eBay and PayPal ALWAYS side with buyer. The main reason of this practice is to minimize possible buyer's credit card charge back to save their cost and make more profit. Buyer can file charge back with credit card issuer WITHOUT LOSING ONE PENNY even later on dispute is found in favor of seller (Buy never pays fees for a dispute regardless of the outcome). While eBay and PayPal have to spend money to process charge backs: money for labor (hire people to process) and office and possible penalty when case loses.
I had a case where the buyer bought the wrong item and sent back to unauthorized address found on the sender's section of the shipping label of the package, without evening contacting me or officially requesting return for an official return address. I had moved and the returned item was lost.
After the item tracking shows "delivered" on UPS site, the buyer requested refund from me. Obviously since I moved and never received the return, I refused refund. Buyer then requested return in PayPal for fake reason "item is defective". I had to accept it and authorized the return to the NEW address. The buyer just inputted the tracking number and PayPal immediately issued him full refund. I appealed and failed. The PayPal agent says although the tracking shows item was returned BEFORE return request was made, and was delivered to a different city (old address) other than the one (new address) I specified, it still counts as a "valid" return address because the distance between the old and new address is so "close" . When I asked how close is deemed as close enough to be counted as valid return address, the agent says it is completely at PayPal's sole discretion. Let's imagine a revered case, if seller ships item to a "close enough" city other than the original one on the order, I seriously doubt eBay/PayPal will deem the addres is valid and side with seller when buyer says not received..
In another crazy return case, buyer is supposed to return TWO items. However he messaged me in eBay "I have disposed the one of them so I can only send back one, not two". I had to respond "OK, please send back the only one you have at hand". Eventually I really received only one back. I wanted to charge restocking fees so I called eBay custom service. You know what the agent sad to me?? "Well, I see you messaged the buyer you are OK to receive one of them, not two. The message is deemed as an AGGREEMENT between you seller and your buyer. So even the buyer really returned only one, you cannot refuse full refund or charge restocking fees" --- So what is the final outcome? The buyer got one $150 item for free, and I lost $150, wasted more than one hour on phone with eBay agents, and received a defect on my seller performance because I called to open a case that was sided with buyer.
There are tons of sad stories like these. No help to complain. You have to accept or you cannot sell online. That's cost of doing bunnies. Unless the credit card charge back rules are changed to being more favorable to seller, the situation where seller is always disadvantaged in dispute will never change.
Remember, eBay and PayPal ALWAYS (not 100% but at least 99%) side with buyer. Take this into account and think it carefully if you can afford the loss before you start to sell.
penguins_dont_fly is a Volunteer Community Mentor
