Unusual Ebay Experience

[ben10ben]

I never had heard of this happening before, and thought I would pass it along to you all.

Around the middle of July 2004, I sold a Lionel LW transformer on Ebay. The final bid amount was $40 or so, and it came out to $47.89 paid through paypal. The buyer paid immediately, I installed a new cord as they had requested, and shipped it along to them. Both of us left were presumably happy, and left positive feedback for each other.

Fast forward to a couple of days ago, and my dad gets an e-mail for a Paypal reversal in the amount of $47.89 filed just that day on an auction for a Lionel LW that had ended 14 months prior. As I recall, the buyer claimed that they never received the item, or weren't happy with it, or some other such reason that I didn't see. No e-mail from the buyer, either, just one from Paypal.

I did some digging with the e-mail adress provided, and tracked it to a positive feedback left on our account on August 11, 2004 to a member who is no longer a registered user. A quick search of the buyers feedback revealed that he had apparently done this to several people, and this is presumably why he is no longer a member.

This, of course, is theft, as he is getting the item for free. Furthermore, it's 14 months later, which falls outside of all Ebay time periods for disputes. If he had a problem, he needed to have mentioned a long time ago.

I post this only to tell others of the potential for this sort of thing to happen to them.

[Buckeye Riveter]

And now what??

[Anonymous]

This does sound like an unusual situation.

If i understand you correctly paypal reversed the payment of 47.89 from your account? I find it hard to understand why paypal would reverse that payment not only so long after the original transaction but also without much explanation. I would think they would want more of an explanation as to why the customer was unhappy, rather than just receive a complaint and then reverse the funds.

[ben10ben]

The money isn't officially gone yet, but Paypal has locked that money into our account and we can't use it until they make their final determination. They are investigating at this point, or so they say. We forwarded all of the feedback information we had collected onto them.

[Buckeye Riveter]

Ben, keep us posted as to the outcome. This is very interesting. Now the $100 question, are you sure you are dealing with PayPal?

[tadowler]

I use eBay and PayPal and have never had a problem. However, there are internet sites devoted to PayPal horror stories.

For this reason, I never keep cash in my PayPal account, I always transfer the funds to my own bank account. By doing this PayPal can't "freeze" my funds. I have heard it can take months for PayPal to complete their investigation. Since they are holding your money (and presumbly collecting interest on it), you could say they have an incentive not to complete the investigation timely.

Please let us know how it turns out.

- Todd

[prewardude]

And yet another example of why I would never buy (or sell) anything off ebay.

[Blueberryhill RR]

QUOTE: Originally posted by prewardude

And yet another example of why I would never buy (or sell) anything off ebay.

And I totally agree with you.
Chuck

[Anonymous]

And yet another example why I would never sell anything on eBay through PayPal.
BillFromWayne

[Anonymous]

And I totally agree with both of you. I'll handle my own transactions and money via one or more of the "old fashioned" ways. I'll leave eBay and PayPal to others and to the ever-increasing number of scam artists out there.

[Jumijo]

Ben,

Do you have the buyers name and address still on file? Did you send the item with a signature verification? If so, the buyer commited mail fraud. Go to the post office and file a complaint.

PayPal seems like a dicey proposition. They take a percentage of every sale. And scenarios like this make it that much more unappealing. Money orders are the best method of payment to accept.

Jim

[cnw1995]

I am very disappointed with the 'messiness' of many eBay and PayPal experiences. I've sworn off both.

[Anonymous]

Another reason I dont use paypal.

Sounds like outright theft of a transformer.

I sell occasionally on ebay but require my customers MO or Check only.

The account that is dedicated to ebay's fees are cleared down to a few cents upon completion of each transaction so that there is no real money left in it for anyone to take or freeze

[Anonymous]

Nothing wrong with paypal. I use it all of the time. Seems like some of you guys are paranoid. Don't you give your credit card to a waitress or the clerk to buy gas? Who knows who you are handing it to. Paypal is no more of a risk.

[fwright]

Although I don't have a lot of EBay experience, it is undoubtedly an established secondary market for both the toy and scale train segments. It is the place I turn to to obtain out of production items that my favorite dealers don't have. I would not be able to sell my father's Northeastern RR-dominated collection nearly as well on my own in here in California. And there appears to be a lot less scamming, fraud, and other like activity than in some other segments such as computers.

As a buyer, I prefer PayPal. It's even better than using a credit card directly. I have all the rights of a credit card transaction, and more security because the information only goes one place on-line. PayPal is much faster, and I don't have the hassle and extra expense of going to the post office or bank to get a money order or certified check. And I still have to mail the money order or check. Basically, PayPal is probably worth $4 or more to me as a buyer - another words I mentally add $4+ to my bid for the hassle and cost factor when the seller won't accept PayPal. And I have to mentally add at least 3-5 extra days for the non-PayPal process.

Now that I've become a seller as well as a buyer, the extra fees for PayPal really sting - as do shipping costs. Add to the PayPal charges stories similar to the one that started this thread - this is not the 1st time I've heard of PayPal freezing accounts for no fault of the seller - and I am very leery of PayPal. Not being an established seller with my own credit card account and no selling feedback to tout yet, I'm virtually forced to accept PayPal to get a reasonable price for my items. But I will draw my PayPal acccount down on a regular basis as a precaution.

my 2 cent bid
Fred Wright

[Anonymous]

my pay pal account filters through one of my credit cards, so they have to try twice as hard in order to have their way with me.