Auction purchase of collection-only item, seller slow to respond to request for pickup address.

[graembryan_1]

Apologies if some of this has been covered before, but I have several issues within the one query. I buy a lot of pianos on ebay, and saw another I was very keen on. A couple of things put me off slightly, which were that the description was limited to the manufacturer's technical blurb and that it had previously been used in a nightclub, and the photos were one picture of a brand new piano with the background removed which looked like it had been lifted from a sales brochure, and a couple of Facebook pictures of a piano (could have been any black piano tbh, it was more a picture of the pianist, and showed almost nothing of the piano itself.)  The seller has no previous seller feedback, and 3 item feedbacks as buyer.

The item was listed for collection only, which is fair enough and standard for pianos. Obviously, that invalidates the ebay purchase protection/money back guarantee, as items picked up by a third-party courier are specifically excluded and it's not something I could go and stick in the boot of my car, moving grand pianos is a specialist job. But I was still keen, if the sale was authentic, so I messaged the seller before bidding and asked where the piano would be collected from and if he would accept cash on collection instead of immediate Paypal settlement. He messaged back saying he was happy with cash on collection  and that the piano was in his friend's warehouse in Wembley.

So I put in a bid, and won the auction for £3000. I messaged the seller immediately, referred him to the message I'd sent before bidding, and asked for the collection address. He hasn't responded to that, or the subsequent couple of friendly reminders I've sent. In the meantime, ebay are reminding me to pay for it because he won't dispatch it until I do. 

My gut feeling is that something is wrong with the sale. The more I think about it, the surer I am that I've seen the same photos and vague descriptions before, and the reference to a jazz club rings a bell now too. I'm hoping that he's just slow in responding, but if I'd sold an item for £3k I'd be pretty keen to get it moved on and paid for asap. The other thing is that if it goes down as an unpaid item, presumably that's going to affect my status on any future bids. I buy loads of stuff on ebay, and like everyone else here I don't want to damage my 100% feedback rating or get any defects on my account. Equally, I'm not about to fork out that sort of money given the situation as I see it, especially as he's already said the proposed cash payment  was acceptable (in fact it's better for the vendor as the buyer can't go back later with complaints about the item, which Paypal invariably award against the seller and in favour of the buyer.)

Any advice?