eBay

cal-ectibles · ‎05-31-2021

I've been selling on eBay for 20 years now and seen a lot of scams but this is a new one to me. 0 feedback buyer in Montreal purchased a $320 item so l made sure it shipped with full insurance (Xpresspost) so there would be no opportunity for claims. Well he got me! Made a claim to his credit card company claiming he did not recognize the transaction so they opened a dispute with eBay, who in turn did the usual hold of funds and requested tracking info from me. Of course they already had the tracking info and proof of delivery two weeks previous so I pressed the send info button and instantly received the case decided in buyers favour message. That got my blood boiling so I contacted eBay immediately and after a one hour song and dance routine said it was out of their hands but would submit a request to eBay seller protection on my behalf. And so as I wait for a response from them l have now added a 5 feedback requirement to all my listings, unfortunate because we all start with 0 feedbacks and aside from about half of them being non paying bidders the other half are totally fine. If eBay doesn't fix this loophole it's going to get very bad for sellers very quickly. I can absorb the losses from most late delivery claims where the internatonal buyer waits only a few days after the eBay-prescribed delivery date to make their claim, which eBay pays out regardless of Canada Post's suggested delivery based on the tracking info (Canada Post does not pay claims for late delivery any more). However, I refuse to submit to abuse due to the apparent lack of concern of eBay by not creating a firm policy to deal with clearly fraudulent claims. This was supposed to be my retirement pension supplement and I have a lot of inventory to list still but without support this plan will not be sustainable. 20 years, 100% positive feedback, many thousands of sales and dollars earned for eBay and this is what you get. So disappointing.

marnotom! · ‎05-31-2021

I'm sorry for your loss; that does sound like as though it would hurt.

This does sound like a scam, but it may not be playing out the way that you think. What could have happened is that the buyer of your item was not the credit card holder and the chargeback claim with the credit card issuer is legitimate.

Another possibility is that now that you're in Managed Payments, the buyer really didn't recognize the transaction as your ID isn't going to show up on the credit card statement.

Some sellers in situations like this are brave enough to contact the buyer by telephone to see if a mistake has been made. If it turns out not to be the case, they may file a police report in the buyer's hometown.

Is the buyer still registered on eBay?

Chargebacks are generally very difficult to pull off with Canadian credit card issuers, but how one bank may handle one may differ from another. I'm afraid that the customer service rep you talked to was right: With Managed Payments, the outcome of a charge dispute is out of eBay's hands. How eBay looks after the seller in a situation involving Managed Payments where a dispute for an unauthorized credit card charge is lost by eBay is still a bit murky. It may depend on whether the payment was made through PayPal or paid directly with the credit card.

intimewithmusic · ‎05-31-2021

Thank you for sharing your experience. This past year I've heard of this happening a great many times. Tomorrow morning (Tues) Tyler will open up the weekly chat session. It would be helpful to hear his take on this and his recommendation for how we should react when this happens to us.

Seller protection is Seller protection. Please ask Tyler to address this. He usually opens up the weekly session around 9 or 10 am tomorrow. tyler@ebay.ca.

Sounds like you did your part with tracking, insurance and proof of delivery. I don't see what the relationship customers have with their credit card company and the relationship eBay has with their credit card company has to do with us.

Thanks for posting.

ITWM

widgetc · ‎05-31-2021

With tracking Paypal used to cover chargebacks the seller did they not? Managed payments is a disaster!

intimewithmusic · ‎05-31-2021

Forgot to mention... it's my understanding when this happens in the USA, eBay charges the SELLER a $20 administration fee. I'm curious. Do you know if eBay Canada is also charging you an admin fee?

Thanks

tyler@ebay · ‎05-31-2021

Good questions @intimewithmusic - there's some information that may help clear things up (at least a bit).

When it comes to credit card disputes (also called chargebacks), the ultimate decision always lies with the card issuer or financial institution. That's not unique to eBay, any processor (including PayPal) also has to abide by what the issuer decides in such cases.

Our processes and protections for these types of situations are outlined here. There is a dispute fee that is charged in the event a payment dispute is filed and you're found responsible for the disputed amount, but waived in certain circumstances (more detail at the page I linked).

In general, if a payment dispute is opened, the best course of action to take is to respond to it quickly. Being prompt in this regard and providing the information available (tracking details, etc) helps us best represent the situation back to the card issuer.

Tyler,

widgetc · ‎05-31-2021

Confirms that managed payments is a seller disaster.

pjcdn2005 · ‎05-31-2021

Based on the link that Tyler provided you are covered when buyer claims that they don't recognize the transaction as long as you can show that the item was delivered to that address. It's my understanding that in those situations, regardless of what the credit card company decides, eBay is supposed to protect the seller so I don't know what happened in your situation but hopefully it all works out. Please let us know.

I have lots of 0 feedback buyers and can honestly say that I don't have any problems with them. Imo it's just as likely to have a problem with someone who has 500 feedback as someone who has 0.

pjcdn2005 · ‎05-31-2021

If a seller challenges a payment dispute and they lose, there is a $20 fee charged. If they refund before ebay makes a decision or if they win the dispute, there is no charge.

ricarmic · ‎05-31-2021

I'm not clear on the exact steps in the original post, but for some bizzarre reason despite the fact that tracking is already attached to the item, one has to ALSO manually add it to these cases, it is not picked up automagically.

This is also true for INRs at least in the case that they aren't yet delivered (I've never had one for a package that showed as delivered).

If that is misunderstood, and the tracking is not manually added, I think it is interpreted by the automatic processes that there wasn't tracking - that might be why the automagic instant resolution happened in buyers favour.

This is my thoughts from what I read, but I may not understand the order of events.....

PS When I get these I do call the buyer, and I have successfully avoided the losses a few times now, the latest one the buyer even paid me the $20 extra fee I paid (they used an expired credit card by accident).

pjcdn2005 · ‎05-31-2021

A similar situation was posted on the US boards. The seller posted the message from ebay saying that the dispute was in the buyer's favour and that they were refunded but that the seller was covered by seller protection so they don't have to pay anything out.

The second part of the note you received about the buyer winning didn't say anything about you being covered by seller protection?

If you want to see the note it is post 45 on the following thread..

https://community.ebay.com/t5/Selling/Would-you-please-Refresh-my-Memory-on-a-Chargeback/td-p/319092...

doc_scribe · ‎05-31-2021

@ricarmic wrote:
I'm not clear on the exact steps in the original post, but for some bizzarre reason despite the fact that tracking is already attached to the item, one has to ALSO manually add it to these cases, it is not picked up automagically.

This is also true for INRs at least in the case that they aren't yet delivered (I've never had one for a package that showed as delivered).

This is a scenario that is near-but-not-so-dear to my heart. Just last month, I was responding to an INR claim (btw, still within the estimated delivery range), and happened to click that "Update Tracking" link to re-confirm the number was correct. However, that simple, seemingly harmless and at worst redundant action immediately blew away all of the tracking information displayed in eBay up to that point.

Fortunately, that particular U.S. Buyer received the item later the same day, and closed their INR claim. But thereafter, the expandable 'Shipping' section in the 'View Item Details' page still shows only: Shipped April 20th and Delivered April 20th...all other tracking history is now gone.

So we have to be very careful with tracking number updates - there appears to be a new risk (mainly to our seller metrics) by manually updating the tracking number. If it is already correct, I now include it only in buyer or claim message text, not the tracking number field.

marnotom! · ‎05-31-2021

@pjcdn2005 wrote:

A similar situation was posted on the US boards. The seller posted the message from ebay saying that the dispute was in the buyer's favour and that they were refunded but that the seller was covered by seller protection so they don't have to pay anything out.

Good catch. That makes a lot of sense. If the buyer's charge dispute ticks all the right boxes for fraudulent card use and the seller has ticked all the right boxes for chargeback protection, neither of them should be left hung to dry in a situation like this.

intimewithmusic · ‎05-31-2021

Hi Tyler,

Thanks for filling us in. This hasn't happened to me . It is good to know our footing in the event it does. I'm not sure what it takes for a credit card holder to dispute a charge. As well, that's something I have no experience with. It has happened to Cal-ectibles.

My feeling as a seller.... If I do my part to provide eBay with all of the security such as tracking, insurance and proof of delivery I should be protected against Item Not Received and "I did Not Order This." eBay is the ordering platform not the Seller. We must remember we are Canada.

It is very difficult for Canadian Sellers to compete with the inexpensive shipping costs enjoyed by our American friends. For various reasons we pay a big premium for tracking, insurance and guaranteed delivery and on top we follow up with the best customer service.

Unlike eBay USA there are very few large eBay Canada "Mega Sellers". On top of fullfilling the guidelines put forth by eBay I don't feel it's fair for eBay to force Canadian Sellers to navigate the legal connection between Buyer disputes and credit card companies. That's what we are paying you for to avoid dealing with those issues.

Again , this has not yet happened to me. I suggested in community to Cal-ectibles that they add this to the weekly chat session. I'm not sure why you addressed this to me however I'm grateful. Myself and other Sellers can know what to expect if it does happen to one of us.

Cal-ectible has been selling on eBay for 20 years. He/she/them? has 688 positive feedbacks in the past 12 months. Zero Neutral and Zero negative. 6949 feedbacks. sounds pretty amazing to me. Particularily the fact this Seller is Canadian. 20 years? Seriously? Holy cow. I didn't even know eBay existed. Roland sent me to Knotts Berry Farm just 6 years prior for the unveiling of Windows 95. eBay who?...

I don't know this Seller. I tried to view their listings. they seem to be taken down or otherwise unavailable. I was surprised to see the Seller operates out of my home town of Kelowna BC.

I think the future will dictate the results of these disputes between credit card companies and eBay which are becoming more common. I'm a former owner operator of a large retail business. It went on for 25 years and throughout I dealt with credit card companies and their serivce providers. In that entire time I had 1 dispute. The large deposit I made through the provider ( large company similar to Adyen) got lost but within a few days it was recovered and returned without damage to the relationship.

I hope Cal-ectibles receives the same treatment after their 20 years of supporting eBay. Without Sellers like that we wouldn't have eBay.

Although this hasn't happened to me yet I'd like to think eBay would back me up IF I did everything right. We use eBay specifically for two reasons.

1. Global Market

2. Protection from crooks.

Otherwise there's marketplace.

ITWM

PS

Tyler: "When it comes to credit card disputes (also called chargebacks), the ultimate decision always lies with the card issuer or financial institution."

ITWM : "Sorry that's not true. The ultimate decision ALWAYS lies with the customer. In this case the customer is your Seller.... Cal-ectibles"

cal-ectibles · ‎06-01-2021

Thanks everybody for your input; l haven't heard from eBay seller protection yet but will update if and when I do. I didn't notice any mention of seller protection on the charge-back notification but the customer rep I talked to said he was filing a claim for me. As for the tracking update question, the correct tracking was already shown right below the prompt so I was just going input a copy of the delivery confirmation. When I clicked the button l didnt get a chance, it closed the case right in front of my eyes. No defence available to the seller at all!

If this was a more common dispute I would have responded to the "customer" but I was completely flabbergasted, like the British say gobsmacked! I decided to wait and see what eBay might do for me. My experiences are varied over the years: decisions usually work out about 50-50, best if I can provide proof of delivery. The jury is still out on this case.

intimewithmusic · ‎06-01-2021

Thanks. At least that is something a Seller can try!

intimewithmusic · ‎06-01-2021

Thanks.

It sounds like Cal-ectible didn't have much of a chance to challenge. By challenge do you mean contact customer service or is there an option built into the 1st notification you get with a chargeback?

I wonder what percentage of chargebacks are made by zero feedback buyers?

To avoid this is it better not seelling to them? IE: people using someone' s card and opening eBay accounts to make the pruchase.

I've never let it bother me before but I would like to feel safe listing higher value items. I wonder if I should adopt that policy? This problem seems to be on the uptake.

I never encountered this with my brick & mortar store. Almost all sales were in person using a terminal. This practise of entering a card online and a 3 digit code on the back is completely anonymous. Combine that with someone with no eBay history. It would seem putting a $5000 item on there is asking for trouble.

My policy has been Signature Required On Delivery over $350. I think I'll move that down to $200.

IT

ricarmic · ‎06-01-2021

Just a note, these boards will tend to bend our heads to believing things like all zero feedback buyers are a problem.

That for certain is not the case.

I have a guy that regularly buys $300 to $500 sized boxes for years now and he is every time a ZERO feedback buyer because he just pays via his credit card each time with a "guest" account.

I also have a buyer who's feedback is in the 50s now and ALL of them are from me! If I'd blocked either of these I'd be out 1000s of dollars of sales!

I'm not saying we shouldn't take steps to protect ourselves, sometimes our spider senses serve us well, but just be careful how much we infer from the (hopefully rare in terms of how many are actually ok) horror stories we see here.

intimewithmusic · ‎06-01-2021

Hi ricarmic.

Thanks for sharing your experience. That is a very good point.

I've felt the same way until now. This is a growing NEW problem. YouTubers started talking about it last year and more instances are being reported all the time. Loopholes like this have added risk as word gets out.

Time is going to tell but how we did business a couple of years ago may need adjustment.

Have you ever had a credit card chargeback ?

I could absorb a smaller one but I would hate to lose a $1000 item.

IT