ebay problems

or Why I am not using eBay / PayPal any more

In the last few months (as of July08) I have had a sudden burst of problems with ebay/paypal.

Two were with sellers, where I asked ebay/paypal to decide on a claim and one was with paypal itself.

I am so unhappy with the service that I have received that I have decided to stop using ebay/paypal for the foreseeable future.

Following is a brief description of the problems to help you decide if I am overreacting or if you too should be revising you auction choices.

ebay seller andrew9264 and the Doctor Who scam

This is the one that really put me off. I bought gbp21 of cards from this seller, and emailed to ask if they have any of the more common cards. They responded that they had plenty and would sell me all the common and rare cards in the 4 th series that I still needed for a total of gbp50, including the ebay auctions and postage. They were so pushy that they immediately sent a revised invoice.

It didn’t sound like much of a bargain, but it would be convenient to pick up the remaining cards in one hit.

At this time my Aunt Ester in Sydney passed on, and I went up to Sydney for the funeral. While I was in Sydney I sent payment through for these cards.

A few weeks later a parcel arrived. Instead of the set promised, it contained the ebay auctions cards and a bunch of miscellaneous Doctor Who cards, many of them duplicates, and not near the number of cards I was expecting.

I was running out of time to lodge a dispute (I think ebay gives 60 days) so I both opened a dispute and directly emailed the seller

The seller said he had emailed while I was in Sydney for the funeral offering to send me a bunch of miscellaneous cards instead of the set, and as I ahdn't responded he went adhead and made the swap.

Long story short, then the seller claimed he either didn’t understand my problem, or finally agreed to send the appropriate cards. As the dispute deadline approached I escalated it to a claim (six days after the seller said they had sent the replacement cards), only to find that the seller hadn’t sent the replacement cards.

I asked paypal to make a ruling, saying that I would settle for a reimbursement of gbp25.

Paypal finally emailed me saying that they had ruled in my favour and that I would be receiving the gbp25.

Then they sent me gbp9.

I queried why I had received gbp9 and was told that I had received a refund on the disputed ebay item. I explained that it was not an ebay item, it was the gbp29 postage that contained the disputed amount.

They went off again and decided that as I had already received some refund I would not receive any more.

What really hurt on this transaction was that the seller was just so suspicious and devious in their actions that I really feel far more cheated off than the $30 that I have been.

The seller tried to rob me, I asked ebay/paypal to intervene and they found predominantly in the sellers favour

This is a cut down version. For the full story with copied of the emails, click here

8428gilbert and the promo problem

This seller is a bit notorious with selling poorly described cards, or misrepresented cards. Despite this I did believe that the cards they sold were genuine, if you knew what you were looking for. Over a period of a few weeks I bought a bunch of promo cards from the seller.

At this time I have my Aunt Ester in Sydney passed on, and I went up to Sydney for the funeral.

When I got back I found that I was unable to pay for all of the cards. I could pay for $21 worth, but the other $50 I could not. I emailed the seller, Debbie ,who sent me a Paypal invoice.

I paid that and the other items through ebay.

Then the seller was busted by the David Prowse fanclub for selling fake Prowse signatures.

They were removed from eBay, and all transactions went into limbo.

A few days later I was leaving feedback and saw that the seller was no longer an ebay member, and sent them an email. With no reply a few days after that I filed a dispute for my cards, and a few days after that escalated it to a claim, well two claims actually as I had made two payments.

The end result was that ebay/paypal refunded the payment that went through ebay, but the one that ebay prevented me from making through ebay they said they could not refund and would pursue the seller for.

I tried to explain to ebay/paypal that the payment was for ebay items and that the only reason that they had been paid for directly through paypal was due to the changes in ebay, preventing anyone from making a payment after a few weeks.

The email exchanges went on with ebay/paypal supplying a different person to stooge me around.

I came away feeling that if I needed to make a claim then ebay would not be willing to look at circumstances and would make general, by the book decisions.

This is a cut down version. For the full story with copied of the emails, click here

Paypals Visa misuse

There have been others of late, but the third of the incidents that really put me off ebay/paypal was when I went to make a payment, which ebay/paypal refused to do unless I supplied a credit cards details. Fearing a scam I tried the payment again from my work computer and got the same thing. Reading the request for the details, it sounded like they wanted an additional form of identification, so I gave them the details. The next week I found that the transaction had been taken off my credit card instead of the account that I used for paypal transactions.

I was horrified.

I contacted paypal who explained that they had a program in place that determined the best way for a transaction to be made. As the person from Paypal explained, they would like to override the system, but they are unable to.

What is the system, Skynet?

This is a cut down version. For the full story with copied of the emails, click here

Conclusion

I have had other problems directly with sellers taking money and not returning emails, notably scouse691

And items that never arrived as I did with the_ving, but these recent three in a row have left me very disillusioned with the company, so I am on the wagon.