PayPal Buyer Protection with Alibaba

[MiyagiMan]

Hey PayPal community,

I am communicating with a Chinese seller on Alibaba on WhatsApp and we've come to the agreement of making a payment of $660. I was wondering if there is any way the seller can possibly scam me since we are not making the transaction through Alibaba's Trade Assurance. The seller has shown me pictures of the product, as well as face timing me to confirm that he does have the product. However, the seller was adamant on not making a transaction through Alibaba since they have a "higher fee". In addition, the seller is also making me make the payment first, rather than sending me an invoice. Is that something to worry about? So my question is, does PayPal's Buyer Protection protect me in the scenario that I do not receive the items, or receive items the items that are not described? If there is any more information that I need to provide, I'd be happy to do so.

[Andrew2727]

I think if you do the payment as goods and service your protected, not sure.

[DPCreations]

There are lots of issues here--and lots of "red flags" already.

Good idea to thorougly review PayPal policies for buyer protection here:

https://www.paypal.com/us/webapps/mpp/ua/useragreement-full#purchase-protection

Why not buy directly from Alibaba?  Suggesting other wise is a warning sign.

There are a lot of smart, savvy, and very knowedgable sellers just waiting to take advantage of new, inexperienced, and un-learned buyers.  To avoid scams and loss you need to become the expert.

PayPal will not protect you from bad buyer judgement.

[Whac-A-Mole]

Alibaba offers some warranty,so if you two deal outside Alibaba,you get none.

But you are protected by Paypal buyer protection,if item not as described,you must return items back to china with tracking,do yourself a favor and find out howmuch it costto get tracking to China.