? for Ebayers - handling transaction gone wrong

Have any of you ever dealt with an Ebay transaction gone bad?

I ordered a collar from someone after carefully measuring my dog, and she fell within the stated measurements of the collar, but when I received it the collar was much too tight for her. It's a gorgeous collar, but useless because it doesn't fit. I notified the seller about the problem and received a very curteous response, with a return form to request a different-sized collar, which I filled out and returned with the collar -fortunately, I sent it Priority Mail with delivery confirmation and insurance. It's been 15 days since she received the package according to the delivery confirmation, & I haven't received a replacement in the mail or a refund, and my attempts to contact the seller by email and by telephone have not received any response. So now I'm out the cost of the item, plus two-way shipping! If I'd just kept it I could have at least resold it.

In the auction she states she offers a money-back guarantee. The auction is also covered by PayPal buyer protection. Only 30 days are allowed after the item is paid for to file with Square Trade or with Pay Pal buyer protection.

I'm wondering if I should start with Square Trade and jump to Pay Pal if I don't get a response, or just start with PayPal (the 30 days since my original payment are almost up).

Foolishly, I left her positive feedback as soon as I received the item.

Any input or ideas?
Thanks!

I'd be telling everyone I know; Square Trade, PayPal, even put more feedback on EBay if possible. If she won't return your calls that's a red flag for me. Of course, I'm persistent, pushy and obnoxious when it comes to this stuff.

Does the person you did your transaction with have a lot of feedback? Is it mostly positive? If so, I would give her the benefit of the doubt, and assume that she did intend to do the right thing, and as does sometimes happen, life got in the way. I would e-mail her again, saying basically what you said in your post (that it has been 15 days, you are concerned that you have not heard from her, etc), and that if you do not hear back from her by a certain day/time, that you will have no choice but to start proceedings with ebay and/or paypal. I have been both a buyer and seller for years on ebay, and the great majority of people are not on there to rip you off, so I would definitely try one more time to resolve the problem personally first. Good luck!

I ordered a very pretty pink crystal collar for Dori for Christmas off Ebay and it didn't fit her either. I measured it and ordered the size it recommended. I couldn't return mine because in the return policy it says if the collar touches your cat you can't return it. I admitted to trying it on her, so I was stuck with it. I haven't ordered another off Ebay.

I would write her one more time and tell her you will start the process of filing a claim with PayPal and will leave negative feedback if you haven't heard from her within 24 hours. Be sure to do a read receipt with the email as well (even though that is pretty easy to get around, most people just click yes without thinking....). If your 30 days are almost up, don't be afraid to use that service before you lose it. You don't have a collar and are out the money with no communication from the seller. There has been plenty of time for her to resolve it. Even if there was an emergency, she or someone could have gotten in touch via a form email telling her customers of that (after 2 weeks, everyday issues have to come back into play...)

Personally, I'd go straight to PayPal, and request a refund, and explain what happened. They'll investigate it, and if it's warranted, they'll get the seller to refund your money. I've been thru that a couple of times, as I regularly purchase My Little Ponies from Ebay auctions.

If your warn the seller that you're about to go to PayPal, he or she could take all of their money out of the PayPal account, and you won't get anything. If you receive the item after you get the refund, you can always go back to PayPal and repay the person for it.

Well, she finally called this afternoon!


She said they had to custom-order the replacement size from Europe (it's a really nice collar, I'm a little embarrassed I spent so much , but it's absolutely gorgeous). So it will take a few more weeks for it to arrive. I'm going to go ahead & hope everything's on the up-and-up, and hope the collar gets here in the time she said.

Thanks for the input!

*maybe it was the board magic at work that brought a response!*