Rules question

[nmemoryof]

I made a purchase.  Everything went smoothly.  So I made another purchase from the same seller for a different item.  The seller accidentally sent me another of the first item.  I contacted the seller, who then sent me the correct item.  I still have in my possession the second duplicate item.  The seller is asking me to pay for it.  Now, I know I do not HAVE to.  But I do feel sorry for the seller's error AND the item is a good deal (which is why I bought the first one). 

My question is, would I be violating any eBay rules if I went ahead and paid the seller for his mistaken shipment?  It would be via PayPal but there are no current eBay listings by the seller.  In fact, the seller has had some problems with others and received several negative feedback comments.  This is part of why I feel bad for the seller.  I'm not sure English is his/her first language.  I did GET the items I ordered.  They WERE amazing deals.

I do not want to violate any eBay rules, though.  Please advise.

[mcdougle4248 · Accepted solution]

@nmemoryof 

This is so nice of you.  Yes, you can send a payment to the seller through PayPal without violating policy.

[southern*sweet*tea]

If you don't want the item you can ask the seller for a prepaid return label. There's no reason why you need to pay for a seller's mistake.  If you do want to keep it, then yes, you can pay for it.

[siayan]

This may a little complicated but the best way to do this is to have the seller relist the item and put a very high price on it with a best offer option. You would then offer the price you would pay with free shipping of course. 

Technically if you simply send the money it would be considered a off eBay transaction and that is a no no. It also avoids eBay fees. If the seller is unwilling to do this then your obligation would be finished.

Just my suggestion.

[eunster1313]

You are dealing with an item that the seller has or had for sale on eBay.

Because the seller sent it to you by mistake there is no record
on the sellers account or yours that a sale was made for the item.

When a seller makes a sale they get charge fees by eBay for the sale.
Sending the payment to the seller through PayPal would be considered
100% a violation of this rule because eBay wouldn't be getting their
fees the seller owes them for the sale.

Offers to buy or sell outside of eBay

http://pages.ebay.com/help/policies/rfe-spam-non-ebay-sale.html

[gracieallen01]

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@nmemoryof wrote:

I made a purchase.  Everything went smoothly.  So I made another purchase from the same seller for a different item.  The seller accidentally sent me another of the first item.  I contacted the seller, who then sent me the correct item.  I still have in my possession the second duplicate item.  The seller is asking me to pay for it.  Now, I know I do not HAVE to.  But I do feel sorry for the seller's error AND the item is a good deal (which is why I bought the first one). 

My question is, would I be violating any eBay rules if I went ahead and paid the seller for his mistaken shipment?  It would be via PayPal but there are no current eBay listings by the seller.  In fact, the seller has had some problems with others and received several negative feedback comments.  This is part of why I feel bad for the seller.  I'm not sure English is his/her first language.  I did GET the items I ordered.  They WERE amazing deals.

I do not want to violate any eBay rules, though.  Please advise.

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Just curious here, but why would it make any difference if it was against ebay's rules? 

The seller subsequently sent you the correct item - do you think it is honest and proper for you to keep the 'freebie' because the seller was 'human' and made a mistake?

[*madison]

The op hasn't said they think it's honest and proper to keep the item. If that's what the op thought, the op wouldn't have needed to post here at all , the op could just keep the item.

The op is asking about payment rules up front before anything is done, and that's the right way to go about it.

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To the op,  it will be an off ebay transaction if you pay, and off ebay transactions are not allowed.

Keep the item, or tell the seller to send you a return label so you can return it.

This is the sellers mistake.

[gracieallen01]

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@*madison wrote:

The op hasn't said they think it's honest and proper to keep the item. If that's what the op thought, the op wouldn't have needed to post here at all , the op could just keep the item.

The op is asking about payment rules up front before anything is done, and that's the right way to go about it.

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To the op,  it will be an off ebay transaction if you pay, and off ebay transactions are not allowed.

Keep the item, or tell the seller to send you a return label so you can return it.

This is the sellers mistake.

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Then, wouldn't the buyer just file a NAD, get a label from the seller and send it back?  After all, it WAS the incorrect item - or is there an appropriate category, such as 'wrong item'?

[goodluckselling]

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@nmemoryof wrote:

I made a purchase.  Everything went smoothly.  So I made another purchase from the same seller for a different item.  The seller accidentally sent me another of the first item.  I contacted the seller, who then sent me the correct item.  I still have in my possession the second duplicate item.  The seller is asking me to pay for it.  Now, I know I do not HAVE to.  But I do feel sorry for the seller's error AND the item is a good deal (which is why I bought the first one). 

My question is, would I be violating any eBay rules if I went ahead and paid the seller for his mistaken shipment?  It would be via PayPal but there are no current eBay listings by the seller.  In fact, the seller has had some problems with others and received several negative feedback comments.  This is part of why I feel bad for the seller.  I'm not sure English is his/her first language.  I did GET the items I ordered.  They WERE amazing deals.

I do not want to violate any eBay rules, though.  Please advise.

---

It sounds like you want to do the right thing.  You could either ship the duplicate item back at your cost or you could go ahead and send a paypal payment for the item.

I realize you would have cost to send it back at your cost but it would be the right thing to do in my opinion.  The seller also has shipping cost they paid for as well for this duplicate item.

Paying to do something that will help another person is well worth it.

Good Luck Selling!

[*madison]

If you return the item don't ship the item back at your expense, you should not be out any money.

Again, this is the sellers mistake, not yours.

[fern*wood]

Is this a domestic seller?

[siayan]

The buyer wants to buy an item from the seller The seller should sell it to him on eBay. The only difference is the buyer already has the item.

[nmemoryof]

When I got the wrong item, I told the seller to just refund me the difference as the second item was more expensive.  OR the seller could send me the missing pieces that were part of the actual second order.  Instead the seller chose to just send me the full ordered set.  This was not my fault nor my choice.  The seller never asked for the item back.  I assumed it was because of the cost of shipping.  The seller only asked me to pay for it.  As  I said earlier, I do not think English is a first language.  So communication was imperfect.

Whatever.  None of this was my fault.  I resolved it according to my first advice on this thread.  I just wanted to put it behind me.  To be honest, I didn't want the extra order.  It's too much.  I paid out of charity to the seller.

[nmemoryof]

The seller's profile says Vietnam but the order shipping directly from the manufacturer.  So I don't know.  That's probably why the seller didn't ask for me to return it.