Buyer disputing a purchase on another account

[bhch-0]

Long story short, I sold a sports memorabilia card that I'd purchased from another ebay seller 4-5 months prior for around $1000 Canadian through ebay about 2 months ago. The item is backed by ebay's authenticity guarantee program. The item gets to the fellow, who's American, around middle of July. Due to a general sense of disillusionment when it comes to Ebay's overall bias towards sellers, I decided to close the account.

Fast forward to middle of August, more than one month after the fellow received his item, he says he wants to return it on the whim that he believes it's inauthentic. I reject the return and ebay backs me up as the item is backed by their guarantee, plus I made it clear  I don't accept returns. Fast forward to August 31, the little roach decide to file a dispute against me with his Financial Institution. 

I state my case as clearly as I could (how the item advertised was what was received, is backed by the guarantee etc). Seeing as how this individual is the son of a powerful multimillionaire (yep, I did my research, even managed to track his home address down as all he provided me was a PO box in another state), it's blatantly obvious that the bank will side with him rather than the poor middle-class Non-American. As a result of that, Ebay will refund him and then come after me.

As such, Ebay will inevitably try to charge my acount and let the charlatan keep the item as well. I reached out to my financial institution and advised them of the situation and asked them to freeze the card provided to ebay, as well as block Ebay from being able to extract money from my account. Ebay will invariably keep trying to get what they think that they're entitled to, and after 90 days it will be passed along to a collections agency.

I'm sure there have been some people who've experienced this as sellers. What can I really expect besides some nasty letters and phone calls (which I'll just block). I'm not going to pay no matter what they might do. From what I can see, I can contest the debt and based on the fact they don't have my SIN, and they've inherited it from Ebay, they won't have too much to go off of.

I don't believe the police is going to get involved as they'll believe it's a civil case, and good luck going up against some hotshot in America. Also, don't have the money nor the time to sue Ebay, not that I think I'll win anyway.

I know the agency can't physically harass me at home or my workplace, so what can they really do in the end? I'm willing to take a credit hit if need be.

[marnotom!]

I'm curious about why you didn't call the buyer's bluff and accept the return.  Don't returns go through the authenticator as well?  An attempt to return something other than the card you sold should have been caught at that point.

I'll freely admit I don't know much about how seller protection works for sales made through the various authentication programs.

[rocketscollectibles]

If it's an item not as described chargeback for being not authentic and ebay authenticated it, logically ebay should take responsability for it. But since you deleted your account, you are maybe not eligible to sellers protection now. I dealt with a buyer who had no account anymore and been told a no longer registered user is no longer protected by ebay. You maybe did a huge mistake on this and stupidly thrown your sale protection. Ebay cover sellers in some chargeback cases.

That being said you should never close an account after someone pay you, you're just making yourself look like a scammer trying to runaway with the money. The fact you say he opened a case means your account was still up, and you indeed closed it after that, to runaway with the money. That's bad. Same with asking your bank to block ebay, you cannot do that. You're again looking like trying to runaway suspiciously with the money. That's bad things to do. 

[pjcdn2005]

The buyers bank will most likely rule in favour of their customer but since eBay did guarantee authenticity, eBay should refund the buyer, not you.   If they don't, then I would push the issue with them.  

Did the buyer actually open a return for not as described or not authentic? If eBay ruled on your favour at that time they may do so again.   They do say that sellers may be protected ftom payment disputes if:

• The payment dispute relates to an eBay Money Back Guarantee case that was already resolved with:
  • eBay determining that the seller met their obligations to the buyer, or
  • eBay issuing a full refund to the buyer

https://www.ebay.ca/help/policies/selling-policies/payment-dispute-seller-protections?id=5293&st=3&p...

Before assuming the worst, you may check that link to make sure that you given eBay as much info as you can.

[bhch-0]

I've heard all sorts of stories about the wrong item being returned and ebay ruling the in the buyer's favor. Seeing as how they backed me up initially, I thought that'd be the end of it.

[bhch-0]

I applied for the account to be closed due to another separate issue, an item that wasn't covered under the program. It's not deleted as it takes around 60 days to do that, seeing as how I'd sold numerous things prior to the request.

This application was submitted well before the scammer opened up the request. eBay hasn't tried extracting anything yet, and hopefully they won't. In theory, the financial institution should reimburse the roach and that's it. What does ebay have to do with it? 

[rocketscollectibles]

When you sell on ebay you're under sellers protection. In some cases of chargebacks and frauds when banks side with buyer ebay will cover seller loss and refund buyer without deducting seller. That's a case where you could maybe be eligible for that, since ebay authenticated the item, logically they should take responsability for a chargeback about non-authenticity. 

[myk221]

Ebay sellers protection do not exist, it's a scam. They should clear state like Amazon, seller must eccept returns. No returns means you not reciving item back and Ebay takes your money anyway.

[rocketscollectibles]

I remember your post. You simply had to accept return because the case was for being defective. It's part of the money back guarantee you agree to by selling on ebay. You lost your money because of a lack of knowledge. You declined a return you had to accept. Experienced sellers do not lose their money and item in your situation. Crazy you still did not read rules yet.

This thread is a whole different situation. 

[bhch-37]

Well, the financial institution ruled in favor of the millionaire's son (surprise surprise). I also unsurprisingly don't qualify for buyer protection so I have to pay them $1037+$20. Guess my next step is to file a report with the BBB and the ombudsman as eBay is basically normalizing theft.

[bhch-37]

Meant seller protection. It's kind of late, and I'm pretty frustrated at the outcome. What eBay doesn't seem to realize is without sellers, buyers won't have anything to buy. How anybody is still selling anything on a platform that trivializes theft is beyond me. Shame that this company will endure as most will just chalk it up to the cost of doing business.