Seller not responding and fake tracking info

[qa2014.eya]

I have purchased an item from a seller in China. The seller had great ratings and feedback until suddenly they stopped responding to communication, removed all listings, and made their feedback private. The seller extended the expected delivery date to 2 months from the transaction and provided just a tracking number that for 4 weeks has not yielded any updates.

The feedback numbers of the seller have surely declined since. While I understand this is likely a scam, I want to know what ways are there to report such suspicious activity. eBay seems to be blind and ignorant to those practices. The only available solution is to wait until the expected delivery time then report an item not received. 

Did anyone go through a similar situation? What other options would I have? I paid with a Credit Card so PayPal resolution center is not an option since my transaction is not showing in PayPal, although the transaction was completed in eBay as normal.

[pjcdn2005]

As far as I know the only way to report it to eBay before opening an item not received claim is to phone them.  I suspect though that since the seller made their feedback private that they are already having a lot of negatives and problems and eBay is aware of that.  

You can file a claim through your credit card although I’m not sure exactly how that works.  Keep in mind that if you open a claim with your cc, you likely won’t be able to open an eBay claim if the cc one fails.

tyler@ebay   Any suggestions?

[femmefan1946]

You bought an item.

What delivery window did eBay give you ?

That is firm-- if the seller changed the date on his continuing listing later it will not affect your purchase.

Mark the delivery window on your calendar.

When that window closes you have 30 days to open a Item Not Received Dispute in the Resolution Centre at the bottom of this page.

The first suggestion is to Contact the Seller.

Ignore it, it's not a demand.

Ask eBay to step in and Escalate to a Claim.

If the seller cannot prove delivery (not shipping, delivery) you will be refunded.

Now.

Because you purchased as a Guest Buyer (?) and used your credit card directly, you may not be able to get an eBay refund.And of course you don't have the second layer of protection from using Paypal.

But you do have your credit card chargeback policy.

Call the 1=800  number on the back of your card and ask about a chargeback. The clerk will need dates, currency, transaction numbers etc. 

Because card policies differ, the results may also differ.

If you are buying online, there is a lot to be said for using an anonymizing payment processor like Paypal.

[tyler@ebay · Accepted solution]

Thanks for the tag @pjcdn2005!

Hi @qa2014.eya  - I'm so sorry to hear about what you've run into. A few points I want to call out:

• In order to sell on the site you must have a public feedback profile. If the member's feedback is now private it sounds as though they are no longer able to sell
• In situations where a member's selling privileges have been revoked there may be options to override the usual waiting time before you can open a request with us. The best course of action usually is to contact Customer Support so they can review.  

In this case I've gotten it over to the right folks and they're looking into it. Keep an eye out on your eBay message center for more details!

[qa2014.eya]

Thanks! You tagging tyler@ebay did actually solve my problem!

[pjcdn2005]

I'm glad to hear that!