How can a buyer received an item in perfect condition only to ship it back and ebay sides with them?

[dtech.consulting]

In todays digital age, I thought I did everything to protect myself, the seller.  I take pictures of my Garmin smart watch, I send additional photos of the watch to clarify his/her followup question.  They receive the watch and send a **bleep** pic showing a phyically broken watch band.  Not just broken... BROKEN & MANGLED!  I lookat his photo and compare to my multiple photos that show the same angle as their and there is obviously no damage, ZERO damage. 

With photo evidence I was confident ebay would say woah, this is cut and dry clear case of buyer neglect.  Not the case.  They sided with the buyer, he returned my watch which is now broken, unsellable and refunded the paultry $49 transaction amount.  I'm so angry I could spit nails!  I've never had someone do anything like this to me before and it seems almost unreal that ebay would side with the buyer on this.  Customer service talked a good game by "listening" to me.  But ultimately admitted that there's not a whole lot I can do.  When it came down to the decision, not even a real reason why they sided with the buyer.

This is about as cruel as it can get for me.  I don't understand it and I'm looking into small claims litigation but we're talking $49 here. 😡

[bonjourami]

Ebay would figure the watch was damaged in shipping. And in a he said, she said, case, Ebay will always side with the buyer.

[maddocks]

This.... eBay ALWAYS sides with the buyer. Even when the buyer is obviously a fraudster and gloats about how he is going to screw you in eBay's own emails to you. eBay won't care. Seller Terms and Conditions are absolutely meaningless. /don't sell anything you can't afford to lose //build a fraud buffer of at least 2-5% into your cost of goods sold to compensate for the certain 2% of sales that will otherwise make you pull your hair all out

[bigdeals.etc]

Sorry about this. We've all been there. Yes, unfortunately there almost is no such thing as "valid proof" in ebay's perspective. And whenever it's the buyer's word against the seller's... ebay will always side with the buyer.

That's UNLESS the buyer has a reported history of the activity you are accusing them of. So while it may not help you at this time, please please PLEASE click the "report buyer" link and report this buyer to ebay so they can investigate. I'm sure you wouldn't want this buyer to do this to any other seller again... especially if because they were 1 report shy of getting banned and you failed to report them.

[luckythewinner]

  How can a buyer received an item in perfect condition only to ship it back and ebay sides with them?

Because eBay cannot verify what was shipped, what was received, or what was returned.  

With photo evidence I was confident ebay would say woah, this is cut and dry clear case of buyer neglect. 

All your photo proves is that you have a photo. If all it took to win a case was a photo, then an unscrupulous seller with a photo of a Rolex would have a field day shipping packages with small rocks in them and winning the case based on the photo.

I don't understand it

That's probably because you assume that eBay cares whether you continue to sell here. They don't. 

I'm looking into small claims litigation but we're talking $49 here

Unless your buyer lives in the same state, the chances that your local small claims court can establish jurisdiction over your buyer are slim to none. If that is the case, you will probably need to travel to his state and file your claim there.