Buyer bought my iPhone and returned empty box

[rwilkaa]

Hello,

I recently sold a fully working and boxed iPhone 15 Pro for the value of £560 to a 0 feedback buyer with an account creation date of no longer than one year, I've been selling for 10 years now with 100's of positive feedback reviews as a seller.

I sent out the phone to a parcel pick up shop and the name on the address was different to the name on the account (suspicious I know but I've sold to buyers like this before with the same circumstances).

Upon delivery of the phone to the seller he claimed it was not powering on and would like to return it. Straight away I requested photo proof of the phone not turning on as it was fully working and factory reset for the new buyer to use.

He hit me with pathetic excuses such as his camera is poor quality and his friends usually take his photos for him and they are all on holiday. 

I eventually give in to the return request as I know eBay would step in and grant it anyway so the quicker I got the phone back the quicker I could put it back up for sale.

When the return parcel reached me I knew straight away there was no phone inside it was far too light, I actually filmed myself opening the parcel for proof and in the video you see that it's just an empty box inside containing 1 screen protector.

I opened the case for buyer returning empty box and uploaded picture proof of what the buyer sent me (did not let me upload video but I mentioned I was in possession of it).

eBay reviewed the case and refunded the buyer, I escalated it to be opened again and let them know it was now a police matter and that action fraud and Royal Mail cases were opened and gave them the case ID's and yet they still reviewed it to be in favour of the buyer.

unbelieveable... has anyone else had any success stories against buyers like this?

I simply cannot afford to be almost £600 out of pocket this time of year.

[the-layer-laboratory]

Did you provide ebay with a crime reference number? They usually change their tune once there's actual evidence of police involvement.

[plpmr]

unfortunately there's no actual police involvement as action fraud don't investigate.

[the-layer-laboratory]

Apologies, the nomenclature used was incorrect. Action Fraud should have provided you with a National Fraud Reporting Centre (NFRC) number. You should provide ebay with this information in your appeal case.

[rwilkaa]

Yeah I provided them with the NRFC number in my response when providing more evidence to the case and this was their response. 

"Thank you for contacting eBay Customer Service about the Apple iPhone 15 Pro that you sold. I understand that your buyer did not return the item but an empty box with a screen protector. I can see that you have reported the matter through Action Fraud and I appreciate the time and effort that you put in to resolve the issue. It is my absolute pleasure to assist you today"

"I know these situations can be concerning for you as a seller but due to our platform being completely online, we have no way of verifying the condition the item has been returned you. After reviewing this case thoroughly, We had to close the case with a refund to the buyer because the tracking shows delivered"

[myriad*seller]

Sadly, a common scam

Buyers use collection points as they can set up an account in a false name with a fake address and you will never be able to persue them as you don't know their real name or address.

Don't sell what you can't afford to lose, I'm afraid

Sorry this happened to you 

[myriad*seller]

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@the-layer-laboratory wrote:

Apologies, the nomenclature used was incorrect. Action Fraud should have provided you with a National Fraud Reporting Centre (NFRC) number. You should provide ebay with this information in your appeal case.

---

Sadly the item price probably pushed it over the threshold where eBay will refund you as a gesture of goodwill when you provide an Action Fraud reference number. 

It isn't a given that sellers will be refunded, and much harder to get on an high priced item  

[johnwash1]

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@rwilkaa wrote:

Yeah I provided them with the NRFC number in my response when providing more evidence to the case and this was their response. 

"Thank you for contacting eBay Customer Service about the Apple iPhone 15 Pro that you sold. I understand that your buyer did not return the item but an empty box with a screen protector. I can see that you have reported the matter through Action Fraud and I appreciate the time and effort that you put in to resolve the issue. It is my absolute pleasure to assist you today"

"I know these situations can be concerning for you as a seller but due to our platform being completely online, we have no way of verifying the condition the item has been returned you. After reviewing this case thoroughly, We had to close the case with a refund to the buyer because the tracking shows delivered"

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Absolute pleasure?  I think they have a spelling error with that word 'pleasure'.

I think others more experienced with this kind of thing will be along shortly to advise you to "persist, persist, persist" (for the benefit of us all) and to contact CS at 8am weekdays in the expectation of getting people in Dublin, who have brains and empathy.  If in reality you were a scamming seller, why would you risk exposing yourself by contacting Action Fraud.

Personally I'd be extremely wary these days about selling anything on ebay over £100 (or whatever a seller is comfortable losing) and especially not a phone, other than for local collection.  I'd really like advice on whether there are better ways elsewhere.  People seem to say FB Marketplace is just as bad.

[ikons_uk]

If the buyer sent the item via the post office then ask him for the receipt and then have a look at the weight.

(If he's used an ebay return label, obviously that's a different matter.)

Just a thought. Sorry to hear about this, nightmare.

[trade-price-stamps-2015]

This market place has been going for decades now and it would be reasonable to expect more could be done about this matter, this has been hapening since the start and yet nothing has been put in place to combat this. Feel gutted for your loss and all others that this effects.

I guess its pointless suggesting that Ebay should plug this hole because they have had decades to do so.

Perhaps one of their team could shed some light on the matter and explain, what, if anything has ever been done about this type of crime.

[magpiecorner1]

Is there no way that you can block the phone - won't get it back but it would be satisfying!

Is there a weight on the packaging?

Have you taken him to the small claims court.  You have the photographic evidence and, if there is a weight discrepancy, that would be good.

For that amount of money might be worth a go.  Actually for that amount of money I would carefully check out the buyer's social media.

[rwilkaa]

Yeah I have blocked the IMEI on the phone and reported it as stolen.

No weight on the packaging but I've also opened up a case with Royal Mail to see if they'll assist in comparing the weights to help me.

Already tried searching him on social media's but no result of the alias he has used in the area of Nottingham he was located.

It has been reported to Nottingham Police though and they've been notified his return tracking tells you the post office he dropped it off at and the exact moment the label was first scanned so they can pin point that and pull CCTV if they really want to take it seriously. 

[roger_roger_over_and_nowt]

"I sent out the phone to a parcel pick up shop and the name on the address was different to the name on the account"

Parcel pick up means open to scam,hijacked account with no one to sue.

[trade-price-stamps-2015]

Parcel pick up means open to scam,hijacked account with no one to sue.

Well with this in mind, best if everybody cancels these pick up transactions and return the funds, I know it must be tempting to have that sale and earn that money but it leaves you wide open to abuse like this.

Once the people at the top get to see that these sales are not working and that money is not being made, they may make the process safer for sellers

[pg_kicks]

eBay could solve the issue overnight if they just done an authentication service for phones, we know its a major issue so eBay must know its a major issue but if people carry on using eBay to sell phones they wont change much. The only reason they done authentication on sneakers is because a large portion of the market stopped selling on here and returned/went to GOAT/StockX so eBay copied their system, it now works 99.99% of the time and the only issues is when the person authenticating doesnt have basic training on something new.

[rjwilmsi]

You will have to persist by contacting eBay customer services again, to insist that you have been a victim of fraud and should be covered by eBay Seller Protection. The common suggestion here is to call breakfast time UK (7am or 8am) in the hope of speaking to somebody in Dublin who is more clued up/has more authority than staff offshore.

Unfortunately I think you have zero chance of the police investigating (when a work colleague's £10k car was stolen the police did nothing other than issue a crime number then close the case, fortunately he had a tracker on it so was able to recover it himself).

In theory if you can get Royal Mail or Post Office to provide a copy of the drop off receipt showing a weight so low it proves the phone can't have been included, then you would have good evidence to sue the buyer in court. However, the buyer probably used a false name, you don't have their address so you have nobody to sue - they probably paid on a stolen card and/or a visa gift card so eBay don't have any of their real card/bank details either.

[rwilkaa]

Update: 

Requested a call off eBay customer services this morning, the guy did sound a bit more concerned and on my side of the case compared to what I received so far but because I have already appealed and it's been denied he says you can only appeal once every 30 days.

He said in these circumstances it will need to be referred to the 'Back Office' for another verdict and would get back to me within 48 hours.

Im afraid they are just gonna go over the case details and what's already been looked at and make their decision without contacting me for me evidence and the video I have opening the return that could put the whole case to bed in my favour...

[myriad*seller]

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@magpiecorner1 wrote:

Is there no way that you can block the phone - won't get it back but it would be satisfying!

Is there a weight on the packaging?

Have you taken him to the small claims court.  You have the photographic evidence and, if there is a weight discrepancy, that would be good.

For that amount of money might be worth a go.  Actually for that amount of money I would carefully check out the buyer's social media.

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WHO would OP take to court?

They don't have the buyers real name or address!

When people pull this scam they use a false name and address to set up the account

Hence getting it sent to a collection point!

[myriad*seller]

The call won't come

Nobody will contact you back

They promise this but it never happens, sadly

The "back office" is code for we just fobbed you off 

[signs_and_vintage]

Phone ops are on 'bonuses*' for the quicker they get through calls. Tell caller what they want to hear, onto the next...

*perform to metrics and maybe you'll not get 'offboarded' next round.