Buyer's false statement of damaged on item and asking for a refund!!!

[levon36]

Dear Paypal and ebayers,

I have an rather urgent issue to enquire about and any of your advice is much appreicated:

A buyer purchased a £126 dress from me and opened a case of non receipt a few days after I sent the item. Although she finally confirmed she received it on 5 March, in the meantime, she asked for refund claiming I sent the item after she sent a "message" on cancellation of transaction, but as a matter of fact, she had neither sent me such a message, nor it was sent before I marked it as dispatched (if this "message" had existed)! (So I did not accept her return.)

However, on 6 March, she further escalated this case by changing the reason to item not as described, and claiming there was a dark line through the middle of the dress!!!

This is absolutely untrue!!! I have sold the same dress to a few other customers, nothing like that ever happened as every dress was all very carefully examined before dispatch. Moreover, she never replied my email and never communicated with my about what happened to the dress. By far I have never even seen a photo of the so called "dark line".

On 14 March, the case status was changed to "granted" without letting me know what happened to my item, and now i really have no idea as to what i will be receiving and all paypal needs is only a tracking number from her.

Now, I just want to ask:

 what if, a buyer destroys the item in order to get a straight refund?!

 Is there a possibilty that I received a destroyed dress with my money gone?!

Thanks a million for your advice!

[PayPal_Wayne]

Hi there levon36,

I am not going to lie and say a buyer has never destroyed goods to get a refund because I've seen it happen. But I will say you can appeal the case right away if you receive back damaged goods.

If you would like to appeal the outcome of a claim you can do so within 10 days of case closure by following these steps:

1. Log in to your PayPal account at www.paypal.co.uk
2. Click ‘Resolution Centre’ near the top of the page.
3. Select 'Closed cases' in the drop down menu and find the claim you wish to view.
4. Click ‘Appeal’ in the action column.
5. Provide information for your appeal and follow the on-screen instructions.

Note: The ‘Appeal’ button will only be available for 10 days after case closure.

I hope this information helps you

Wayne

[levon36]

Hello Wayne,

Many thanks for your reply, but please allow me to get some updates here:

They buyer notified paypal she sent the item back to me on 21 march, this afternoon I saw paypal closed the case, stating the delivery was complete, however, I did not received anything from her!

I checked with the tracking number on royal mail's website, it said the item was disptached from my local post office, but I received nothing.

Now paypal fully refunded her with my money and limited my account by saying funds insufficient!!

Please could you give me an idea what I shall do now?

Thanks again,

Levon

[PayPal_barry]

Hey levon36, if you have been given a tracking number. I would suggest also bringing that to your local post office and have the postal workers there locate the item for you. If the buyer has supplied a valid tracking number confirming delivery, we may well accept that. You could ask the buyer to maybe forward you the postal receipt to hand in at your local sorting office.

[lexi67]

Hi,

A simialr thing seems to have happened to me although unfortuately I refunded the money before getting the item returned. Now the buyer won't send back the item worth £190!  The buyer had the handbag for 2 weeks before claiming it was damaged and wanting a refund.

I wonder if tis happens alot

What was the user name of your ebayer?

[mumsy]

Hi just been reading through this post and I am begining to realise how much this is happening to others recently.  I am going through a similar situation at the moment where my buyer has purchased an item 34 days ago and they waited until I gave them excellent feedback yesterday before they decided to complain. They say my item has a couple of pieces missing and a damaged part when I am absolutely certain that the item i sent was brand new and missing nothing and no damage when it left my house.  I am going to offer them a full refund once the item is back in my possession but  I am worried that they will claim there money back off paypal which is £80 and also get to keep the item as this has happened to a few of my friends recently too. This sort of behaviour needs stopping as it is not fair on the innocent sellers.

[lexi67]

Hi.

I agree, also reading alot of the posts.

I think what you ahve to do is escalate it through Paypal and they then apparently won't refund the money until there is a tracking postal number.

I think there is a scam going on where people wait for good feedback, then request a refund and hope that either Paypal gives a refund straight away or that the seller does not escalate it and gives a refund.Then they get the itema nd the money.

I have spent hours on the phone to paypal and ebay and they all say there is nothing they can do which does not seem righ or fair

If you reply through Paypal and wait for the item to be returned then Paypal should only put a hold on the funds until a tracking number is reported that the item has been posted. Then once you ahve received the item back they release the funds.

It has certainly made me very wary of ebay and extra sure of taking photos/accurate description over the top of what I would do normally.

All the advice is do not give a refund until you ahve the item, but I would escalate it through Paypal if they put the dispute through Paypal.

[Hornets_Nest]

I am having a similar problem.

I sold a phone in perfect working order and the buyer has returned it with a damaged SIM tray making it now only really good for spares as the cost of repair is £30 and I only asked £40 for it when working.

It's clearly wrong that the buyer has in this case acted in a dishonest manner as the unit has not been returned to me in the same state that I sold it.  Whilst I do not want to spend hours and hours on this it is a matter of principle - I am prepared to close my account with Paypal and dispute the chargeback.  Whilst this was not an eBay tranascation anyone who takes the trouble to look at my eBay feedback will see it is 100% based on 540 transactions and so I'm not in the habit of ripping people off.