Just looking for some practical or moral advice here.
I’ll keep it brief. I sold an item (fairly cheap, abotu £10) which was bought by some guy in the Ukraine. His ‘address’ was that of a UK->Russia/Ukraine shipping service in London. I posted it recorded post, so proof that I posted it but no tracking.
He’s claiming to have not received it (after 2 weeks). As requested I sent a photo of the proof of posting. He initially claimed that the address was his home address then when I told him I looked it up on Google maps and that it was in the middle of an industrial estate he changed his mind. He then said the shipping service place didn’t receive the parcel. When I posted the parcel it had my return address on. It hasn’t come back to me or the Post Office I sent it from.
To be fair he has decent feedback but at the same time either he could be bullshitting, or the shipping company have lost it. I sent 9 other parcels that day from the same place using the same posting method. They’ve all reached their desitnation.
Ebay have now started sending me those sort of raised eyebrow messages ‘you should resolve this to maintain your reputation’ type thing. But it seems ‘resolve’ means I give him a full refund. It’s not a lot of money, granted, but it also feels like I fullfilled my part of the deal by posting it (with proof that I did) so the risk is on the buyer here as used a third party in the posting chain.
Am I wrong? Should I stick to my guns or just refund him and move on?
i’m from Ukraine, and using shipping services of this kind regularly.
there’s pretty much mess in their work.
last time i used such kind of service it took them 3 weeks to register my parcel after its arrival to UK address.
and it was not small/inconspicuous at all — it was a bike frame in the box…
so, first of all that guy should ask his questions to shipping service support (if any).
I had similar issues sending stuff with these shipping brokers, now I don’t allow them, too much hassle. In this case I’d refund the buyer and ask that should the item eventually arrive he does the right thing and pays you for it.
For £10 the stress and time spent ain’t worth it, even though it totally isn’t your fault.
I can’t really stand ebay and try and avoid using it as much as possible. It was good once, but now, for the most part, nearly any other option is cheaper . You can grab the odd bargain sometimes. TBH I’ve been using it more for comedy value during lockdown, MPC1000’s @ £1,000! Native Instruments Komplete Audio 2 for £400. …it makes me laugh anyway.
I think for old speakers, you can maybe get some consistent deals.
Ebay always initially asks the buyer and seller to try to resolve any dispute themselves. If after a period of time the buyer and seller cannot reach agreement Ebay will arbitrate and make the decision.
In your specific case, Ebay may not necessarily force you to refund (particularly if you have years of good feedback) because you have proof of postage. As the amount is so low, Ebay themselves may refund the buyer (keeps both sides happy).
Ebay has always been a great place for buyers, particularly when using Paypal, due to its very high level of buyer security.
Ebay used to also be a great place for sellers, however increased fees and too much buyer protection has changed that. However, things have improved slightly for sellers since they have frequent offers of the 1£ max sellers fee (though you still have to pay the Paypal fee).
UK eBay User here. has anyone else experienced this?: suddenly all the important filtering options seem to have been hidden. I like to filter by UK only etc etc and now I can’t see them in the usual place. In one instance I could get to them by choosing some category and then another but for some categories I can’t get to that filtering list at all.
I’m hoping it’s either a browser issue (Safari here) or just a temporary thing. But if it isn’t it makes eBay pretty much unusable for me.
They like to roll out stupid changes like that quite often. Last time that happened to me the options I wanted were hidden in the ‘all filters’ option at the top of the search results. What’s pissing me off massively at the moment is the blocking pop-up trying to entice me to use the app with a £5 voucher. The offer expires and then they start a new one. If I wanted to use the app I already would!
so i scored a cheap rytm mk1 with screen burn on eBay for 450 and it arrived works well, cleaned it with baby wipes (it was literally brown) recalibrated, added os 1.70 and its all going great then the ebay seller messages me saying can i send it back for a refund because it was sold in error???
what do you think i said…?
“My Analog Rytm inadvertently tripped inside a shipping box with your address and by the time I’ve realised what happened the courier had already picked it up for shipping!”
Unless it’s a stolen item, then I think what they meant to say was “I would like to make you an offer on an item you own” because that’s how it is, lawfully speaking.
"hiiiiii i added the listing, packed it, weighed / measured the package, accepted the buy, printed out the label, drove to drop it off, waited for it to get picked up for you to clean the patina off and get used to it.
but every step was an accident! ship it back to me at your expense I await your response!"
