Restricted for following customer support’s direct instructions??

[jimmy_5608]

Had to cancel a sale due to the item being damaged in handling. Talked to multiple customer service agents about how to cancel the order and issue a refund since the funds were locked in PayPal until delivery, and they all assured me that the best method would be to have the buyer open a claim. Have transcripts from multiple agents directed me step-by-step on what to do while promising no adverse reaction will be taken on my account, only for the “back office” to permanently restrict my account from selling days later. Anyone have any experience with an issue like this and know who I should escalate this to? I had some customer service reps from a eBay 800 number submit an “appeal”, but it was denied with no rhyme or reason (heck I wasn’t even contacted I had to call back weeks later). The last agent I talked to said any appeal that’s  been denied ones will automatically be denied again and there’s basically no one to talk to or nothing to do about it.  

Not exactly sure how you can do exactly what eBay says to do and keep receipts and record and they choose to still screw you.

I have an otherwise perfect record on the site, so I’m not understanding the issue, especially because eBay says in multiple places the sellers can cancel an order. The buyer never lost any funds, eBay made a sellers fee from me, and now seems to have no interest in honoring what their reps say. It seems like you can only cancel an order if you have the value of the item to spend from your personal funds, while PayPal holds funds for up to three weeks. 

I’m at a loss with a customer support here, any advice? I still have all the chat transcripts from customer service as I saved them knowing this might be an issue because it seems big companies customer service seems to be very forgetful of what they tell you. 

[r_lresale]

If I'm understanding correctly you never sent the item out correct? Did you sign up for managed payments? PayPal isn't holding anything as they no longer process payments and haven't for at least a couple of years. Ayden processes payments for ebay now and you have to set up a bank account in order to receive your funds. Also as a new or infrequent seller ebay holds payments for up to 30 days in case your buyer needs to refund your item and the refund will come out of those held funds. You were not restricted for calling customer service but I suspect you haven't given ebay your bank account and identifying information. Was the sale for the computer?? Don't be surprised if you are asked for receipts/invoices for proof of ownership as there has been alot of stolen items, counterfeit, fraud lately and ebay has been really strict with policies lately. If they do ask for receipts and you don't/can't provide them unfortunately restrictions will be permanent. 

[iamalwaysright]

What do you mean by perfect record on the site? Is any of this record for selling? Because ebay doesn't care how much you buy, it doesn't count as selling experience. You were likely too new of a seller to sell something that high of a price only to back out of the sale for whatever reason. Apparently your activity seemed fishy to ebay. How exactly did you cancel the sale? You said you were told to have the buyer open a claim. So you actually messaged the buyer to open a claim, or did you not communicate and waited for the buyer to open the claim themselves? You never actually explained how this sale got "cancelled".

I'm not trying to sound mean, just a few clarifications needed here. Also in hindsight, it was probably best to ask about your problem here at the same time as when you talked to all of the CS agents. Or even in lieu of. Sorry

[dbfolks166mt]

     First thing to understand is the current eBay call in customer support is useless and they often provide bad information to get you off the phone. You did not specify what the item was but I am assuming it is the laptop computer. If it was "damaged in handling" you could have taken a couple of courses of action the first being reaching out to the buyer letting them know the item as damaged and asking if they wanted to cancel the order. You could have also canceled the order as the item being out of stock which gets you a ding on your performance but will generally not get your account restricted unless you have too many of these. 

     Electronics tend to be a high scammer target especially when associated with new sellers. You are in a large metropolitan area (Memphis) this may have been something better sold locally. 

[jimmy_5608]

Just wanted to clarify for you and the other person asking yes I did contact the buyer right away. The only reason I didn’t cancel the sale on my side because I could not do it without paying for the item out of pocket which I mean come on am I really supposed to just fork over $700 if my own money because I couldn’t sell something that kind of seems unrealistic. But yet when I contacted customer support to try to have them cancel the order for me and use those funds that are in escrow or whatever that’s what I was instructed to do and I did it right away. So I can see how a buyer opening a claim would give a ding, but why the hell would eBay tell me to do that and literally promise me there’s been an adverse reaction if that wasn’t the best course of action. And hell yeah I should’ve asked here. I thought their customer support was trust worthy apparently they just say whatever lol. 

[jimmy_5608]

reply below I sent to someone else, but I also went to provide you some some seperate specifics. Basically the laptop was dropped and it wasn’t damage like super bad, but it definitely wasn’t an open box condition anymore it got dented and of course if I sent it to the seller like that, they would’ve returned it and that probably would’ve been worse I would think. Which I told eBay all of this. I also told the buyer this and they even put it in the claim that I asked them to open the claim because neither of them or me could cancel the order any normal way because like I said, I eBay is escrowing this funds ( sorry I think I miss spoke and said PayPal before but yeah for new sellers they hold your funds ) and if you need to refund someone they don’t refund them from those funds they ask you to use your payment method which I had a payment method but I did not have is $700 lol. Which like if it’s a video game or like $10 T-shirt fine but like who besides large store sellers are just gonna have like that kind of cash laying around seems like a terrible system rigged against the average seller. 

And to your last point the funny thing is, I did ended up selling it locally to someone that didn’t even give a **bleep** about the ding like weeks later. I just think it’s kind of silly that I cannot sell on eBay ever again, because I literally listened to their instructions and also it wasn’t phone support. It was a chat and I saved all the transcripts because I generally don’t trust people anyway, I even sent them to the customer and had them to have the claim reference the chat transcripts I had so I don’t know what the hell  happened on eBays side to think anything was off. The customer service dude literally said “I will be able to verify that you contacted us and I will make sure they know that no adverse reaction should be taken.”

Just wanted to clarify for you and the other person asking yes I did contact the buyer right away. The only reason I didn’t cancel the sale on my side because I could not do it without paying for the item out of pocket which I mean come on in my really supposed to just fork over $700 because I couldn’t sell something that kind of seems unrealistic. But yet when I contacted customer support to try to have them cancel the order for me and use those funds that are in escrow or whatever that’s what I was instructed to do and I did it right away. So I can see how a buyer opening a claim would give a ding, but why the hell would eBay tell me to do that and literally promise me there’s been an adverse reaction if that wasn’t the best course of action. And hell yeah I should’ve asked here. I thought their customer support was trust worthy apparently they just say whatever lol. 

[jimmy_5608]

Please see last responses I posted. I think it answers most of what you asked. And they never gave me any reason to believe they thought the problem was like fraud, or any sort of scamming sort of thing. I don’t even know like who I could show the receipts to but like obviously I have the receipt for my computer, and I have the chat transcripts so just getting someone to actually look at my case would probably be a good start? At that point I can give them whatever receipts they needed, but I can’t even seem to get someone to actually give more than 15 seconds of attention to it at eBay.

[jimmy_5608]

I think I replied to everyone that reached out. Thank you for your insight, you can look above for my responses and if you have any more information that you think might be helpful I really appreciate it. 

I totally should’ve asked here when I was trying to figure out how to cancel the order, but also I trusted customer support because you know it’s like their job lol. Silly me on that one.

[fab_finds4u]

No, you don't fork over $700. Did you read Refunding buyers?

"When you offer your buyer a refund, the amount will be paid from the total of your Available,  Processing, and On hold funds.* 

That means eBay reverses the payment.

eBay charges you .30,  and that fee will be paid from your linked checking account or an on-file payment method that you were supposed to attach for seller fees.

I suspect you got some bum information from someone you called. (I thought eBay had to call you) 

PayPal doesn't  hold funds. The payment goes to Adyen. eBay does hold funds for 14 to 39 days but they say the refund is taken from the payment that's on hold.

https://www.ebay.com/help/selling/managing-returns-refunds/refunding-buyers?id=5182

[jimmy_5608]

My guy I appreciate where you’re coming from and trying to educate. But I’m not giving you some hypothetical situation of what I thought I should do. I am telling you what literally happened when I went through the cancel an order process and tried to click the refund button it tried to charge my payment method and it declined because I did not have that much money. Those funds that were in escrow were not available to use and even the eBay customer support person could not cancel my order.  

Appreciate you reaching out but I literally explain something and it’s like you didn’t read what I said.

Edit: tone 

[jimmy_5608]

and you’re right about what the policy says, but that’s not what happened in practice. That’s kind of a shaft honestly too. And it’s not user error either. I’m not stupid. I went through the process. The customer service rep couldn’t even figure it out probably why they gave me some trash information to get me out the chat. I’m sure most people don’t save transcripts, but as someone that works in compliance, I always keep receipts. 

My question above all else is who do I even bring this to cause customer support that handles account restriction quite literally won’t listen or read what I’m trying to convey. 

Basically is eBay going to honor with their customer service reps tell people are they just gonna tell me to go screw myself? And I’m deadass looking for an answer to that question that’s  not rhetorical 

[fab_finds4u]

You must attach two separate payment methods.  A checking account for automatic payouts, and another method for seller fees that aren't taken from your checking account and this can be a debit card, credit card or a checking account. You must specify how you're going to pay seller fees. The .30 that eBay wants before they can process a refund requires you to specify how you want those seller fees to be paid.  

eBay won't let the refund go through until you do that.

Here's the method for setting up your checking account for automatic payouts if you haven't  done that already.

https://www.ebay.com/help/selling/fees-credits-invoices/setting-changing-automatic-payment-method/up...

Here's the instructions for setting a method for selling fees.

https://www.ebay.com/help/selling/fees-credits-invoices/setting-changing-payment-method-fees-selling...

Once you specify your credit card (or another method) for eBay to take the .30 cancellation fee try again and the refund should go through using the payout that's on hold.