Buying and selling boaty bits on Ebay - how to lose money fast

[lovezoo]

I´ve seen various posts with people talking about using ebay to buy and sell things and thought you might be interested to hear that I´ve just been ripped off for 150 quid doing just that. I sold an item to a buyer with good feedback, sent it via Recorded Delivery to the address PayPal told me to. The buyer gave me positive feedback and now 6 weeks later, PayPal have taken the money back, and won´t tell me why (due to the data protection act apparently). Their advice is to go to the police.

My advice to anyone thinking of selling something on ebay is to accept cash on delivery only, oh and sell it on boatsandoutboards rather than ebay as ebay won´t even give me the listing costs back as it is older than 45 days. Marvelous.

At least the sun is shining and its 25 degrees outside.

 

[Whitelighter]

Have heard of this happening quite a bit. Tried to buy somthing the other day but buyer refused to accept paypal as snatch backs were to easy.

Maybe try www.sailroom.co.uk in future for your boaty bits?

 

[gjgm]

how does the snatch back work? How can paypal debit you again? Guess millions of transctions do actually go ok, though.

 

[[2068]]

Try HERE.

...basically the online small claims service.

"PayPal (Europe) Ltd is a company incorporated in England (company number 4056598) with its registered office at Hotham House, 1 Heron Square, Richmond upon Thames, Surrey TW9 1EJ."

dv.

 

[Major Catastrophe]

Even better, PayPal and Ebay are now Swiss companies, so outside EU rules and laws.

Edited as it should be Luxembourg, not Switzerland. Which, of course, is still in the EU.

 

[Lakesailor]

Never use 3rd parties.
Get a (UK) cheque which you allow to clear, or bank transfer into your account or cash.
Don't send the goods until you have the loot.

If they don't like it, tough.

 

[RestlessL]

[ QUOTE ]
how does the snatch back work? How can paypal debit you again? Guess millions of transctions do actually go ok, though.

[/ QUOTE ]

My advice is to sellers is to check that the transaction is covered by PayPal's "Seller Protection". Without this you run a real risk of a "snatch back".

Basically, the buyer claims that he has been defrauded (e.g. someone else has used his CC details). Paypal see that they have offered him/her "Buyer protection", but that they have not offered you, the seller any protection. They will therefore take sides with the buyer.

Yes, it stinks.

 

[Lakesailor]

Just don't use PayPal

 

[RestlessL]

[ QUOTE ]
Just don't use PayPal

[/ QUOTE ]

Very sound advice.

 

[Major Catastrophe]

[ QUOTE ]

"PayPal (Europe) Ltd is a company incorporated in England (company number 4056598) with its registered office at Hotham House, 1 Heron Square, Richmond upon Thames, Surrey TW9 1EJ."

dv.

[/ QUOTE ]

Almost wrong and will be from 2nd July.

<span style="color:blue">"Currently, PayPal (Europe) Ltd. is the service provider for PayPal in the EU. PayPal (Europe) Ltd. is a UK company regulated and authorised by the Financial Services Authority (FSA) in the UK as an electronic money institution. This authorisation enables PayPal to provide its service throughout the EU.

From 2 July 2007, a new PayPal company, PayPal (Europe) S.à r.l. & Cie, S.C.A. (PayPal Luxembourg), will become the service provider for PayPal in the EU. This is a Luxembourg entity regulated as a bank by the Commission de Surveillance du Secteur Financier (CSSF), the Luxembourg equivalent of the FSA. PayPal Luxembourg will provide the PayPal service throughout the EU. </span>

 

[chuckaduck]

I use paypal on a daily basis and find it good my only qualm is their fees

 

[fireball]

We sell a few bits on ebay - and have been asked why we don't use paypal - the very simple reasoning is that it doesn't offer the same protection as CCard does. We quite happily take payment over the phone using our card services (it is a business, this is just a tiny part of it) ..

 

[lovezoo]

I have actually been using PayPal successfully for several years and the vast majority of buyers and sellers are honest. The problem is the 1% who aren´t and if you are unlucky enough to get caught out by that 1% then you will find that Ebay and PayPal just don´t want to know - after all they haven´t lost out, you have.

As it stands PayPal won´t even tell me why they have taken the money back - apparently the Data Protection Act prevents them from doing so - which to me sounds like they are colluding with the fraudster at my expense.

And as for "Seller Protection" I have found this is an empty promise from PayPal. As the buyer was using a ´confirmed´ address and as I used Recorded Delivery to ship the item and can prove he received it I should be covered. In practice they won´t pay out and won´t tell me why ("for security reasons").

Ebay have given me an address in Germany my lawyer can write to though.

Meanwhile the fraudster is still operating on Ebay - they haven´t banned him...

 

[Lakesailor]

Escrow agents are more usually an American thing and have been foisted on us Brits as part of the eBay experience.
Have nothing to do with them. It's not in your interests as a vendor. OK, one or two punters may not bid, but if you have squeaky clean Feedback that shouldn't be an issue.

 

[Richard10002]

[ QUOTE ]
I sold an item to a buyer with good feedback, sent it via Recorded Delivery to the address PayPal told me to. The buyer gave me positive feedback and now 6 weeks later, PayPal have taken the money back, and won´t tell me why (due to the data protection act apparently). Their advice is to go to the police.

[/ QUOTE ]

At least tell us the buyers user name so we can avoid him/her. PM me with it if you prefer.... there may be some signs of dodginess and I'd be interested to have a look.

been using ebay since 2003 and have managed to avoid the bad guys so far .... sometimes someone looks good on the face of it, but I've had a gut feelin g and avoided them.

 

[tcm]

praps mobilise the vast resources of the forum to go round and make the culprit see sense? Or at least take pix of where they are to embarass them or whatever.

 

[cliffdale]

Please give us a link to the buyer. I would like to see the feedback. Hope everything goes ok for you.

Cliff

 

[Steve Clayton]

[ QUOTE ]
Meanwhile the fraudster is still operating on Ebay - they haven´t banned him..

[/ QUOTE ]
"Win" something else from him and then immediately neg feedback and raise an eBay dispute. It will take forever for eBay to sort out and your neg feedback is there for all to see /forums/images/graemlins/laugh.gif

Something else you can do is watch his items. see who wins and then contact them and let them know what happened to you with this seller. On the winners check their bio and see if you can contact them outside of eBay to advise them. /forums/images/graemlins/ooo.gif

 

[lovezoo]

The dodgy buyer´s Ebay user ID is "lewisdjb" and the last thing he bought was back on the 3rd of May, so it looks like he has stopped buying things. I would like to make it clear that at this stage I don´t have any proof that Lewisdjb is a crook, there maybe a perfectly reasonable explanation as to why PayPal took the money back from me and it could just be that PayPal have made a mistake. Lewisdjb hasn´t replied to any of my e-mails though and as it stands he has my goods and I don´t have any payment from him.

I am still pursuing PayPal though as they offered me Seller Protection if I followed their rules - which I did. I have asked for an explanation in writing as to why they are refusing to honour this.

I have to say at the moment my main gripe is with PayPal - they are a big company regulated by the Financial Services Authority and yet they seem to think they can just take money from a customer (me) without any explanation. If you look on PayPals website, they say that "PayPal works hard to help protect sellers" - I haven´t seen any evidence to back this bold claim up.

PayPal also say that their fraud rate is less than 0.5%, but they also say they have over 100 million accounts - on that basis they have 500,000 fraudsters at large, which suggests if you accept PayPal regularly you will eventually get ripped off, just like I did.

I am determined not to let PayPal off the hook on this, and will let you know how I get on.

 

[Major Catastrophe]

[ QUOTE ]


I have to say at the moment my main gripe is with PayPal - they are a big company regulated by the Financial Services Authority

[/ QUOTE ]

I hope you sort this out and can always make a complaint to the FSA - after all, that is what they are tere for.

As I posted earlier, after the 2nd July it will get more difficult as Paypal no longer comes under the FSA and you will have to complain to the Commission de Surveillance du Secteur Financier in Luxembourg.