. It needs to be conscious of that fact and that without it, it's revenues would drop significantly.

brandeentertainment · ‎04-15-2014

Was the case won or did both the buyer and seller get refund .. AKA Paypal playing nice. It has happened 3 times to me ...

I understand what your saying but How would you go about that ... IF you haven't noticed there are as many scam sellers as there are buyers on here ..

Ebay really should have no repsonsiblility over your business ... Police and insurance take care of that .. The fact that they have put a system in place to help is good but no matter where you sell online it is the same ... Ebay,amazon etc. they are all just sites for us to use they are not insurance companies or police etc...

I have been scammed by many buyers but i just move on because it is the name of the game... I don't role over and play dead I weighed the options before I came to ebay and decided that I would sell on here knowing full wells there rules...

I had a buyer get a refund from paypal last week because they tried to do a IND on me and the item and his complaint was clearly in the description so paypal refund buyer and close the case but did not take the money from me they took it from there own pocket ...

The rules they have in place for protection is all for Marketing purposes and in my opinion not an obligation ...

IF you Rent your brick and mortor store and someone breaks in and steals from you do you get mad at the landloard NO does it have anything to do with the Landlord a.k.a owner of the place you sell your stuff at ... You call the police and file a claim with insurance company ....

I am not saying your outlook is Crazy and I am not saying your wrong alll I am saying is we as sellers make our decision when we come on here and ebay and paypal have 0 obligation to be mediators they do it because without it ebay would never have become what it is ... Like I said it is a Mediator with no REAL obligation to do so ..

You want it to dig deeper it by no means has any obligation to do so ...

I retract the statement of no way someone can win what I should of said and meant to say is there is no way you Can prove it ... Without tracking a postal worker can put it in the trunk and bring there kids for some presents and nobody can say 100% where it is ....

I once brought to ebays attention that one buyer had filed INR on 13 sellers in 2 months and you could even see the feedback for the sales of the same items they claimed to not receive .. After getting all 13 sellers to leave follow up feedback stating buyer claimed they did not receive ebay did nothing ...

So my outlook is from countless hours os wasting time tell myself they are obligated when they really are not at all obligated to ... Like I said it's like saying your landloard is responsible for stolen goods in your store becuse you pay him for a place to sell your stuff...

mr.elmwood · ‎04-15-2014

Coin, you do not like an answer, so, you resort to demeaning and insulting people. You want opinions and then go on to say you do not like the opinions.

I suggest this. Every time you post, put the answer you want in the post. That will save us from saying something you do not like, which is just about everything.

eBay is not for everyone.

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thecoinhunterca · ‎04-15-2014

Brandee. Bottom line is that "blind leading the blind" is not a solution. I'm not sure how some of the responses in that thread are helpful to anyone. I was fairly descriptive (numerous times) in my post and people still blindly responded with comments like "you'll never win, drop it, etc..." Every case and scenario is different. Doing something in a situation like this is the right thing to do. By doing nothing you're allowing the obvious to thrive and damage the community. Like I said, fraud trumps buyer protection. Even at Ebay. BTW this is not a case of Paypal refunding the money. The messages came from Ebay, the Ebbay ccount was removed and feedback restored.

thecoinhunterca · ‎04-15-2014

Well Elm. I like answers that help people. I know how to read Ebay's help so repeating it here was not really an answer was it?. I came on here for ideas outside the box and to see if anyone else was successful in this particular type of case. Apparently this proved to be an insurmountable task. I'm not sure how telling you that you gave poor advice would be considered either insulting or demeaning. I'm sure you've provided great advice in the past. Just not this time.

pjcdn2005 · ‎04-15-2014

Congratulations on winning and thank you for letting us know what happened.

Based on what I remember, any advice that you received was based on the facts that were available. It is unusual for a seller to win a case like this and I suspect that if you had been the only seller with the same complaint, you would have lost and received an unresolved claim on your record. I'm glad that it didn't work out that way. If the same situation comes up on this board again, I would give the same advice that I did earlier but I would also mention that there is a chance of the seller winning IF they can find some evidence of another seller having the same problem.

We all have to give advice based on our own experiences and based on other situations that we are aware of. There is no guarantee that a seller is going to win a case just because they think that they should and it would be detrimental for someone to suggest that always happens.

Btw..any advice that you were given was free...you were welcome to take it or leave it. I suspect that if you had simply come back to the board and related what happened in your situation rather than coming here and criticizing everyone you would have received some respect and more thank you comments for letting us know that there are some instances when we can fight and win.

mr.elmwood · ‎04-15-2014

PJ, I too, fail to see the point of criticizing an answer that was based on partial information. To be rude and demeaning to others? Someone else can have that personality.

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pjcdn2005 · ‎04-15-2014

You're right, some of the posts from the OP in both threads are uncalled for.

But me attacking the OP back wouldn't do any good and might just get my post removed. I was trying to explain things to the OP from another point of view.

rose-dee · ‎04-15-2014

There is another way of looking at this. It's good that Paypal finally resolved this issue, but how much time did you actually end up having to spend to get to that point, and what was the original loss in the transaction?

If your own time is at least as valuable as a minimum hourly wage, I think it's a good idea to balance that against the amount of the loss (which in most cases you should be able to write off as a business expense anyway). I personally believe it isn't worth raising blood pressure and creating stress and frustration over a minor loss if it means the issues can't be resolved quickly.

Yes, this does mean "rolling over" now and then, but it also means taking the long view and keeping perspective. You may have felt the advice you were given by some sellers was inappropriate, but I imagine many of them may have been thinking along these lines too. There comes a point where a battle is no longer cost effective.

I'm just playing devil's advocate for the other side of the coin, so to speak...

mr.elmwood · ‎04-15-2014

"Rolling over" is a defeatist statement by a bully. Someone who will expend untold amounts of time, energy, money, just to prove to themselves they are right.

Very much like the person who spends $1500 to fix a car to sell and then gets $1000 in the sale: "See! I sold it!"

"You are $500 behind on the deal."

"Yeah, but I sold it."

Chest thumping bullies? Name callers? Have to be right all the time? Not the way I conduct my life.

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rose-dee · ‎04-15-2014

Yes, well, and to quote the OP himself (from the original string):

"Relating to this case, I and the other seller hope that Ebay will do the right thing. We both spent hours on the phone with both Ebay and Paypal."

For some, winning is all, regardless of the cost, and obviously the other seller was just as determined. One can only hope the item in question was worth several hundred dollars, and the buyer truly a serious menace to eBay.

nuvistors · ‎04-15-2014

Some people , like the Op, only want to hear from people if the agree with them.

Right or wrong does not matter.

thecoinhunterca · ‎04-15-2014

Look. This has nothing to do with bullying or chest thumping or whatever else you wish assume it is. The facts presented to you were fairly clear. I provided extensive details about what happened. I may have showed some lack of restraint but some of the responses were both difficult and frustrating to read. Some of you provided "canned" responses without really giving much though to them. I'm not sure how that helps anyone. I apologize if the tone of some of my posts might have offended anyone. The point I was trying to make is that providing blind cookie cutter advice is not always the right way to go. Secondly, Ebay needs to encompass some "brains" into it's process when dealing with certain problems. When these issues are brought forth (with enough frequency) things do change. With respect to the analogy of time spent vs results gotten. Well, I got my $40 bucks back (pays for a dinner), negative feedback reversed (priceless), DSR reversed (can be financially penalizing over time) the offending Ebay account was closed (prevents someone else from being stiffed) and so was the Paypal account. We can debate how to quantify all that and if it was worth the trouble. It certainly was to me. Frankly if you truly give a **bleep** about the community, be it fraud, customer service, buying and selling experiences, rules or otherwise, you may want to speak up every once in a while in order to make Ebay a better experience for BOTH buyers and sellers.

cumos55 · ‎04-16-2014

If a seller has a problem with a buyer... big, or small problem ..... that seller should report that buyer.

eBay brought forward this option as an assist to sellers.... that is reporting a buyer without the buyer knowing... an anonymous report..

How many reports does it take to remove a buyer from eBay.

Two persistent sellers took it upon themselves to report this buyer...

If several sellers speak up and work to get a buyer off eBay... then it would appear that that buyer will most likely be gone..

The system of reporting a buyer works.... and one would anticipate that if several sellers get together with respect to a problem buyer that buyer will most definitely be gone....

A level of persistence does help.

cumos55 · ‎04-16-2014

Board advice.... comes from many angles. It is dependent on what the seller lists on eBay, ad how they each have adjusted to eBay's rules....

Each seller has a protocol they follow..... the primary consideration being what they sell and at what price.... That is the start... and then comes the shipping option...

Everyone has a specific view of what to expect..... Ultimately everyone agrees that there is an expected sequence of events....

Sometimes that sequence gets turned around and gets adjusted.....It could be a one time occurrence... or... something that could happen if there is agreement on the part of several sellers.... and then eBay/Paypal is forced to deal with the situation

eBay has its rules and in this instance it would appear that

Report a Buyer

did work...