Amazon delivered eBay item to wrong address

[gnosemalf]

Apologies to anybody who notices but I am posting on behalf of my girlfriend again. She has so little spare time that it makes problems like this all the more frustrating.

She bought a not inexpensive item which did not arrive. She queried the seller who said it had been delivered but it had not been delivered to our address. She eventually contacted eBay who opened a case and it transpired that rather than use her registered eBay address, the seller had used an address which was suggested by Amazon from our postcode which is quite wide due to us living in a rural area. The address that she was told it was sent to is a house which is currently empty and the item was small enough to go through the letterbox - what we are supposed to do about that is anybody's guess.

After investigating, eBay have found in the seller's favour because the item tracking says that it is delivered. She was on the phone to eBay about an hour ago and they said they would look into it and call back in 'five minutes' but they haven't and now she has had to go to tend to her elderly mother whilst quite upset about it all.

I've read that it is typical of eBay to find in favour of the seller in cases like this even if there is evidence that the item has been delivered to the wrong address but surely the seller is at fault if they do not send an item to a buyer's registered address.

How can she sort this out?

[**peaseblossom**]

The seller should have sent to the address supplied by ebay, and if that didn't happen ebay should have found in your favour.    I would persevere with ebay.     The alternative would be to find out the owners of the empty house and see if they are willing to retrieve the item for you.

[thesmokingrunner]

Bit of a long shot but a couple of ideas:

1. If the house is currently unoccupied but the inhabitants are likely to return it might be worth putting a note through the letterbox explaining what's happened and asking if you could be contacted so you could arrange to collect the incorrectly-delivered item (with sufficient ID, obviously).

2. If the house is currently on the market you could try contacting the estate agent, explain the problem and see if they can help you retrieve the item as it will be addressed to your girlfriend rather than the property's owners.

Like I say, it's a long shot but trying anything is better than trying nothing. Good luck.

[gnosemalf]

Thanks for the suggestions but she shouldn't have to be chasing around trying to locate the owner of a house when the seller is clearly responsible for sending the item to the correct address. Surely, eBay should recognise that the seller did not use the registered address and find the seller at fault.

[thesmokingrunner]

I totally agree with you on all points: the seller should have posted to the registered address on the purchasing account, eBay should recognise that the seller did not use the registered address, the seller is at fault for (rather oddly, in my opinion) posting an item purchased on eBay to an address recommended by Amazon and your girlfriend should not have to chase round trying to locate the owner of the house so that she can hopefully retrieve the item.

However, you are where you are. It depends on just how much effort you and your girlfriend are willing to put in to even attempt to recover the incorrectly-delivered item. You know where it is - it's at least worth a try isn't it?

That's what I'd do.

[gnosemalf]

The item was 'delivered' by Amazon so when the seller looked up our postcode, other addresses will have appeared and for whatever reason, they picked the wrong one. And as I mentioned in the original post, I am posting this on here because she genuinely doesn't have time to do so and running around trying to find the owner of a house (which is over half a mile away) is considerably more time consuming than posting on here. Also, there is no guarantee that the item actually has been delivered there - it's just educated supposition.

I'm just bleeping bleeped off at both the seller and eBay for making lives so bleeping difficult because of their lack of care and attention.

Anyway, she's still out and not expected back until about 8.00pm by which time she will be too tired to want to do anything.

[jonatjonatjonat]

Given what you’ve posted, the inclination to want to get the product back seems low. As others have said. What happened shouldn’t have happened, but it did.

If eBay aren’t being forthcoming with a refund, how was payment made? You’d probably needt make a claim with your payment provider.

[papso22]

Just to clarify.  The address the seller has to send to is the address your girlfriend used when she checked out.  That does not have to be the same as her ebay registered address.

What written evidence do you have of the delivery to the wrong address?

You should not have to go chasing the parcel but that might be your only option.

[gnosemalf]

Unlike me, she only has one address registered with eBay so everything is sent to this address by default and there is no reason whatsoever for her to have selected any other address, let alone an address half a mile away.

Anyway, two updates/clarifications.

Firstly, I spoke to the neighbour of the house where it was supposed to have been delivered who I actually know and he says that there have been no deliveries for us. He said that he is 100% certain but he will check.

Secondly, and slightly confusingly, my girlfriend told me that it was the eBay representative that she'd spoken to who said that the address used was Amazon's suggestion. I'm not sure what that means but anyway, eBay didn't get back to her - no missed calls. Nothing.

This isn't the only thing that has gone missing recently and it's getting tiresome for both of us. One item sent twice via Royal Mail (untracked) has not arrived - we know our postman very well and he's been delivering to us for 16 years so even if something was sent with the wrong address but right postcode, he would deliver it to us. It's unbelievable that in 2025, with all the navigation technology available, so much stuff is delivered to the wrong address. We just watched a television drama series from 2022 in which What3Words was used yet half the delivery companies don't use it. It should be an available field in every delivery address form.

[gnosemalf]

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@jonatjonatjonat wrote:

Given what you’ve posted, the inclination to want to get the product back seems low.

No, the energy to turn private detective on a Saturday night on a possible wild goose chase is low.

But I did.

See previous post.

It wasn't there!

[jonatjonatjonat]

I’d say that item has gone missing and if eBay aren’t believing you, go to your payment provider.