lost package in mail, 16 defects as a result, how best to protect myself, and possible repercussions

[dutchman48]

OK, contrary to a lot of comments, a package has been lost in the mail with 16 items in it. Fortunately I was smart enough to insure it so will not be out any money when I refund the buyer.

My concern is the defects. If I refund and I read correctly, I will be awarded 16 defects, one for each item. How can I refund without getting the 16 defects?

What will 16 defects from the same person do to my TRS status?

Any info would be appreciated as this is a major concern.

Thanks in advance

[dutchman48]

The defect rate won't affect your status until you have transactions with defects with at least 8 different buyers (at least 5 different buyers to impact Top Rated status) within your evaluation period.

I just reread some stuff.

Will the clause above mean I am worrying for nothing?

[pjcdn2005]

As it says, you need to have defects from 5 different buyers to lose your TRS so you don't have to worry about TRS.

It will count as just one defect so it 'shouldn't affect anything else such as search but I don't think that any of us know that for sure.

[mr.elmwood]

Max is one defect per transaction regardless of how many widgets.

[pjcdn2005]

Actually, that's not quite true. I said that it would count as one defect but now that I think about it, it would count as one defect if the items were all from one listing. If it was 16 different listings, it would count as 16 defects (even when paid for at once) but that still wouldn't affect TRS unless there were defects from other buyers. 

I was sure that there was a FAQ about that on last year's spring update which explained what a transaction was. I don't see it right now though so it's possible that might have changed but I haven't heard anything about it.

[pjcdn2005]

Found it....

It is from last year though so as I said, something may have changed since then

http://pages.ebay.ca/sellerinformation/news/springupdate2014/sellerstandards.html

Defect rate

What is considered a transaction?

A transaction is a purchase from a listing. If a buyer purchases two or more identical items from the same multi-quantity listing, or purchases the same items in different variations such as color or size from the same multi-variation listing, that is considered one transaction. If a buyer purchases items from four different listings from the same seller and combines them into one order, that would be counted as four transactions. Note that the defect rate will not affect your performance rating until you have a transaction  with a defect from 8 different buyers (5 different buyers to affect your Top Rated Seller status).

[dutchman48]

I thought it would be 16 transactions so we will see what happens. No cases have been filed or opened. I just refunded voluntarily.

[ricarmic]

What country was it? Some countries are INR defect free, ones like Brazil, Russia etc, there are 34 countries that are "defectless" in INR situations.

For those interested, here is the list:

Argentina

Armenia

Belarus

Brazil

Bulgaria

Chile

Colombia

Croatia

Cyprus

Czech Republic

Ecuador

Estonia

Greece

Israel

Hungary

Indonesia

Kazakhstan

Latvia

Lithuania

Malta

Mexico

Peru

Portugal

Romania

Russia

Saudi Arabia

Slovakia

Slovenia

South Africa

Sri Lanka

Turkey

Ukraine

United Arab Emirates

Zambia

[dutchman48]

USA

[ricarmic]

Darn! As I recall when I had a similar situation, it counted as "1" however all my %s showed as though there were (in your case) 16 defects until they rolled off. I didn't go over the 2% mark so I don't know what would have happened TRS status wise. (in my case it was 4 items so less of an impact)

[maximus7001]

Send the money with paypal friends and family to the buyers paypal then message the buyer telling them that refund was given to them via paypal. No defect this way but you will loose your final value fees.

[zee-chan-jpn-books]

So just to rephrase to make sure I read that correctly, if I pressed the refund button (assuming buyer did NOT open a case) via eBay (because I wanted my FVF back) to refund an item because my buyer didn't get it after a month, I WILL get a defect?

But if I log on to Paypal, and chose send money to friend/family to the buyer to give the refund (and lose my FVF), I WILL NOT get a defect?

What if the buyer is so new that they don't realize I have sent a refund "privately", or that they are being a jerk and opened a case afterwards via eBay anyway, wouldn't I risk having to refund twice? 

As mentioned in a different thread (where the buyer gave me a fictional name for shipping), I had a brand new buyer messaged me saying that she didn't get her item, and it's currently the 3 weeks mark now. I asked her to wait for a month so there's 7 days left for the item to hopefully arrive. I haven't heard back from the buyer at all yet. Just getting a bit worried since I haven't had to refund anybody ever since the defect system rolled out. I would love my 0 cases and 0 defect status...... 

[zee-chan-jpn-books]

I would love *to keep*... ran out of time to edit lol

[rose-dee]

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@maximus7001 wrote:

Send the money with paypal friends and family to the buyers paypal then message the buyer telling them that refund was given to them via paypal. No defect this way but you will loose your final value fees.

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This may seem expedient to avoid defects on the face of it, but I'm not so sure it's a good idea.  If you refund outside the eBay system, you've cut off the paper trail at your own end.  

I think 'Zee-chan' has it right when he says there is the risk of an inexperienced (or very clever) buyer opening a case anyway.  The seller might then be forced to make a second refund through the eBay channels.  At the very least,  the seller would end up with an open case on his record, in addition to a possible defect.  

As far as the OP's situation goes, the section 'pj' quotes above from the FAQ is also my understanding.  At least that's how it was several months ago, who knows now?  

So the number of actual defects in the OP's case will depend on whether those transactions were individual, separate listings, or a multi-item order from a variation listing (or one listing).  And since there is only one buyer involved, eBay tells us (if we can believe it) that it won't affect our seller status until there are 8 different buyers (5 for TRS).  Of course, they don't say anything about search placement.  

[bcwet]

Refund the buyer in full through the ebay/paypal transaction. But do not put in a request to get your fvf back and your wont have any defects.

[pjcdn2005]

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@bcwet wrote:

Refund the buyer in full through the ebay/paypal transaction. But do not put in a request to get your fvf back and your wont have any defects.

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The OP has already refunded but if they were to do it that way, they likely still get defect(s) as ebay assumes that the refund is because a customer was unhappy about something or that the refund was seller generated.