No refund from seller!!

[damian_steele]

Except that they are or were a seller on Ebid! And it is the case, I will think twice.

I don't see why you think it is the fault of eBid.
eBid is a venue for buyers and sellers to meet. eBid does not act as a middleman for the payment and have no responsibility for the buyer paying the seller or the seller supplying the buyer. It is up to the parties involved to agree a suitable payment method that both find acceptable and offers whatever level of protection is desired.

PayPal's failure to obtain a refund is exactly that: PayPal's failure. Not eBid's.

It's a shame that you had difficulties and hopefully you will realise that the vast majority of sellers here (and elsewhere) are honest and helpful. Please don't tar everyone with the same brush because of one bad experience.

[selkab]

Some people say that they won't buy on eBid or eBay or Amazon etc etc because they had a bad experience or two.

I was wondering if these people stop buying at local malls because one or more stores gave them a bad experience. How about if they take a trip to another country and hit a bad sale in a local shop, do the quit buying from that country,

Geesh pretty soon they wont be able to buy anywhere on the world and may have to look elsewhere in the universe. ;-)

[BAGHAG999]

Can understand the buyers frustration , i would contact paypal and say i paid in good faith using Paypals buyer protection policy.

[darklisruthven]

I understood that Paypal have been known to use debt collection thingamajiggy (techincal term!) regulations if someone naughty has had to refund but not had enough to do it in thier paypal account. :P

[burgyeb]

I am currently dealing with a seller who advertises on their site that if you buy more than one item, the second cost a certain amount of money (discounted amount). I received some type of instant invoice from eBid; the full shipping amount has been charged.

I contacted the seller and requested a combined invoice, with s/h discount applied to invoice total. No answer. Placed a third bid, that still is running. Asked seller a question about 3rd auction I bid on be added to combined total, with applied advertised s/h discount. Again, no answer.

The seller seems to have a good rep with other buyers,so that is why I did not get too worried. However, should I get worried about a seller who does not respond to a request for an invoice, or answer a direct question. Not sure. Seller may want me to cancel transaction or refuse to pay, so that they can cancel the transaction.

I generally do not have a problem getting my money back via paypal. I had 1 transaction that went real sour, for greater than $2,000, and Paypal had my money back in my account in about 1 week. The transaction occurred here. They do include dispute process for transactions that occur on the Bay, and for outside transactions.


P.S. I do not like this instant invoicing. Is there anyway to opt out? If not, can a seller send their own adjusted invoice? I anticipate problems with this, as I have a buyer right now, bidding on 4 of my auctions? So I need to know if it is possible to opt out of this feature. I guess a seller could always refund the discounted amount, but they should communicate that if questioned. Comes across as arrogance when sellers refuse to communicate; almost as if they think they are above questioning. Well anyhow, I need some kind of imfo on this new system. This could make buyers not want to deal with more than one purchase.

[somersethedge]

at the bottom of the listing on your AAL (after auction log) you will find the name and address of the seller..... with that information you can go online and fill in the forms for the small claims court..... simples.....

it worked for me a while back, as soon as the seller received an official letter from the courts I got my money back

[NuttyKrafts]

No, I don't like this instant invoicing either - bought two items from the same seller at the weekend, the seller offered postal discount for multiple items but the invoice that came automatically showed the full postage TWICE. I did ignore this and emailed the seller who sent combined invoice but any newbie might not be savvy to this and pay straight away thus paying more postage than necessary.

[kreativebargains]

How was the item shipped? Pretty sure that if you sent tracked or signed for to the Paypal verified address then Paypal should cover you. It seems that they frequently try to fob you off in the first instance, I am currently disputing a chargeback with Google. In my case they seem to be mellowing a little since I found their own appropriate section in the terms and conditions that says they should not have accepted the money in the first place. If you have jumped through their hoops you could be OK if you let them know.

[iwiw60]

I don't see why you think it is the fault of eBid.
eBid is a venue for buyers and sellers to meet. eBid does not act as a middleman for the payment and have no responsibility for the buyer paying the seller or the seller supplying the buyer. It is up to the parties involved to agree a suitable payment method that both find acceptable and offers whatever level of protection is desired.

Thanks, Damian...I still believe that this is a PayPal problem at this point, and definitely NOT eBid's...

[rokins_toys]

Except that they are or were a seller on Ebid! And it is the case, I will think twice.

But from your original post, it's like you're getting angry with all sellers on eBid and warning people to be careful of all sellers on eBid! See Below.

""So do not pay for any items without receiving an invoice or contact from the seller - you may not get your money back. This has certainly made me think twice about doing anything on here. If this happens a lot it is not good advertising for ebid is it and does not do any of us any good!!""

Reality is, there are good and bad sellers on all platforms, it doesn't matter if it is FeeBay or Amacon or any other not so well-known platform. Yes, all places have policies in place to deal with sellers or buyers that are a persistant problem and it is ok to have a rant, just as long as you do not imply that all sellers are just as bad as the one you are talking about who you have had a bad experience with.

PayPal is an eBay company and despite their buyer protection program, this program does not extend to other sites like eBid. I have even seen some top high street names offer paypal as a payment method and PayPal's payment protection does not extend to them like it does not extend to here on eBid. FeeBay are just trying to dominate the market place, trying to force people to buy from eBay sellers to be covered by the payment protection. I have even seen top name high street shops trading on FeeBay, but I doubt they'll trade there for long when they see the rip-off fees they're paying haha! Unless they are getting bargin basement prices that are not available to ALL sellers!

As for your issue in getting a refund, this is something you need to take up with eBid support. You need to inform them that PayPal cannot obtain a full refund for you because they are petty enough to not offer buyer protection here on eBid and cannot take the money from the sellers paypal account and that they have asked you to contect the seller but obviously the seller is not responding to your emails/messages etc, so eBid support should step in and sort things out from here and try to get you that refund.

If eBid are unable to obtain any form of contact from the seller and are unable to assist you in obtaining a refund, then your last option is to go to the police. Might sound a bit heavy handed, but this is the real world and even online sellers are subject to the law of the country they are trading from and the laws of other countries if the buyer is in a different country. This person has taken your money, not sent the item, there has been no contact from the seller for however long you have tried for and no ability to get a refund from the seller, the money transfered from paypal account to a bank account, laws have been broken here so you can take this matter up with your local police. Just make sure you have kept every email/message from eBid, PayPal, invoice if one exists etc. as you will require this as evidence as well as proof that no one has been able to contact the seller and no one has been able to obtain a refund for you. Obviously, the police is a last resort but it does depend on how much you're out of pocket with this particular case of yours. They might advise you to go to small claims court which will cost more than what you are out of pocket for.

But do remember, every online auction site has bad and good sellers whether they are private or business sellers. And some operate more professionally than others when it comes to business sellers.