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I got Scammed, & eBay coming after me for $3270 & won't hear my side.
This has been an exasperating experience. I'm writing to this community before I cancel a 23 yr. membership to eBay, maybe someone out there can give me some helpful advice. here's the story.
around Oct 1st I noticed most of the saved E-mails in my home computer were suddenly "gone" and then I realized I was not getting any new e-mails over the next few days, it took several days to get my email put back in my name & when new messages started coming in I saw many from eBay about my account & angry sellers & eBay freezing my account, it took at least 4 more days to find someone @ eBay to put me back in charge of my own account as every time the asked for phone verification it never matched my long established phone no. finally I got a sympathetic person @ eBay to reestablish my phone number & that's when all the damage was realized. the scammer had set up BIN sales for 3 identical (expensive) sound systems for $2500 and actually sold one, the money was sent to a Citi-bank card he had set up in the meanwhile & deposited, Ebay went after my own Chase card & was able to take $3270 from it....why the extra $770 was tacked on, I have no clue. after much protesting from me they seemed to have sent it back to Chase & went after the original Citi bank card, of course they never got the funds back from that scammers card & are now attempting to "again" get it from me, I of course removed all payment methods as I certainly don't trust eBay anymore to do the right thing. there's probably much more, but basically all I get is one-way messages from eBay with hardly any way to tell my side of the story, if they would actually just look at the progression of things, they could easily figure out what happened, this is all very frustrating & completely unfair & I don't have anywhere to go with my complaint & am seriously thinking of closing the whole thing down. one thing I don't want is for eBay to add this on to my taxes on the 1099K or whatever it is, what an insult to injury to have to pay taxes on $3270 that I didnt receive. thanks for any help you can offer.
shipscript
·2 years agoYou will probably receive a 1099K, but you can deduct the expense of the "refund" that eBay issued the buyer, which canceled the sale. There may be further deductions if eBay extracts money from your bank. Check with your accountant.
Account security is the responsibility of the account holder. Most hijacked accounts occur due to clicking links in emails or on websites, and eBay doesn't have any responsibility to protect members whose accounts were hijacked through no fault of eBay. However, eBay does try to help out as much as possible by reversing any damage that it can. In this case, they attempted to pull money from the scammer's card, but failed.
The situation sounds like your email became infected first, and then your eBay password was stolen through a request to reset your password. I'm sorry you were caught up in this mess. It's an extremely expensive lesson in caution.
bruceang
OP2 years agoI can see I came to the wrong place, sounds like eBay employees. if eBay had bothered to help put me back in control of my own account in a timely manner, this wouldn't have happened. they wouldn't even let me present my side at all, it's nothing but one-way conversations with no ability to even defend myself. & my email DID have something to do with it, they (scammer) were able to get my messages diverted to their account somehow & it slowed down what was going on with my eBay account as I was locked out of that as well & didnt know that items were even being offered for sale...until it was too late. when they (eBay) refuse to help me log into my own account, I am helpless to do anything. after the 1st attack on my credit card (which was not they card they paid out to) I blocked & removed any further payment methods, this will probably end with me either canceling a 23 yr. account ...or eBay restricting it to death. if you folks don't think it can happen to you...I hope you never find out.
shipscript
·2 years ago@bruceang
I do truly empathize with your situation. It can happen to anyone — been there done that. I've always been skittish about linking a payment account to any company (like the IRS) that can take funds at will, so, for the past 40 years, I've had different bank accounts for different purposes, and maintain a low balance in those public facing accounts. But, even with my protections in place, someone made a $5000 ACH withdrawal from my BofA checking account that had just been funded to write monthly checks, so it was flush at just the right moment. All the scammer needed was the routing number and account number off the face of a check. The unauthorized withdrawal was not caught until my other checks started bouncing.
The bank was at fault for allowing an ACH transfer that did not contain the proper credentials and authorizing name. In the end, BofA went after the recipient of the ACH transfer, and that company was left holding the empty bag, while I was left to mop up the rest of the damage. To this day, I still keep nearly empty checking accounts because I do international business with overseas customers who need to pay me with a wire transfer or ACH transfer, and I don't want bidirectional exposure.
While eBay played no part in the breech of your account, they do have the deeper pockets, and maybe they will feel some guilt for making it too hard for you to quickly recover your account. So you may still find some sympathy there, even if only to meet half way and accept half the blame. I would recommend that you keep trying to reach out to them. The only eBay team that can help with these account issues is the Customer Support staff that can be reached through the help pages.
We volunteers on the community forum can only provide suggestions on where to poke next, but that is about all we are good for when it comes to account issues like yours.
bruceang
OP2 years ago"While eBay played no part in the breech of your account"
Hummm....eBay kept me from my account while someone was selling items under my name, refused to put me in charge of my own account for 8 days while a scammer sold fake items under my name, & then tried to charge me for all this while they kept my away....nothing to see here, I guess.
disneyshopper
Mentor2 years agoHaving emails deleted from your computer has nothing to do with ebay. Aren't you logging in regularly into ebay? If so, you would have seen those fake listings, and done something about it then. Payments from sellers don't go to a credit card. You stated the scammer/hi-jacker had payments sent to his Citi card. Payments go to a checking account.
To contact Ebay Customer Service, use this link and click on "Have us call you":
https://www.ebay.com/help/contact_us?id=4002&st=10
Customer Service is open 5:00am to 9:30pm Pacific time.
bruceang
OP2 years agoThank you for your sympathy, no & I don't live & breath eBay, I can actually go a week without doing so. the payment DID go to a Citi bank account (per ebay) I have the last 4 numbers...you are wrong !