I mixed up items, how do I resolve the situation?

[christophernlewis]

I sold two items, one for about £50 and the other about £150. I messed up when packing them and sent them to the wrong buyers. The one who bought the expensive item has received the cheaper one and has complained. I don't know if the other has arrived yet. Both buyers are in mainland Europe. I do not have duplicate items to send.

I do I resolve this without loosing too much money? 

[slippinjimmy]

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@christophernlewis wrote:

I sold two items, one for about £50 and the other about £150. I messed up when packing them and sent them to the wrong buyers. The one who bought the expensive item has received the cheaper one and has complained. I don't know if the other has arrived yet. Both buyers are in mainland Europe. I do not have duplicate items to send.

I do I resolve this without loosing too much money? 

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The only thing you can do is try to get them returned to you do a direct exchange.

Of course you would need to cover their expenses either way. Ultimately if you can't retrieve or redirect the items you'll have to refund, maybe only one if the the buyer of the cheaper item is happy keeping the more expensive one.

Bottom line: there is no way to "force" either buyer to do anything other than return for a refund and even then the buyer who got the deal can refuse and there would be nothing that anyone can do.

It's a mistake most sellers have made if they have been around for any length of time. I've done it 3 or 4 times but always had very co-operative buyers and was able to keep my loses to a bit of shipping money.

[inhawaii]

Don't worry, i think we've all done that before.  Be humble.  Be honest.  Try to work with the 2 buyers and see what you can come up with.  Your mistake is going to cost you money, but consider it a learning experience. 

I think the 2 most popular options would be:

A) Work it out with your buyers to see if each one will send the package to the other buyer. It's risky. Both buyers have to be honest.  Both buyers have to be reliable.  Both buyers have to be willing to cooperate. You'll may need to offer them something "extra" to make up for your mistake.

B) Have both buyers return the item to you (at your expense of course) and you ship them back out to the correct buys. This is a better option because you have more control. You don't have to depend on the other person as much. This option is also more costly. 

I had the exact same thing happen to me a few months ago. 

Customer A got customer B's item.  Customer B's item was one of kind.  I had no more. I sent customer A a pre-paid, pre-addressed padded envelope so she could easily ship her wrong item to customer B.  I also sent customer A her original item plus and extra one as a bonus for being so understanding and so cooperative.   Fortunately i had more to send.  She was happy. 

Customer B got customer A's item. I told customer B to keep customer A's item and that his item will be coming shortly, which it did.  He was happy. 

My mistake was quite costly but it ended up with 2 happy customers both who left me positive feedback. 

Good luck and stay safe!

[kensgiftshop]

Best way to do it is to have them file an INAD and you pay return shipping.

Once the items are returned, refund, then relist so they can buy again.

[dk0]

The tricky part here is whether or not the buyer who received the more expensive item is willing to return it.

I had a similar situation years ago.  One buyer realized what I had sent him was worth more than what he ordered, so at first he ignored multiple emails, then he finally said he had already returned them.  I asked for tracking but he went back to radio silence, so it was pretty obvious what happened there.

[christophernlewis]

Thank you all for your answers. I think I'll try to get both items returned to me. I hope both buyers are reasonable people and will agree.

[luckythewinner]

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@christophernlewis wrote:

I sold two items, one for about £50 and the other about £150. I messed up when packing them and sent them to the wrong buyers. The one who bought the expensive item has received the cheaper one and has complained. I don't know if the other has arrived yet. Both buyers are in mainland Europe. I do not have duplicate items to send.

I do I resolve this without loosing too much money? 

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We can't really answer that without knowing what you consider to be  "too much money". 

In a perfect world, your buyers would be honest and understanding and would ship the items to each other with you reimbursing them for postage. But the world is not perfect, and most buyers are not willing to do extra work and wait extra time in order to reduce your costs.

Some choices are: 

(a) Ask the buyers to do an exchange. Getting the guy who received the £150 item for £50 to follow through might be a challenge, though. If it works you lose 2X shipping. If it fail completely, you lose £200 of merchandise plus 4X shipping. 

(b) Hope that both buyers return the items, and then you re-ship them correctly. Again, getting the guy who received the £150 item for £50 to follow through might be a challenge. You lose 4X shipping.

(c) Ask the unhappy buyer to return for refund, and hope the £50 buyer does not also ask for a return. You lose £150 of merchandise plus 2X postage and might get the £50 item back. 

(d) Refund the unhappy buyer, and hope the £50 buyer does not also ask for a return. You lose £150 of merchandise plus 1X postage. 

How much would all that postage amount to, and is it worth all the hassle?