Ebay return / refund

GMac11

GMac11

GMac11

Soldato
Joined
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Posts
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Location
Northern Ireland
This one is new territory for me so hopefully someone can shed some light. I needed to return a faulty item (delivered from Netherlands) which was agreed however the seller's return address is in Australia. I then decided to negotiate a partial refund to save any further hassle which again was eventually agreed upon.
However the seller is saying they can't initiate the partial refund until the return is closed and they also can't do it through PayPal. They have excellent feedback and I do genuinely believe they can't figure it out but I'm wary that if I close the return I have no further leverage.
I'm thinking at this stage it might just be safer to go with the return, no matter how costly given the amount must be refunded anyway.
Any thoughts?
 
GMac11 said:
This one is new territory for me so hopefully someone can shed some light. I needed to return a faulty item (delivered from Netherlands) which was agreed however the seller's return address is in Australia. I then decided to negotiate a partial refund to save any further hassle which again was eventually agreed upon.
However the seller is saying they can't initiate the partial refund until the return is closed and they also can't do it through PayPal. They have excellent feedback and I do genuinely believe they can't figure it out but I'm wary that if I close the return I have no further leverage.
I'm thinking at this stage it might just be safer to go with the return, no matter how costly given the amount must be refunded anyway.
Any thoughts?
Click to expand...

Partial refunds are tricky, but not that tricky

You're right. Definitely do not close the return.

I'm actually trying to remember when I had to do this as a seller for a partial.

Remember, the seller has to pay postage for a faulty item. Had the same. Bought a faulty sensor bin and it came dented. Seller tried to get me to send it back at my cost. EBay then autosent a royal mail parcel letter for a massive box. Had to call them up and eventually kept bin as seller didn't want to pay the postage.


Might be worth chasing the full refund and return. The seller can't say no if its faulty. You'll probably get to keep it. As a seller I wouldn't want to pay return postage on an item I need to bin!
 
don't trust anyone on ebay.
Look at it this way, if you do what they say, you are then not covered by ebay's buyer protection, tell them they can start up a support call/chat with ebay to help them if they can't figure it out.
 
Thanks all. I'd consider myself quite savvy when it comes to online scams etc and I'd definitely make sure to leave myself covered. I was curious to see if there was any way out of this with getting the partial refund without anymore hassle, which appears is not possible. As for the return to Australia, I guess you have to go with the address provided regardless of where it is to ensure you are within eBay guidelines. After all as has been mentioned the seller must cover costs anyway so that's their problem.
It's a bit of pain that I'll have to wait for a considerable time to get my full refund is all.
 
open a returns case to state it is faulty, it is the sellers responsibility to cover the return postage charges as per ebay rules. If they do not provide a postage label and instructions then the case will be closed in your favour with a full refund to you and you not having to send an item back. Whatever you do, DO NOT CLOSE THE RETURNS CASE, if you do you'll have no leg to stand on at all and the seller can simply just ignore you and not issue any refund, they cannot issue any refund before the case is closed as the money relating to the item is withheld whilst there is an open case.

I recently had this with a seller in america, they accepted international shipping with eBay's global shipping program, the item arrived faulty, we opened a returns case, they refused to cover the return postage costs (which would have been more than the purchase price of the item), i contacted ebay and they said the seller must cover the costs, the seller continued to refuse, gave them the appropriate amount of time to respond as per the ebay returns case, once the time had passed i asked ebay to step in and got a full refund.
 
Marc2180 said:
No he can't. See the post directly above yours.
Click to expand...
Because he let the buyer open a claim.
As someone who buys much more than I sell on eBay, I never waited for things to escalate.
The buyer now has to offer what he's happy with and wait for the buyer to accept or refuse it, within the given time.
International sellers can be tricky. Returning an item is complicated, expensive and quite often the seller still overcomplicate the return to discourage you to return it.
And the waiting time to sort any problem through eBay is, again, quite often stressful and time demanding.
 
Marc2180 said:
open a returns case to state it is faulty, it is the sellers responsibility to cover the return postage charges as per ebay rules. If they do not provide a postage label and instructions then the case will be closed in your favour with a full refund to you and you not having to send an item back. Whatever you do, DO NOT CLOSE THE RETURNS CASE, if you do you'll have no leg to stand on at all and the seller can simply just ignore you and not issue any refund, they cannot issue any refund before the case is closed as the money relating to the item is withheld whilst there is an open case.

I recently had this with a seller in america, they accepted international shipping with eBay's global shipping program, the item arrived faulty, we opened a returns case, they refused to cover the return postage costs (which would have been more than the purchase price of the item), i contacted ebay and they said the seller must cover the costs, the seller continued to refuse, gave them the appropriate amount of time to respond as per the ebay returns case, once the time had passed i asked ebay to step in and got a full refund.
Click to expand...
Agree. Sometimes is worthy claiming back from PayPal the cost of the returning postage.
Only had problem buying from China, as the seller was hard selling, pushing to get any money from a faulty item.
 
Michael Marini said:
Because he let the buyer open a claim.
As someone who buys much more than I sell on eBay, I never waited for things to escalate.
The buyer now has to offer what he's happy with and wait for the buyer to accept or refuse it, within the given time.
International sellers can be tricky. Returning an item is complicated, expensive and quite often the seller still overcomplicate the return to discourage you to return it.
And the waiting time to sort any problem through eBay is, again, quite often stressful and time demanding.
Click to expand...

So your post is null and void, the case was already opened and the seller can not issue a partial refund at all, its return for a full refund or nothing following ebay's return case. Yes the seller COULD have done so before the case was opened, but he can't now.

Its not particularly painful, its up to the seller to arrange the return postage if a label can't be provided through ebay, just send the seller messages through ebay (so ebay CS can see the messages themselves) asking the seller to arrange the return postage, if the seller refuses just contact ebay and let them know of the situation, they'll give the seller a reminder and if the time for them to respond and provide the postage expires, get ebay involved again and the case will be closed in your favour. I spend my entire working week selling stuff on a business page on ebay, i know my way about ebay and what needs to be done to get the result you want.
 
Marc2180 said:
So your post is null and void, the case was already opened and the seller can not issue a partial refund at all, its return for a full refund or nothing following ebay's return case. Yes the seller COULD have done so before the case was opened, but he can't now.

Its not particularly painful, its up to the seller to arrange the return postage if a label can't be provided through ebay, just send the seller messages through ebay (so ebay CS can see the messages themselves) asking the seller to arrange the return postage, if the seller refuses just contact ebay and let them know of the situation, they'll give the seller a reminder and if the time for them to respond and provide the postage expires, get ebay involved again and the case will be closed in your favour. I spend my entire working week selling stuff on a business page on ebay, i know my way about ebay and what needs to be done to get the result you want.
Click to expand...
My previous comment was regarding the refund, but as you correctly explained, would only be possible if the seller acted before the dispute being opened.
One question though: at this stage, is the seller able to offer some % of refund or should really be all or nothing?
One thing with some international sellers is the seller and the product is listed at some country but the item is posted, and should be returned to (I assume), to a different country.
Few years back ordered an amplifier, listed as Austria. The item was dispatched from Poland.
 
Michael Marini said:
My previous comment was regarding the refund, but as you correctly explained, would only be possible if the seller acted before the dispute being opened.
One question though: at this stage, is the seller able to offer some % of refund or should really be all or nothing?
One thing with some international sellers is the seller and the product is listed at some country but the item is posted, and should be returned to (I assume), to a different country.
Few years back ordered an amplifier, listed as Austria. The item was dispatched from Poland.
Click to expand...

It all depends on the reason for return in the returns case, if the customer claims it is faulty then it doesn't give the seller an option (it certainly hasn't shown itself to us anyway and we deal with several returns per week (the joy of used car parts!)), either full refund or accept return and provide return label.

It'll go back to whichever address is stated on ebay as the return address through the returns case or if the seller provides a label from a 3rd party it'll be to whichever address they put on the label, but they need to still upload it to ebay so ebay can see everything. That's something I noticed with the case we had from america, the sellers registered address was in Florida, but the return address shown on the returns case was somewhere in middle america, and the address the seller told us to return it to under our own cost (which we declined) was to neither of those 2 addresses.
 
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