I am writing this in hope that i may save someone else from my experience. I listed an electronic device and it was bought immediately using Buy It Now. I throughly checked the unit before listing it and it was in perfect condition. I double bubble wrapped and shipped next day. The customer received and next day emailed me and claimed the lid and hinge was broken. I told them to send it back and i would look at it to see if there was mail or other damage. I asked for original box back also. I told them that if i or mail was at fault i would refund immediately. I heard absolutely nothing for 8 days, then bam. I had a complaint filed against me.
I answered immediately and told ebay the condition etc of merchandise and that i had tried to contact buyer but he wouldn't respond. Within hours i had an email back stating that they had ruled in the buyers favor for a full refund including shipping. Then they closed the form so that I couldn't even reply to this. Case closed and buyer gets everything back and i have a unit that is no longer usable and no compensation whatsoever and no help from ebay. At the same time as ebay filed complaint they also put an immediate hold on my paypal account of course for the funds. I waited for the unit to be returned.
When it arrived i checked it, no hinge broken on outside as stated but sure enough the lid had been forced back and it was broken internally. I wrote endless emails to ebay trying to dispute and these were ignored. Almost immediately upon delivery they refunded the buyers money, within the hour. Then i get a letter from paypal stating that for a period of at least 35 days my account will hold all monies from ebay transactions becasue i now have an unsatifactory account according to them. Now keep in mind that up until then i had no problems listed with ebay. I always went out of my way to keep the customer happy.
I am not a power seller just a little seller here and there. I also want to note this customer had no bad feedback but then again what they had previously bought would have been hard to damage. It is also hard to know now as ebay has made it a policy that only buyers may leave bad feedback. I was told by ebay that they changed this policy because it made the buyer happy and brought in new sellers. I told ebay maybe they better go google their company and read some of the complaints against them. I had suggested that maybe to be fair they could split the payment equal between both of us and was informed that they don't and can't do that.
Its all or nothing. So i told them that the conclusion was that the unit left here fine, no damage whatsoever during shipping and came back broken and i was just expected to eat the damage and lose the money also and they said yes. So now account funds will be put on hold, i lost all in this deal with no recourse AND because report was filed i also lose ALL listing and fees to ebay. Yes you heard me right. I lost my butt on this deal but learned a great deal. I told ebay and paypal both they don't need to worry because i will NEVER again use them as a selling venue and will defintely inform everyone around me about their dealing and practices.
I am aware that i am only one small seller in a big sea but if you put all those sellers together it makes a much bigger group in that sea. They took no time at all to review my case just simply stamped it in favor of buyer and closed it. So be very careful of what you list and don't expect to get your money back at all if a buyer decides they want their money back because it won't happen and don't make the mistake of thinking ebay is fair, they pretty much told me that they only take the buyers word because without buyers they wouldn't have sales. Cha ching: (
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