Seller can't or won't ship item, yet listing still active

[wildekat0516]

Received notification from seller item "no longer available" and "order something else".  I need the specific item I ordered and went I went to check other listings from other sellers, the exact item I ordered from the seller is still active.  There is nothing on the eBay help pages that let's me report this, or to open a resolution request for weeks yet.  The seller marked the item as shipped even though the email I received initially said the item was delayed.  I emailed back a couple of days later requesting how long a delay, and then was told item would not be able to be shipped. 

[momcqueen]

What did(s) did this all happen?

No matter, if you used paypal to pay for this, go to the Paypal Resolution Centre and open and Item Not Received case. Often, they allow cases to be opened sooner than ebay does because they have different standards to follow.

Do NOT accept an offer to replace from this seller. They sound far too disorganized to truly send it to you, and often this is merely a ploy to get innocent buyers to close their cases. An empty promise, nothing more. 

Let us know if you run into other hiccups with this, or if my advice doesn't work. 

[reallynicestamps]

Seller who dropship are prone to this.

Droppshipping means the seller lists from a catalogue and never sees the actual items. When he gets an order, he tells the supplier who ships, often from Asia.

The supplier has hundreds of sellers doing this, so when you see an item with dozens of identical pictures and descriptions, you are seeing a dropshipper in action.

When the supplier runs out of the item, he rarely tells his hundreds of dropshipping customers. And every one of them is unknowingly out of stock.

Dropshipping appeals to would be sellers who know little about running a business and who are often too lazy to find a reliable supplier.

[mpit7628]

I recently had a seller disappear the day after I purchased 2 dresses from them. After about a week or so I went to eBay's resolution center and I received my refund for both dresses with in 2 days. I have a feeling eBay has realized that there is serious problems with some sellers from China that are scamming people and are trying to get to the bottom of it.

[momcqueen]

I think there have been more reports than usual here in the Community by buyers of sellers being suddenly shutdown so I suspect eBay is cracking down on problem areas.

[momcqueen]

Also, eBay has more tools at its disposal than ever before to link multiple accounts to a single large seller so it may be that many accounts are shutdown one at a time as that is discovered. They may all belong to the same party.