Buyer read my listing wrong and blamed me in the Return Request. Will this hurt my account?

[esipower2020]

So I'm pretty new to Ebay, so let me know if I'm missing something. I'm selling a used stepladder, and tall stepladders are difficult to ship. Since they are so long, wide, and lightweight, the shipping would cost more than a new ladder, so I wanted to do local pickup only. 

So when I made the listing, I specifically turned off the option for shipping, and selected Local Pickup Only. Once the listing was made, in the shipping section, all it says is "Free Local Pickup." In addition to that, I also had "Pickup Only" in the title, as well as "Local Pickup Only" in the description. I didn't think there was anything else I could do to be more clear that is was pickup only and NOT shipping.

Someone ended up buying a ladder, so I messaged them asking when they could pick it up, and they responded that "the post said free shipping." I told him it says local pickup only in multiple places, and he said he couldn't pick it up, so he requested a refund, no big deal. 

However, in his return request, he selected "Item did not match description" and then commented "The ad said free shipping." As far as I can tell, this is simply not true. I believe this buyer only looked at the shipping section, saw the word "Free" within "Free local pickup," and assumed it meant free shipping and decided to buy without reading anything else. This really isn't a huge deal, except for the fact that he blamed the mistake on me in the return, despite what I messaged him.

So my question is: will that false claim that my "Item did not match description" have a negative impact on my account? And if so, is there a way to dispute the false claim? 

I've attached exactly what I see in my listing, and I have not changed anything since his return. Let me know if I could have been any more clear that it was local pickup only and not free shipping.

[gwzcomps]

If they opened a not as described case it will count against you.  It only matters once you get "too many".  I wouldn't recommend selling common easy to find items like that on eBay if you are going to do local pickup only.  It might help to put "LOCAL PICKUP ONLY" as the first three words in all caps.  In the end you are going to find it either won't sell of you will run into more dumb buyers like this.

[femmefan1946]

No.

As long as you refunded promptly the Dispute has no effect on your selling account.

It's having arguments with the buyer that causes Defects.

And while we are at it, Feedback is not used by eBay to assess selling accounts either, although some buyers do refer to it.

[debad4042]

Wait? They filed a case and don't have the item? I'd be a smarty pants and issue a return label to them.

[pjcdn2005 · Accepted solution]

You won't get a defect although you will get a mark against you on your service metrics but that won't affect you unless you have quite a few of those.

I'm curious...did you tell them to open a return? The easiest way to have refunded them is for you to have cancelled the purchase using the ' buyer requested cancellation' reason. That wouldn't have counted against you.  In this case you could also have used 'problem with address' as a reason for cancelling.

[bimmerpc1]

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@esipower2020 wrote:

Someone ended up buying a ladder, so I messaged them asking when they could pick it up, and they responded that "the post said free shipping." I told him it says local pickup only in multiple places, and he said he couldn't pick it up, so he requested a refund, no big deal. 

---

That happened because eBay's stupid mobile implementations display listings with local pick up as "FREE SHIPPING".  Not sure of the exact number, but something like 40-50% of traffic on eBay is mobile.  If you do local pickups, this happens A LOT.  Worse, your listing title with "pickup only" in it may not have been shown to the buyer if they purchased through an eBay product page.

So it was a good move to contact them and ask when they'd pick up, but then your next move when they responded about not being able to pick it up would have been what @pjcdn2005  - cancel the sale before a request is opened that can negatively affect you.

Local pickups on eBay are a mess.  There are ways you can make it easier but there will always be huge risks that don't exist on other platforms.

[gwens*4saleitems*]

............... General Question ...................... 

How is this a "Return Case" ? (item wasn't shipped / received) and not a simple cancel because the buyer couldn't do local pickup ????????????????? 

WTH ! I'm confused 

[luckythewinner]

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@esipower2020 wrote:

So I'm pretty new to Ebay, so let me know if I'm missing something

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Unsolicited advice: 

'The pre-owned items you receive may not be exactly as pictured, but will be in similar usable condition. "

Many sellers have done something similar to the above and lived to regret not picturing the actual item the buyer is getting.

Your picture is part of the description, and if it does not match teh item it is reasonable grounds for a "not as described" dispute. 

That side, I suspect some buyers will be hesitant to buy an item that they feel may be different than what they see when they come to pick it up. 

[esipower2020]

If that is the case, that is incredibly frustrating. However, when I search for local pickup items on my own phone, both in the app and through a mobile browser, it pretty clearly says "Free local pickup" where the shipping info is, and the entire title of the listing shows as well.

Something I just found out now is that you can choose "Free Shipping" as a filter, and it will show free local pickup items along with items with actual free shipping. Now even then, it still clearly shows "Free local pickup" but I can see how that would be confusing. 

Next time I'll try to make sure I'm the one who cancels the order, but this person pretty much requested a refund as soon as he read my message asking for his pickup availability.

Honestly I agree with you and most people who replied here that ebay isn't the best way to sell used local pickup items, but I'm running this account on behalf of my company and we decided to list all our inventory on one website for now, so I'm just trying my best with what I got. 

[esipower2020]

I did not tell them to open a return, they told me they were going to request a return as soon as I messaged them asking for when they would pick it up since it was local pick up only. Honestly I wouldn't have known to cancel it anyway since I'm new to the app, but I wouldn't have had time to anyway since he requested the refund almost immediately. 

So that's good to know, I'll try to do that if this happens again. 

[mdaneke]

Yes, It will!