Buyer Return Returned Back To Buyer By Royal Mail (Ebay Provided Return Label)

[belascos]

Hi guys,

we had a return for an item does not fit return. The item reached our local sorting centre in London Home Counties and then the tracking did not update for 8 days. (Buyer used an ebay provided RM 48 return label, which they will have ultimately paid for)

The buyer escalated it to a case as we did not receive the item thus did not refund due to this (as shown by tracking). Hence, Ebay placed the return on hold, twice.  After a while we received an email saying the buyer has been refunded as we had 'received' the return. 

So, I checked the tracking, it was delivered by Swan House DO (Leicester's Delivery Office). The buyer's delivery address is also in Leicester. Therefore, the item has seemingly been returned to the buyer by Royal Mail for an unknown reason.

Ebay have reviewed the information and are sticking by the item being received by us at our return address, eventhough I have pointed this out and explained that the Leicester Delivery Office cannot deliver an item to us in the Home Counties 90 miles away! Ebay keep asking me to ask Royal Mail to retrieve the parcel, eventhough it's been delivered somewhere in Leicester

Anyone been in a similar situation to this?

Thanks for any replies.

[sheba-knows-best]

This seems a clear case of a parcel mishap/Royal mail error (label falling off etc)

I would:

(1) Contact the buyer. Ask them for confirmation that parcel had been received by them. 

(2) Wait at least until Monday.

(3) If they respond, yes, offer £5 via paypal (or other mutually agreed method) to get your parcel back. You've only lost a fiver and a bit of time. So job done.

(4) If they respond no, ignore you, or take your fiver and do a runner, you can now contact ebay, proving you have "reached out" to your buyer. If you have no joy with the first CS, demand a manager, until you get a UK rep who understands the distance between London and Leicester and that you have "reached out" to improve the "buyer experience". The objective is to get a goodwill gesture of a full refund from ebay as their returns system was clearly at fault and they refunded despite returning the item to the wrong person.

You could, of course, just go for option (4) from the getgo without contacting the buyer first. But I suspect quite a few British CS will ask you to reach out to your buyer first. But who knows, you may get lucky...

[belascos]

Thanks for the detailed response, I will do as you have mentioned and hopefully get a resolution!.

Appreciate it

[pg_kicks · Accepted solution]

Get the GPS tracking location from the delivery confirmation and hope you get somebody with CS who has an above average IQ, you will need to fight but if you can prove the tracking is not actually your location they *should* reinburse you, you can also get Royal Mail to email you confirmation they have delivered to original sender/wrong location and that should be enough. Sadly eBay do AI first then its just luck on which human you get, half dont seem to know what they need to do when its a situation where they need to actually look outside of their script. I've not had this but I have had deliveries showing delivered at 5am where its clearly an incorrect scan and then its lost, had to fight till I got somebody half decent who could see sense.

[myriad*seller]

"The item reached our local sorting centre in London Home Counties and then the tracking did not update for 8 days" 

Sounds like they attempted delivery but did not leave a card

You did not collect or arrange redelivery within 7 days so the parcel is returned to sender

When you saw it was at the delivery office you should have collected or arranged free redelivery on a day you were available to take the parcel

eBay will accept attempted delivery as proof you got it back, so they refund the buyer, in line with the terms and conditions

The buyer doesn't have to prove delivery of the returned item, just that delivery was attempted

This is to stop sellers refusing to accept returns to get out of refunding

So It shows it got to your sorting office, sat there uncollected for 8 days and was returned as per Royal mails holding time. 

[sml192]

If delivery was attempted to the seller's address then that should be reflected in the tracking.  The tracking should also show as 'Returned to sender' if not delivered or collected. 

The screenshot of the tracking provided by the OP doesn't show either of those things so eBay shouldn't have found in favour of the buyer. 

[mustangbooks]

That's not how it works nowadays (I know, I worked for Royal Mail last year).  On attempted delivery with no answer, you no longer get a card asking the recipient to collect from the DO, you now get a card saying an automatic redelivery will happen the next working day.  If 3 attempts at delivery are made (so 2 cards left), then the item may get returned to sender.  But it sounds like the parcel didn't even reach the local DO, if the last scan was at the mail centre?  So possibly the delivery details on the label were unreadable for some reason??