eBay can't stop theives from stealing from you

[chasearooauctions]

I had a buyer with a brand new account open on March 8, 2022. Purchase a lot of 6 brand-new smartphones from me on March 8 I shipped those out and the day he received them, he opened a dispute with his financial institution. I get an email from eBay stating to upload a picture of why I believe the items are as described. That alone makes no sense so I uploaded a picture from the listing.  I received a message today that the buyer won the dispute. I lost 6 brand new phones, and the money from the sale of those phones and a crook along with one positive feedback (mine) got away with stealing on eBay. BTW, I appealed it and ebay said, we can't help you, it came from his financial institution. Well, doesn't every transaction on eBay come from someone's financial institution?

[mtgraves7984]

eBay can't stop theives from stealing from you

@chasearooauctions 

I can empathize, but haven't yet experienced the 'financial institution' chargeback. Seems inevitable and I sure do dread it...

[itscalledapostingid]

Someone had suggested messaging the buyer a pre-paid shipping label by ebay messages.

Then reply to the dispute with an image file of the shipping label captioned "Here is another copy of return shipping label we already provided. Return merchandise for refund." 

Then if they sent back an empty box you could file police reports and present those reports to ebay as evidence for your appeal.

I have not tried this yet myself.

[kensgiftshop]

Some items just aren't worth selling online, to many scammers.

[iart]

This is horrible. I don't know how to prevent it. But, if we were angry enough, we'd cause the buyer some stress on their end. File a police report with their local. File a report with the the carrier (USPS if that's how you shipped). Contact their financial institution and claim they are accessories.

None of which will get your money or phones back but sometimes karma needs a push.

Our sympathies.

[caldreamer]

Any customer can "reverse credit card" charges (keep item and your money).   Scammers always looking for "high value" items to resell.   Selling high value items online is very risky.   

This happens in brick & mortar stores also.   One repair shop in my neighborhood only accepts "cash" from their customers because they have been burned so many times by customer "reversing charges". 

[gatefold]

you have my sympathy-

there is always a reason attached to the dispute....

why were the items not returned as a condition of the refund?

[donsdetour]

" Purchase a lot of 6 brand-new smartphones"

well if you have the correct information on said phones you can get em killed as stolen...

[vintagecraze50]

If this seller just lost 6 iPhones or similar item, we are looking at thousands of dollars in stolen merchandise. If I were this seller I would be absolutely filing police reports in this persons jurisdiction, and starting a court case with them. One IPhone gone is bad enough 6 of them at once horrible. Brick the phones so these people have a useless piece of junk.

[vintagecraze50]

You should have filed police reports and other fraud reports and uploaded into the case, not just a photo.

[itscalledapostingid]

Opening a payment dispute is not a crime.

That's why I made the suggestion of sending the pre-paid shipping label. (See my previous post.)

The financial institution will then wait for the merch to be returned before refunding.

[vintagecraze50]

It is mighty dreadful. May good karma be with you.

[vintagecraze50]

Yes, I would imagine that a lot of smallish business just cannot tolerate this at all.

[iart]

So, real question. If they live 1000 miles away, how are you ever going to appear in court? Hire an lawyer? Pay all the filing fees? Pay the service notification? I don't think you can file in you own county, but I may be wrong.

Really, unless in the same state, near the same county, I don't think this is an option.

Unless filing in federal court? And I have no idea how much that would cost or what that process would be.

(We are no strangers to filing small claims court cases.)

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@vintagecraze50 wrote:

If this seller just lost 6 iPhones or similar item, we are looking at thousands of dollars in stolen merchandise. If I were this seller I would be absolutely filing police reports in this persons jurisdiction, and starting a court case with them. One IPhone gone is bad enough 6 of them at once horrible. Brick the phones so these people have a useless piece of junk.

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[vintagecraze50]

Correct, that is the way it suppose to work in theory and practice. Also, as a buyer you are suppose to work with the merchant first to get a refund with return of merch. What some of these scammy people do is file a chargeback first BEFORE THEY work with the merchant. If merchant refuses returns or gives people hassles about returning merch then that’s another story.