I sell restored vintage violin bows through Ebay’s “But it Now” format. A prospective buyer wants to buy and pay for a bow that I have for sale now, but she doesn’t want me to ship it. Instead, she wants me to wait until sometime in the future, when she hopes that I would have another bow that she would find “irresistible.” Then, she would buy and pay for that one, I would send both bows in one package, and she would only have to pay for one shipping fee instead of two. (Shipping a bow by USPS costs about $30 because of the extra charge for items longer than 30 inches.)
I am not opposed to her proposition, but I’m not sure how the mechanics of the deal would work out. Because, if she paid for the bow and I didn’t send it, Ebay would know that I hadn’t. Would EBay then, after a certain amount of time, automatically refund her payment and penalize me for not shipping the bow?
If that’s what would happen, is there some way to structure the deal so it wouldn’t happen? How about if I sent her a small, lightweight parcel that cost very little to send. Then Ebay would know from the tracking that she had received a shipment from me.
Does anyone out there have any other ideas or advice about this?
I’m sure she is not trying to scam me, and I can’t even see how this could be a scam.
