Seller immediately escalated to claim before I could submit evidence. What should I do?

[johnsfc]

Hi,

So I think I have become victim to my first ever Gumtree/PayPal scam. I saw an ad for a laptop which I wanted and had a back and forth with the seller and all seemed legitimate so I asked him to send it to mail it to me 1st class recorded with ParcelForce. I paid an extra £28 for it to be sent recorded on top of the £250 I paid for the laptop. He then said he did it through Royal Mail but they didn't give him a tracking number. The days went on and I still had no laptop. He had apparently rang Royal Mail and they "told" him it had been lost and they had offered him a refund for the item. I then asked for the refund and he persistently kept saying PayPal wouldn't let him send it. I even pointed him in all the right places however all of these were apparently unsuccessful. I even went to the length of giving him my account number and sort code so he could do a bank transfer to avoid PayPal and even this was still not an option.

After over a week of waiting for the laptop I decided to try and get my money back through PayPal so I opened a dispute. I didn't quite understand the whole thing and thought it would be like a back and forth messaging system overseen by PayPal. I initially sent a comment just saying I'm opening the dispute just incase he couldn't work out how to pay me as I still thought there was some validity to his situation. He then posted a comment lying and said Royal Mail had sent it to a place called Oldfield (happens to be my last name) which is literally no where near where I live. My address was clear on PayPal and I even texted him my address when sending the postal address. He then said I had taken out over £400 out of his account somehow. He then immediately escalated the dispute to a claim judging by the timestamps. Because he has done this I cannot add any evidence or any more comments showing my innocence which is the reasoning for this long rant.

So in summary I need to contact PayPal to send them evidence is there an email address I can do this and what steps can I do to help my case?

Thanks,

John

[omarrob]

The same thing have just happened with me. the seller directly escalated the dispute into a claim and im now unable to provide any evidences. what should i do

[omarrob]

The same thing have just happened with me. the seller directly escalated the dispute into a claim and im now unable to provide any evidences. what should i do

[kernowlass]

@omarrob

When you open a dispute  you should put in all your evidence immediately so that does not happen.

But if it was for an item not received dispute then the onus is on the seller to provide a tracking number that proves delivery of the item to you OR you should get a refund.

If its an item received but not as described dispute then paypal will let you know if they need further evidence but they ''tend'' to find in favour of the buyer BUT you will probably have to send the item back to the seller trackable to prove delivery before they have to refund you.