Refund discrepancy Ebay vs. Paypal

[albertabrightalberta]

Although I don't have a return policy, I will accept a return when a buyer is reasonable and honest, willing to pay return shipping and contacts me within a reasonable time.

So a buyer purchased an item but when she received it, it didn't fit her phone and she requested and I accepted the return.

Purchase price was $20. Shipping was additional and not to be refunded.

When I received the return, I issued the refund through the ebay transaction for $20 as shown:

$20 refund issued

Yet when I looked at my Paypal account, there's a difference in the amount withdrawn for the refund. They took $20.38.

Extra 38 cents taken from PP

I'd already paid Paypal $1.10 for the fee when the buyer paid and I know Paypal doesn't credit any portion of that fee when I issue a partial refund but it doesn't seem correct that I'm charged an additional fee. 

Did PP mess up?

[dtexley3]

@Anonymous 

eBay is aware of this issue where they are sending the incorrect sales tax refund amount to paypal on a partial refund.  If eBay is REALLY serious about "mending fences" they should identify ALL these transactions, refund the sellers the difference and notify sellers about the refund and why.

You want to build seller confidence in eBay as a company?  Do the right thing and make it the sellers whole, all the affected sellers, not just the ones that send valuable time calling CS over and over and over to get it fixed.

[dede394]

Hi @Anonymous, you've shared that eBay fully refunds sales tax to the buyer, regardless if the seller only partially refunded the purchase.

What is eBay's position on the portion of the purchase amount that was not refunded, e.g. shipping charged, but on which sales tax, now refunded, eBay still owes the affected state?

[cloud9lena]

I've been calling eBay about this issue for 3 month already!!!

Every time all my explanation starts from beginning - every time CS is surprised and they were telling me every time that it's an unknown problem - nobody contacted them about it before:(

2 months ago they told me they opened a ticket with a tech. crew,  and it's suppose to be resolved on the begging of February and I was suppose to receive all my overcharged credits automatically! Didn't happen:(

I'm in California and I noticed the overcharge happens only with my CA returns, but last week it happen with other state return too 

I asked If I can open a case WITH EBAY about this issue to get responses and follow -ups from the SAME person, and do not start again and again and again with each following return -CS replied they are not work this way

[cloud9lena]

I just received reply from CS on my issue with overcharged refunds

...."Thank you for contacting us about the tax refund issue you had noticed on returns, specifically when the buyer is located in California. After looking into this matter further it appears the amount of tax that is coming from your account correlates directly to the tax that was charged by that state on the shipping charges. When issuing a partial refund through PayPal it is important to include this tax in the partial refund amount entered, or it will come out of your account. In the future an easy way to make sure the correct tax amounts go back to your buyer is to issue the refund utilizing the partial refund tool on eBay."

1st of all. I issued all my refunds through eBay return request cases, so all refunds were calculated automatically by eBay

2nd. Do I understand right that CS rep saying that SELLERS are responsible for the refund on the taxes on the shipping? Why? We didn't collect this money. eBay did. 

[dtexley3]

brian@ebay This is a known issue when partial refunds are done via a return request.  Why are the CS agents unaware at this point?

[jmj1997]

This happened to me recently.  I sold an item, eBay took $6.20 of the total amount paid by the buyer to pay the sales tax.  I did not receive the $6.20 sales tax, which makes sense as it is intended to be paid to the State of CA by eBay as sales tax.  I understand and have no problem with that.   The buyer then requests a refund and eBay automatically (and before the grace period is over) took the total amount of the money originally paid by my buyer (which includes the $6.20 sales tax) from my PayPal account and refunded the buyer.  I have been on the phone with eBay customer service reps several times (at least 30-45 minutes each time) and not one of them understands that eBay is responsible for refunding the $6.20 sales tax to me.  This should happen automatically and without so much time and effort on my part.  

[usmediamass]

@Anonymous 

It has been another eight days and no response.  

[alseyf-73]

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@usmediamass wrote:

@Anonymous 

It has been another eight days and no response.  

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You are encouraged to continue speaking with Customer Service about any questions you have, as Customer Service would be best equipped to address any concerns you have.

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@kocak90 wrote today:

I contacted ebay again and they told me I am right and they will issue a refund to my paypal acc. in 48 hours. But that refund never occurred.

I talked with ebay 5-6 times. None of the customer reps solved my problem. They kept referring me to other departments who told me they will do it manually in a few days.

Those a few days ended up becoming 11 days. I am thinking now that the refund will never occur. Has someone ever lived through a similar process?

[jaad_6732]

The difference in the tax refund is because its telling you what you refunded not the amount received at first. You will more then likely see a refund from ebay for the taxes since the amount of the sale was refunded and you can also get your ebay fees back. In the end though you sold a item for 20$ and got more then that back so I would just chalk it up as a win lol 

[alseyf-73]

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@jaad_6732 wrote:

In the end though you sold a item for 20$ and got more then that back so I would just chalk it up as a win lol 

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Lots Of Love to you, too! And um, perhaps read over the posts again, and watch for the 38 cents.