Hello Friends,
We have been victimized by what appears to be a Dummy Package Scam involving 3 cell phones purchased on Ebay and paid for via PayPal. Neither Ebay nor PayPal gave more than a cursory review of our filings and rejected out of hand our claims including Appeals. Clearly their Protection Plans are at best flimsy and at worst a Hoax.
Sadly, the phones were purchased from 3 different, first time Sellers who shipped them from the same Post Office via USPS on separate days spread over 2 weeks. We have detailed USPS Tracking Reports that clearly demonstrate false addresses for receipt. PayPal's response is that they have Strong documentation from the Sellers that Delivery occurred, and our only recourse is to contact the Seller.
Good Luck with that. All emails to the Sellers either by Hotmail or Gmail were promptly bounced back as Undeliverable. The point is that Delivery may have occurred but not to our address - a subtle but critical detail that continues to be overlooked by both Ebay and PayPal.
Sound Familiar? Sure looks to us like Mail Fraud.
The next steps that we are considering are to 1) File Report with USPIS 2) File Report with local Police 3) Contact FBI Mail Fraud Division.
Our questions are if anyone has had a similar, recent experience and was there a successful outcome? i.e. did you get your money back from either Ebay or PayPal? What additional steps should we consider?
Looks like a long slog, but after all we are out nearly $1000.
Many thanks,
