Best regards,
@farmalljr wrote:At one point in time, eBay would protect sellers on some small level, when you shipped to a FF. If it was delivered to the forwarder, the buyer could not claim INR. Now even THAT protection has evaporated.
eBay does still protect against INR claims, when the package is tracked and scanned delivered to a US address (I don't ship international, so I don't have direct experience of those rules). Several of my clients have been protected that way -- buyer claimed non-delivery, tracking shows package was delivered, buyer INR claim is denied. Interestingly, none of those buyers have thought to (or been able to?) file a chargeback on the payment.
I've personally had one buyer who thought she was just so smart... she made a purchase and had it shipped (back when I was still shipping some items internationally). It was scanned delivered to the US address she gave me. A couple weeks later, she messages me that the shipment was damaged and she wants to return it...and oh, by the way, her address was in Georgia the country, not Georgia the state, so she needed a return label from her international address, which she was kind enough to supply.
It almost felt good to explain to her that she most certainly could return her purchase, but that the return label would be generated for the same US address the package had been delivered to. And that, oh, by the way, that address is a registered Freight Forwarding company and your eBay protections against this kind of issue ended when the FF company accepted the delivery. But I'd be happy to send her the label for the US address and she could work out the rest with the FF company.
Never heard another peep (even tho she had been added to by BBL, she could still communicate with me for this singular transaction, just not create any more transactions with me). It was a somewhat low price item, in the $25-$50 range as I recall, but I'm guessing the cost of getting it back to the US was more than that. She really should have thought her little scheme thru.
Now before you get all upset that an 'innocent buyer' was being treated like a scammer... I purposely did not copy the complete text of her messages (I don't want to get banned for language) or the actual number of them or the attitude they just oozed. And if she had indeed returned the purchase to the US address, I would have sent the label needed to return it to me from that address and refunded her when it arrived. I was treating her exactly as I would anyone asking for a refund for a damaged shipment. She just didn't follow through.
-Bob.
Cancelling an order because of the delivery address is a legitimate reason - it's called "Problem With Address". No qualifiers - no "but you can't do this for this, that, or the other reasons". Just a simple recognition that they seller has a problem with the buyer's address. Period.
What you have failed to recognize is that some sellers choose not to ship their products internationally - could be for any reason or no reason, but it's their choice to make. Since eBay has failed to enforce the fact that the buyer's home address in non-US but their delivery address is, they apparently are OK with sellers who don't want to ship internationally, for any reason or none at all, using the Problem with Address cancellation option.
The reason the seller wants to cancel orders to Freight Forwarders is irrelevant. The reason why the international buyer circumvented the sellers domestic-only listing is irrelevant. What is relevant is that the seller has a problem with the delivery address supplied by the buyer and the seller is therefor allowed to cancel. If eBay wants to say "no, that's not a valid reason", then they also need to explain why they are letting international buyers purchase domestic-only listings. That sounds less like "just a venue" and more like an active partner making business decisions for your business.
If it makes it easier, look at it this way - you have a BBL for buyers that you simply don't want to do business with, regardless of your reason why. If the buyer tries to circumvent the BBL, the order is summarily cancelled - end of transaction, no feedback allowed, no defect to seller account. Listing a product as domestic only should be the same - if the buyer tries to circumvent a seller's domestic only listing, the order should be cancelled - end of transaction, no feedback allowed, no defect to the seller account. There is no difference -- in both cases, the buyer is circumventing a restriction the seller has placed on their listing. "No Shoes, No Shirt, No Entrance".
-Bob.
@this*old*attic wrote:
It’s NOT a “business choice” it’s a problem because, in the end, this is EBay’s sand box and not just any one individual seller’s. Bottom line, EBay allows US addresses, including freight shippers, and even created the global shipping program (or whatever it’s called) to get sellers to CHILL. Why? Because international customers increase sales for everyone and what enough sellers do to turn off customers potentially hurts all of us.
”Problem with address” means a buyer’s address has cropped up as undeliverable in some way (invalid/incomplete/etc.). NOT “Gee, I just don’t wanna”. Using that answer is just a lie to avoid one of the other choices that causes a ding.
The very fact that EBay DOES NOT offer a way around this is….um, a clue.
Yet folks who proudly proclaim they will fake workarounds to the site’s set-up are the exact same ones who jump on any little transaction awkwardness or disappointment, loudly screeching that their customer is a deviant scammer who should be booted from the site or otherwise harshly disciplined to better police the site and protect sellers.
@this*old*attic PayPal allowed Sellers to block foreign funding sources, eBay's Managed Payments does not. Sellers should still have that option so that is should be their choice.
"Problem with address" can be used for unusual circumstances as stated by eBay on a Weekly Chat last year ( wish I had the reference and if memory serves Trinton posted that but he is gone from support here). This may be one of those circumstances where the venue does not block foreign funding sources and if Sellers have foreign countries turned off then technically they should be permitted to cancel those transactions.
For myself I have shipped to many foreign Buyers with US addresses on both coasts without issue. That is not to say I won't have an issue in the future but thus far I haven't. I HAVE had issues with shipping directly to Buyers in other countries. I think many of those who use Freight forwarders are resellers in places where things here in the US are hard to come by and my OPINION is that many of the Buyers have stores or are well off and can afford the extra shipping cost.
