Buyer returned empty box, eBay denied my claim in spite of police report

[aniwonder]

Hello everyone,

I was scammed out of 2800$ on eBay and am wondering what my recourse could be. I sold a rare marvel steelbook collection in October, buyer claimed some of the movies were open, filed a return request, and returned essentially an empty box.

The day I got the return I called eBay and was told to file a police incident report, which I did. I sent them the information. They claimed they never received it in time, and closed the case.

I appealed and escalated multiple times, and received a call today that the payout a team leader had requested was denied by the highest instances.

The buyer who did the scam had been on the site since January 2019, had 1 feedback, and is no longer a registered user on the site.

Has anyone every successfully sued eBay in small claims?

I filed a complaint with the police, with Canada Post for mail fraud and with the RCMP anti-fraud center at this point.

I just cannot accept that a buyer can return an empty box so easily and get away with it without consequences.

Any advice would be appreciated.

Warmest regards,

[aniwonder]

I received a callback from Canada Post. Because of the police incident report I supplied, they're treating it as mail fraud. My package was insured, so they're hopeful I can get some reparation through that channel.

So that is an option, for posterity, if anyone researches this thread in the future.

[femmefan1946 · Accepted solution]

If the buyer is in Canada, you would be best to use Small Claims Court to  sue the buyer.

EBay is "just a venue".  If you had sold the item through the local Pennysaver, would you be suing the Pennysaver if the sale went bad?

DD was involved in a Small Claims case recently in BC. It was entirely mediated by email. She had a lawyer, but the complainant, her neighbour, did not. She won the case and there were no costs to her. The losing complainant had some court fees to pay.

As I understand it, Small Claims can tell complainants to make financial restitution, but don't have any means to enforce this. I would be happy to learn differently.

[femmefan1946]

Also "essentially an empty box". So you did get at least part of what you sold back?

[aniwonder]

I received 3 dvd cases and 17 steelbooks from completely different movies, all of which were either missing discs or had none.

So no I did not get anything back from what I had originally sent. Market value of what he sent back is about 80$.