Tracking scam, received refund, seller continues with impunity
So this is what happened to me:
I purchase an approximately $40 item. Seller buys and drop ships a $1 random thing from Amazon. Seller posts Amazon tracking into EBay sale through Aquiline. Weird package arrives. Actual purchase never received. EBay shows delivered same day as weird package. Aquiline won't show actual shipper, and clicks through to a blank screen. Seller is messaged for shipper detail, but they don't respond. I open EBay case, then seller replies with Aquiline. Tracking isn't searchable and there's no way to directly track delivery. The weird package Amazon "tracking" numbers on the front of the Amazon plastic envelope is an Amazon Logistics number which isn't publicly trackable. Case is complicated with a tracking number showing delivery but of course it's fake.
EBay granted a "courtesy refund" but the seller had NEUTRAL and NEGATIVE feedback for failing to deliver previously. The negative claimed the seller was not in the states as listed. My negative feedback wasn't posted, I guess because I was refunded? The seller continues with impunity!
This is unique because it involves both Aquiline and Amazon. Third party tracking sites seem to facilitate the scam.
kensgiftshop
·1 year agoAlways check the seller feedback page and see where they are located.
If it's an International seller shipping from the US, good chance they are dropshipping from Amazon or Aliexpress.
ingyhere
OP1 year agoThank you. That is actually great advice, and it is what I did. In this case they claimed to be in a major city on the north-eastern seaboard but that appears to be a lie. Other posts on the forum indicate EBay isn't seriously validating seller locations.
I think it's a situation of a number of oversights being exploited. The more dimensions that can be exploited, the less secure and reliable is the site.
Ironically, given all the controls today on selling and buying, EBay seems to be back to its original concept: You are taking a risk! But nowadays not all negatives are being published, so the capacity to identify scams is limited. Not a good combo!
mudshark61369
·1 year ago@ingyhere ,
"I open EBay case, then seller replies with Aquiline. Tracking isn't searchable and there's no way to directly track delivery".
It would appear that you filed an Item Not Received (INR) dispute, when you should have filed an Item Not As Described (INAD) dispute. You did receive something just not what you ordered. You were lucky that ebay could not verify the Aquiline tracking info, and issued a courtesy refund. Had the delivery been able to be verified you would have lost the dispute.
"EBay granted a "courtesy refund" but the seller had NEUTRAL and NEGATIVE feedback for failing to deliver previously".
You should check the feedback profile of any seller you intend to buy from Before making a purchase.
ingyhere
OP1 year agoAs clearly stated earlier, the tracking could not be linked directly to the sale. My household buys more than one item at a time, we live in an urban area that sometimes has porch pirates and for various reasons due to my career receiving a "free" item of the type sent would imply a different kind of scam. So, no, it was in fact the correct dispute when the package could not at that time be connected to the sale. I would have done a charge back, anyway, if the dispute was denied. Who cares if my 20+ year old account that has made the Bay lots of profit is closed when they cannot guarantee freedom from sophisticated scams. I would generously suggest the focus be on eliminating third-party tracking proxies like Aquiline that allows scammers to operate. Or, alternately, the fact that EBay allows them to retain functional accounts after such reports.
As clearly stated earlier, once again, it's reasonable to tend to lean toward giving sellers a break on a platform seemingly stilted toward buyers (no return feedback, for one). This seller had over ten positives to accompany a single negative feedback. However, my feeling is the positives were set up to make the account look great ... Not really hard to do for nominal cost. So, as a former seller and now sometimes seller who always checks feedback, no I'm not going to be uptight about seeing a single cranky negative six months ago. Here I would generously suggest that the focus be on why apparently not all negatives published by buyers appear on the seller profile. (There are numerous potential reasons for this but they all boil down to policy decisions.) For every negative in the past year now, I think it is reasonable to assume that there are at least one or two others that were shadow banned (exactly what's going on here).
kathiec
·1 year ago@ingyhere
It's an easily solved problem. If you didn't receive the item you purchased, go to the item in your purchase history and click Return under More actions. Select that the item was not as described in the listing. After three business days have passed, go back to the return case and ask eBay to step in. They'll either send you a return label or refund without requiring a return.
ingyhere
OP1 year agoRight. I guess in this case I received something that actually wasn't the product so that is legit. The problem was I initially couldn't connect it to the Ebay sale due to obfuscated tracking. But I can see this happening with items going to different addresses, too. ...