Refunding buyer

[southern-finds]

I recently sold an item and buyer messaged me asking for refund bc item arrived damaged,  said she had contacted ebay. I tell her that i have no problem refunding her if she will just send proof of damage. Well she never contacted ebay like she claimed and hasn't sent any proof of damage  but keeps asking me to refund her the full amount through PayPal and not go through ebay refund request. I'm fairly new to this and not sure what to do.  My question is,  does buyer have to make request for refund through ebay? 

[reallynicestamps]

It's quite possible that the person nagging you is not the actual buyer.

Until she opens the dispute, you are not required to do anything.

Rather than proof of damage, should she open a Dispute- probably Not As Described- demand the return of the purchase before refunding.

You can do this even if you have a No Returns policy.*

You may have to pay for a Return Shipping Label.

If she doesn't use the label, you win the Dispute and eventually the cost of the label will be refunded.

If by some chance she does return the item, refund promptly.

Then Block her, relist the item and sell it. (She may even be right about the problem.)

but keeps asking me to refund her the full amount through PayPal and not go through ebay** refund request.

Now.

Do you mean she has opened a Paypal dispute?

You respond IN THE DISPUTE and once again ask for the return of the item before refunding.

Here's the fun part.

PP makes the Buyer pay for return shipping, not the seller.

Mwah hah hah hah haaaaa.

If she doesn't return it, PP will refuse the refund.

Now she can still go to her credit card, but neither PP nor eBay will help her with that if she has already failed with them.  And again, you can demand return before refund, although who pays for the return is up to the card's policy.

Did I mention that you should demand the return before refunding?

You can sugarcoat it by saying you need to investigate the reason for the problem, but reassure her that yada yada yada you will be refunding on the return.

*Note that a No Returns policy is not a No Refunds policy.

** Has she been on eBay for a longish time? Check her Feedback Left for Others. She may have had her right to use the Money Back Guarantee rescinded for blatant overuse.

[pjcdn2005]

I would ask her to open a return claim through eBay. Once she does that you can click on one of two options.  You can require a return before you refund or you can just refund.  You do want to do the refund through eBay. The fact that she is asking you to refund without opening a claim could mean that she doesn’t want to be on ebays radar for some reason.  

if the buyer opens a claim through PayPal than it becomes a payment dispute similar to a credit card dispute and you have very little control on the result.

[pjcdn2005]

@reallynicestamps 

In Managed Payments a PP dispute is handled the same way as a credit card dispute which means it may not  result in the item being returned at all.

[pjcdn2005]

I should have mentioned that buyers do not have to provide proof of damage.  But in an eBay claim they do have to send the item  back if you require them to.   You will have to pay  for return shipping if the buyers says the item was not as described / damaged.