Accidentally paid for an item twice

[paperd_88]

Hi all, please bear with me as I know I have made a pretty rookie mistake here, but I'm not 100% sure where to go from here, since I have never done this before.

I checked out an item earlier today but the item didn't show in my payment history, nor did the listing go down, so I figured maybe it didn't go through due to connection issues or something like that. I checked out again, and thought nothing of it once I saw it in my payment history. However, it's hours later now, and I see that the first payment is now in my payment history showing as a duplicate pending payment. I contacted the seller to see what they might be able to do to prevent this and stop me being double charged/refund me if it goes through. Still waiting on a response though, so I'll post an update once I hear back. Is there anything else you guys recommend doing besides that?

Thanks in advance for any replies.

[mam98031]

Always watch your emails.  You will get notified when you purchase something.  So even if the system is a little behind in updating you know what you have purchased from the email notifications.

You just need to wait now.  You did the right thing by contacting your seller, letting them know you only wanted one item and accidentally purchased the second one.  They can cancel one of the transactions and then refund the payment you made.

If your seller doesn't answer by tomorrow, send them another email in the morning.  You definitely want to catch them BEFORE they ship.

Come on back if you need any further assistance.  

And don't feel bad.  We all make mistakes from time to time.  Everyone does it, even those that claim they don't.  LOL

[paperd_88]

Hi! Thanks for your quick and polite response, I feel a bit better now about my little mishap here, haha.

To clear things up, the listing is for one item as the seller was only selling one of these, so there are no worries about getting two items shipped on accident. I'm just worried since I paid for this twice technically, and that this second payment is in a limbo state where it's pending to go through for an item that was already bought. I can't find much info on scenarios like this online which just adds to my concern.

While I was writing this reply the seller got back to me and says he doesn't see any duplicate charge. Does this mean I'm probably in the clear and that this "pending charge" is, for lack of a better word, a "ghost charge"?

[mkaczorsee · Accepted solution]

If there was only one available and you paid, the system will not let you pay twice. 

One of the 2 pending charges will time out…meaning only one will go thru. 

[paperd_88]

Okay, glad to hear that, I didn't know about that being a thing. Thanks to both of you for your time!

[mam98031]

Go back and look at the listing number.  Look at quantity available.  If it was a multi quantity listing it would be there.

By now your purchase history should be all up to date as even on a bad day it wouldn't take that long.  That is probably the best place to go and look to see what you have purchased.  

https://www.ebay.com/myb/PurchaseHistory

[latkoh57]

HELLO!??!

Recently I have purchased something of ebay, & the same thing has happened to me. Once I purchased ebay immediately took the amount out of my bank account, next morning I wake up with another notification of “ebay -$60”. They charged me twice, & its not a double purchase, please let me know if you have gotten any solutions or if you had got your money refunded. Thanks so much would be widely appreciated!!

[mam98031]

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@latkoh57 wrote:

HELLO!??!

Recently I have purchased something of ebay, & the same thing has happened to me. Once I purchased ebay immediately took the amount out of my bank account, next morning I wake up with another notification of “ebay -$60”. They charged me twice, & its not a double purchase, please let me know if you have gotten any solutions or if you had got your money refunded. Thanks so much would be widely appreciated!!

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@latkoh57 

Go and take a closer look at your account.  It is highly likely you will find that there is only one charge.

When a buyer submits their payment for a purchase, Ebay pings the buyers funding source.  That is NOT pulling the money from your account, it is simply getting authorization for the charge.  Then a day or so later it will come through again and actually pull the money from your account.

So the 1st amount is simply an authorization, the 2nd one a day or so later is actually pulling the money and the original pinged amount will have disappeared.

This is a really normal process for credit cards and bank accounts that has happened for a very long time.  

But I encourage you to go an verify this by looking at the details of your account that you paid with.

[beautifulperfumes88]

Hi   Same thing happened to me just recently. I purchased the item and it went through so I didn’t go to check out twice or anything like that but somehow it charged same amount twice on next day. So I contacted Ebay and I even sent my bank summary shows deducted twice from my bank account  

but they said can’t find the any transaction with the particular seller 

so I got so confused and I contacted to seller who was very nice and such a helpful person. 
He even picked up the phone in the middle of the late night to find out issues 

He said it’s called the “Ghost Transaction 

You will see two transactions but it only charged one and other one will disappear within 48 hours. 
so I’m waiting to clear on Monday 

I just don’t know why they do things like this ,  Now I knew that I’m not only person got charged twice without any reasons. 
I think their systems got some kind of problems ^_^ 

[mam98031]

@beautifulperfumes88 

Read post # 8 just above yours.  It explains the process.

[beautifulperfumes88]

Thank you for your reply mam98031

and I wanted share my terrible experience with people  

So other people will know and aware of that.  

Customer service of Ebay reached me today and I started thinking about more and more and now I think that maybe my internet provider had problems that time.

 
The place I live have bad internet connections and interruptions all that time lately especially last year and a half 

More people stayed at home and used more internet services because of the pandemic. 

When I checked out for the payment 

I clicked the confirm and pay and went through at once and I received the confirmation note through email but maybe something got wrong because of my internet provider. 
That’s how I’m thinking about now  - - -   

[lohep-0]

Always have them call you they will refund you they have done it to me twice in two weeks I think I’m done with them myself I don’t believe there’s a glitch lol 

[gulnarmccoo-0]

I paid once for the cell phone, in a few minutes I had to cancel the purchase, but the problem is that EBay charged me twice according my bank account. I got the refund, but extra payment is still pending. Talked to the bank, can’t reach out the ebay customer service.

[mam98031]

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@gulnarmccoo-0 wrote:

I paid once for the cell phone, in a few minutes I had to cancel the purchase, but the problem is that EBay charged me twice according my bank account. I got the refund, but extra payment is still pending. Talked to the bank, can’t reach out the ebay customer service.

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Something "pending" typically only lasts a few days at most.  Something Pending does NOT mean it will be charged to your bank account.

When a buyer purchases something on Ebay, Ebay pings your funding source which creates this Pending entry that you see.  That is a guarantee that the funds will be there when Ebay fully processes your payment.  

Then when the transaction is processed, it would then in a couple days show on your bank account as a transaction with the funds removed from your account and the Pending transaction would disappear.

Now since you decided to Cancel the purchase, your payment never completed the cycle.  Your account was NOT charged.  I'm not sure how long that pending notification will remain, buy it will not get charged to your account because you cancelled your order.

Oh wait, one thing.  A buyer can request a cancellation but they can not actually create a cancellation.  Only the seller can do that.  Did your seller accept your cancellation request and return the money to you?

[kh-leslie]

Hi everyone,

Due to the age of this thread, it has been closed to further replies. Please feel free to start a new thread HERE if you wish to continue to discuss this topic.

Thank you for understanding.