Newbie with a eBay issue. Goods not sent.

[Rosturra]

Hi Everyone.

 

Any help or advice appreciated...

 

 

I won an auction on EBay for a mobile phone - on 8th November.

The seller requested that I pay a cheque or transfer.

I didn't think this was overly risky as the seller had positive feedback of 99%, and the total cost was £45. Hardly worth a [problem].

So I transferred the money,

 

I wasn't particularly bothered when there was no item for a week - as I thought that the seller would wait until funds were lodged which can take 5 days. I would.

 

I got the following response when I chased this on 17th November.

"Hello sorry weve been away and just returned home so will be sending phone out to you asap many thanks and sorry for the delay"

 

With no phone on the 21st November - I posted a polite reminder. No response.

 

So I raised an eBay dispute on grounds that goods were not received. To which the seller replied 'On way'.

 

EBay won't proceed further until 10 days have elapsed. I waited 10 days. Nothing.

 

With no phone on 3rd December - I posted a note, "If there's an issue with the phone then just refund the money and forget about it".

 

Again no response. So I raised the issue with eBay's Trust and Safety team.

 

So on the 5th December. I finally let rip. "You have three days to pay me back before I take you to the Small Claims court. Any letters will be charged for etc" in the hope common sense will prevail.

Needless to say; No response.

 

I also gave negative feedback - to say that goods not received.

No Response. However seller did change their profile to hide feedback!

 

What should I do next?

 

I am a bit perplexed. £45 is not enough money for this to be a [problem]...

Yet the seller has had plenty of time to sent item - or drop out of the deal...

 

Should I wait for eBay to follow this up in my behalf - or is it up to me?

Should I contact the Police? Or go through the courts?

Should I just cut my losses, put it down to experience and only ever pay with PayPal in the future?

 

What is the relevant law here? The seller is a private individual not a business.

[andylane]

Hi

I also got scammed of £475 for a graphics card and he disappeared off the face of the earth. I basically went through ebay but the protection was more for him than me (£120) was the max in protection then. The police said its your card protection people problem and they said it was a police problem and it was past to and thro.

 

I basically lost nearly £500 on one transaction so good luck and it was a hard lesson learned for me.

 

I NOW TRUST NO-ONE.

 

Thanks millwallhead for the stinging lesson email:[email protected] which is now closed

[Alastrum]

£45 may not seem worth much to you, but if you consider he may well have sold the same non-existent(?) phone to hundreds of other people too....

I would certainly do everything you can to follow this up with eBay just to get this seller thrown off. Of course, this may not get your money back, nor may it prevent them from opening another eBay account under a different name.

Check with your bank, to see if they can do anything about the cheque you sent: at the very least, they may be able to help the police by informing them which account it was paid into, which may help identify the seller. If eBay can't get you your money back, I would certainly report this to the police, as the seller may be doing this to many other people. Unfortunately, many people may think that £45 isn't worth making such a fuss about, and thus not report it, which may be what the seller is counting on.

You have to realise that a seller can con hundreds of people like this in just one week, take the money and close the account down, and disappear forever. eBay is generally an honest place, despite things like this, but you do need to be careful. Don't let it put you off trading, but always pay by PayPal in future, who will always refund you in a genuine dispute like this.

[IdaInFife]

Basically you have no other route than small claims.

 

Pull their contact details and phone them.

 

If these are incorrect report them for false contact details.

 

You have NO protection unless you pay by paypal.

 

I hope you have kept a copy of sellers name and addresas etc.

 

 

Idax