Made a stupid mistake and lost money.

[whisperbows]

A month ago I sold an item($140),got paid,shipped, and left positive comment. Buyer claimed there was a small defect and said he would keep the item if I refunded $30 and I did. Next, he supposedly found another defect and wanted full refund so I made a big mistake by refunding the money before item was returned. He says he shipped but can't provide tracking. Obviously, a Refund Request should have been filed and I should have waited to do feedback but the guy had a 100% rating. He left me negative comment then requested to change to positive. It was changed saying we are working this out. His last correspondence was "can't find tracking, I'm done with this and I will report you to Ebay for harrassment if the emails don't stop". I can't leave negative feedback and I can't report him so I guess I this is where you chalk it off as experience and let it go but this guy needs to held accountable

[whisperbows]

A month ago I sold an item($140),got paid,shipped, and left positive comment. Buyer claimed there was a small defect and said he would keep the item if I refunded $30 and I did. Next, he supposedly found another defect and wanted full refund so I made a big mistake by refunding the money before item was returned. He says he shipped but can't provide tracking. Obviously, a Refund Request should have been filed and I should have waited to do feedback but the guy had a 100% rating. He left me negative comment then requested to change to positive. It was changed saying we are working this out. His last correspondence was "can't find tracking, I'm done with this and I will report you to Ebay for harrassment if the emails don't stop". I can't leave negative feedback and I can't report him so I guess I this is where you chalk it off as experience and let it go but this guy needs to held accountable

[thatsallfolks]

All buyers have 100% feedback. And there is no way to hold him accountable unless you want to take him to court.

[alturiaoct7_9]

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@thatsallfolks wrote:

All buyers have 100% feedback. And there is no way to hold him accountable unless you want to take him to court.

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The court costs would probably be more than the OP lost

[thatsallfolks]

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@alturiaoct7_9 wrote:

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@thatsallfolks wrote:

All buyers have 100% feedback. And there is no way to hold him accountable unless you want to take him to court.

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The court costs would probably be more than the OP lost

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Yes, but if the goal is to hold the buyer accountable ...

[llllady]

OP, I am sorry this happened to you, but you are an experienced seller and should have known better.  I bet you won't let it happen again.  You learned a hard lesson. 

Use one of the tools that eBay has given you, and put the buyer on your blocked bidder's list to avoid them coming back for more freebies. 

@whisperbows

[goodluckselling]

Sorry for your bad experience.  Just chalk it up as a learning experience.  Every business ever created in the world has made mistakes.  Learn from this one and move forward without worries.

Just move on to the next transaction and have all your actions in line so you can handle issues like this moving forward.  Do not give up.

Good Luck Selling!

[siayan]

 I hate to hear stuff like this. Isn't much you can do about it but what goes around comes around.

My only question is why? You are a experienced seller.

[Anonymous]

My advice is this. I never offer partial refunds period!

What I have done in the past is request the item back for full refund. In most cases buyer just decides to keep item and move on.

[postingid2017]

That may be true, however, the Plaintiff (or the OP) can stipulate in his/her complaint to recover the filing fees and if won, he/she would recoup the cost of filing/mailing/travel and any additional costs as well.

[the_fancy_fox]

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@postingid2017 wrote:

That may be true, however, the Plaintiff (or the OP) can stipulate in his/her complaint to recover the filing fees and if won, he/she would recoup the cost of filing/mailing/travel and any additional costs as well.

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Sometimes. It's totally up to the judge to award those and its real hit or miss.  For that amount of money, write it off. 

[mistwomandancing]

Sorry you ran into a stinker of a buyer.  They're out there.

The best help when we run into a situation like this is to be absolutely exact with eBay's protections which are laid out for us to make use of.  Obviously, they don't work to help us if we start handling these problems on our own, working deals with our buyer on our own, making refunds on our own, etc.

Hope if anything like this happens again, you'll do it eBay's way to take advantage of the protection they have for sellers.  It's isn't absolute, but it goes a long, long way to assuring us we either get our money, OR we get our item back.

[baantiques]

Lesson learned.  Things like this are why I don't offer any kind of return without going through ebay's resolution thingy.  

[whisperbows]

Thanks for the replies and I accept your comments why did this happen to an experienced seller. Has anyone seller turned into a buyer then buy a small item from a guy like this and leave negative feedback assuming the item purchased deserves a negative because I have noticed he mis-represents some of his listings like listing as new when it is used.

[siayan]

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@whisperbows wrote:

Thanks for the replies and I accept your comments why did this happen to an experienced seller. Has anyone seller turned into a buyer then buy a small item from a guy like this and leave negative feedback assuming the item purchased deserves a negative because I have noticed he mis-represents some of his listings like listing as new when it is used.

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I think it is better left alone. Don't stew on it.