INR opened. Trying to resolve but buyer not responding. SCAM?

[redbirdvintage66]

I have only been selling on Ebay for two years as a hobby for some extra cash. This is my first INR case. I shipped item on April 17.  Sent a complimentary message (I do this with all my buyers to establish communication and rapport) to the buyer letting them know I shipped their item and gave them the USPS ETA. It arrived at USPS in Portland OR on April 21st. Then delivery stalled. The last update was April 25th stating item "in transit". Buyer filed INR without trying to inquire/ communicate with me first. Ebay tells me to refund the buyers money within 3 days. I immediately sent the buyer the tracking info and also a message stating my concern and that I would check with my local postmaster to see if they have any further information. No response from buyer. The next day, I messaged the buyer again letting him know the item is still in transit and to give it a few more days as the PO was experiencing weather related delays. Again, no response from buyer. Did a little research on the address and discovered this could be a potential scam freight forwarding address. 6215 NE 92nd Drive. Portland, Oregon.  When I looked up the company, there are MANY reviews warning that this is a scam across many selling platforms. I contacted Ebay, but they told me to refund the buyer, file a claim with the post office( which is another fiasco) to recover my money. They also told me they will with hold my pay out as a way to "protect" my money... say what? That doesn't make sense. Can any of you advise on how to proceed. I REALLY don't want to pay this buyer, as I am 99.9% sure this is bogus. I hope I am wrong.

[sdneped]

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@redbirdvintage66 wrote:

It arrived at USPS in Portland OR on April 21st. Then delivery stalled. The last update was April 25th stating item "in transit". 

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Call the freight forwarder @redbirdvintage66 to confirm that it arrived, then share that name with your buyer.

[redbirdvintage66]

Thank you all for your advise and constructive criticism. It is helpful and much appreciated. This is a wonderfully supportive and helpful community. All the best to each of you! 

[redbirdvintage66]

Thank you for your kind response and advise. It is much appreciated! 🙂

[redbirdvintage66]

Thank you for your comment. I plan to refund the buyer and take it up with the USPS. Your response is very helpful, and hopeful! Much appreciated too! All the best to you.

[gone.c-33]

You say “I immediately sent the buyer the tracking info and also a message stating my concern and that I would check with my local postmaster to see if they have any further information.”

But did you actually enter the tracking number IN THE DISPUTE or you just DMed it to the buyer?

If you hope that eBay will give your item a bit of time to get unstuck you need to add the tracking to the dispute.

[reallynicestamps]

When was it due?

The buyer can't open the Claim until it is overdue.

Immediately put the tracking number into the Claim even if it doesn't show delivery yet.

Don't bother communicating with the buyer.

Freight forwarders are the second safest addresses you can get.

The forwarder's clerk doesn't care that much about what is coming in. They just do their job, bored and waiting for coffee break.

If you put in the tracking number eBay can see that the shipment is either in transit (and might maybe fingers crossed give you a little leeway) or has already arrived.

Never talk to phone clerks. They work for a subcontractor and are notoriously undertrained.

And also waiting for coffee break.

[mintsfmintsf]

Sadly, in a case like this you are kind of screwed unless it was an item that was shipped through an eBay special shipping program like eBay Standard Envelope in which case, eBay would be sending the buyer a refund.

Since it is not showing delivered, you can request USPS look into this.  They will normally respond to a request within 3 business days which means that this item very well could be found.

[itsjustasprain]

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@mintsfmintsf wrote:

Sadly, in a case like this you are kind of screwed unless it was an item that was shipped through an eBay special shipping program like eBay Standard Envelope in which case, eBay would be sending the buyer a refund.

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No - for an eSE shipment YOU must refund the buyer (as eSE shipments cannot be scanned as either Accepted or Delivered because they do not have tracking barcodes - just routing codes). After you refund the buyer you can then file for restitution from Ebay up to $20 of value.

[itsjustasprain]

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@tsme35 wrote:

I had a problem with Portland OR freight forwarder last year, had 2 packages scanned in Portland then nothing. My buyer didn't open a case but email me about it being stuck and if it doesn't move they'd open a claim. So I open a mail inquiry then a missing mail report, I got a call from the Portland PO, she told me they have thousands of packages delivered to that freight forwarder and they can't scan them all, some just get thru. I informed her that will cost them a lost package claim, didn't bother her none.

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Hah! Once those lost package claims start piling up the head office WILL be bothering her about it. A missing mail claim is the easiest one to win from USPS because your proof is their tracking - which stops and never gets delivered to the recipient.

[slati_2013]

I had a case like this to a freight forwarder. I am 100% convinced it was delivered even though the scan did not show so. Another time I had an item supposedly stuck in transit. In this case I contacted the buyer because it was a fire department chief who placed the order himself and stressed it was urgent. To my surprise he told me the items were delivered weeks ago, yet the tracking showed in transit. 

But there is not really much you can do here. Even if it was delivered and the tracking still shows not delivered, you are going to have to refund. In my case the buyer asked if I could send the order again. I said sure but this time it was coming by UPS and would require a signature. I never heard from him again. 

[chapeau-noir]

@redbirdvintage66  If you haven't, check with your own post office and see what their internal tracking says - they often have more detailed information than what we get.

Also, and I know this sounds like it shouldn't work, but it has, open up the tracking number on the USPS website and enter it for notifications - you can choose what events to be notified of (i.e., movement in the system, delivery, late delivery, etc.). Text or email. For some reason, when I've done this it has bounced the package loose - I don't know why, but it costs nothing to try except a minute of your time.

[mam98031]

@redbirdvintage66 

@redbirdvintage66 

Sent a complimentary message (I do this with all my buyers to establish communication and rapport) to the buyer letting them know I shipped their item and gave them the USPS ETA.

I respect you are doing this in an effort to give top notch customer service, but at some point you will run across a buyer that gets upset by it as they may feel like they are being spammed because Ebay automatically sends that type of an email to your buyers when you create the shipping label in Ebay.  Too many emails are simply annoying for some and can cause them to take it out on you at some point.

Buyer filed INR without trying to inquire/ communicate with me first. Ebay tells me to refund the buyers money within 3 days.

That is not unusual for a buyer to do that.  It is nice if they contact us first, but certainly not necessary.  You might look a bit closer at that INR.  It likely tells you to respond in 3 days, not necessarily refund in 3 days.  If the item has had movement on the tracking in the last 7 days, Ebay knows that the seller needs time to allow the carrier to actually deliver, so the INR stays open.  

Because you shipped to what is known as a Freight Forwarder really has NOTHING to do with the INR being filed.  There are plenty of **bleep** out there and most transactions move through them without issue.

You appear to be losing site of how well protected sellers are with INR claims.  It is the best Seller Protection that Ebay offers.  The FIRST thing a seller should do when a buyer files an INR regarding a USPS package go to the USPS site, call up the tracking on the package and then sign up for email updates on any movement on the package.  That way if there is any entry on the tracking, you get an email.

Then you go and file for a TRACE.

https://usps.my.site.com/emailus/s/package-inquiry

You will get an email from USPS with a Trace number for you.  It usually takes them 24-72 hours to respond with actual info.  

Now go to the INR and send the buyer a message.  Keep all you messages inside the claim for good record keeping and don't seen a ton of emails to your buyer, just enough to keep them informed with new info as you get it.  But message them and tell them you have filed a Trace on the package and will update them as soon as you get info.  USPS usually responds in 24-72 hours.

The trace will often shake the package loose.  And hopefully it will do this for you.

You are assuming that there is some kind of scam going on here because a freight forwarder is involved.  You need to understand the freight forwarder did NOT file the INR, they can't, they aren't the buyer.  Only the buyer can file a claim.

When the package gets delivered, then you are covered by Seller protection.  So do NOT rush to a refund, there simply is no need for it at this point.  Keep an eye on it and come back as you have other questions.

[dbfolks166mt]

     As others have noted you do need to respond to the INR case by uploading the tracking number and routing information. It is best to pull this from the USPS site as the information eBay shows is not always in sync with USPS. If you fail to respond to the INR the buyer can ask eBay to step in and of course eBay is going to side with the buyer, fully refund them and ding your metrics. 

     You are in Loveland, Ohio and most of your items appear to ship USPS ground advantage. You mailed the package on April 17 and it arrived in Portland, which is also the destination of the FF, on April 21st. I would have expected any "weather related" delays to have occurred before the item arrived in Portland. Even if there were delays in Portland the package should not have languished in Portland for almost 2 weeks. 

     You can open a lost package claim with USPS based on the timeline below. One of the questions they are going to ask you is if the buyer/receiver has been refunded for the item. If you refund the buyer there is of course a risk that USPS may find the package and deliver it and you are stuck with trying to get your money or the item back from the buyer. I have had to file more USPS insurance claims, 4 of them in the last 8 months, than I have filed in the last 5 years. USPS never located any of those items and the cases were quickly settled and I received the checks shortly afterwards. Based on the following timeline you should be able to file a lost package claim as of 3 May. You will need a USPS account to open the claim. 

[a_c_green]

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@chapeau-noir wrote:

Also, and I know this sounds like it shouldn't work, but it has, open up the tracking number on the USPS website and enter it for notifications - you can choose what events to be notified of (i.e., movement in the system, delivery, late delivery, etc.). Text or email. For some reason, when I've done this it has bounced the package loose - I don't know why, but it costs nothing to try except a minute of your time.

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I think some clarification is needed here, because this gets trotted out by people on a regular basis in this forum. What the USPS tracking notification option does is to set a "flag" on the package record in their tracking database. It does not (repeat, not) have any effect on the movement of the package itself. If there are any updates to its tracking, a text or email (your choice) is sent to your phone or email address, so that you don't have to keep checking it yourself on the website.

In other words, what this does is simply speed up your notification of an event that was going to happen anyway. The Latin name for this effect is "Post hoc ergo propter hoc" ("after this, therefore because of this"). Something seems to have happened because something else was done first, therefore they're connected. Actually they are not. I brush my teeth every night, and therefore the sun rises in the morning. (Hey, you're welcome. 😎) You start to wonder where a package has gone to, so you sign up for notifications at about the same time that the package was going to finally get scanned again, and boom, there it is. ("Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." -- Arthur C. Clarke)

What can get the USPS stirred into action (in a perfect world) over a possibly-lost item is to actually file a package trace request or missing mail claim. That will trigger an action request to whatever facility handled it last, and sometimes that does have a successful outcome. Requesting notifications alone will give you quicker notifications, but does not exert any action on the package itself, wherever it might be.

[sextons-sweet-deals]

sounds like your buyer might be overseas. Did you review their profile? Where are they located?

This issue is a typical scam that a buyer tries to use that they have not received the item, but tracking shows delivered (freight forwarder only). It can make some sellers feel pressured to refund. Buyer gets money back and keeps the items after international shipping process is completed. 

A seller will never see tracking of delivery to the buyer that I'm aware of if shipping to a freight forwarder. 

I'm not sure about eBay international shipping service.