I am a Seller, buyer wants to take me to small claims court over item I have proof of delivery?

[conniesparris93]

Hello,

I sold a pair on girls boots for £20 on eBay with £3 delivery using Royal Mail on 17th June.

On 27th June, I got a buyers request opened saying they hadn't received their item. 

I emailed the buyer 3 pictures of receipts with all tracking information and asked her to wait a full 2 weeks to see if it would turn up as possibly delays with coronacrisis and everything. I immediately call Royal Mail asking what to do and they declared that it wouldn't be till the 3rd July I could do anything as it wasn't classified as delayed or lost yet so they wouldn't pass me onto any further teams. 

I asked the buyer to just hold on and as the week progressed I made 3/4 calls to eBay about what to do, they said I was doing to right thing by keeping an open dialogue with the buyer, calling Royal Mail and generally making a lot of effort to resolve this. 

This is where it gets frustrating, so I go on the Royal Mail website, enter the tracking information and find out the the item has been delivered by her local post office. It even says the town she is in as having delivered it. I relay this information back and she says that there is a house in the town next to her with the exact same road name, exact address par a digit on the postcode, and the Royal Mail confuses the address and she gets their mail and they get hers.  So she's now saying the item is at the address of the other house and that I need to do something about it. 

I double checked the address I put on my package (it was an online postage label so I was able to check) and i definitely wrote her address. Now due to the proof of delivery being tracked with Royal Mail, eBay closed the case in my favour. 

I don't know what I can do, she knows where the item is but won't get it, I'm in England and she's in Northern Ireland so it's not like it's local to me to retrieve it. The case got closed this morning in my favour and she has now emailed me saying unless I refund her immediately then she will take me to the small claims court? 

I don't understand, she hasn't herself done one thing to try resolve this? She refuses to call her local Royal Mail to sort the issue, she refuses to assist me in getting a compensation claim from Royal Mail, she's refusing to go get the parcel she knows where it is and now saying she'll take me to court, 

I understand she's frustrated but I've rang eBay and Royal Mail so many times asking for assistance and both saying there's nothing I can do as i've done my part. 

can she take me to court?! Have i not done everything required as a seller?!   I'm so frustrated and sad about this all

[red_magpie]

All transactions on eBay are governed by eBay's user agreement, which both parties have accepted. And also agreed to accept eBay's decisions on refunds.

EBay's policy is that unless the tracking record confirms delivery to the buyer's address, the seller will be required to refund them. If it does confirm delivery to her address, eBay will find in the buyer's favour. You both agreed to this in accepting the user agreement.

It was eBay who decided against her claim, if she wants to contest this decision it's eBay she will need to take to the small claims court!

It would be a good thing to note EXACTLY what the tracking record stated about the address. It's too complicated to go into now, but there can be some ambiguity about what eBay accepts as "the buyer's address". In some cases, it appears that they may accept proof of delivery anywhere in the buyer's postcode area (or even the same town?) as sufficient.

Read eBay's full policy, and you will see what I mean: http://pages.ebay.co.uk/help/policies/money-back-guarantee.html

Unfortunately, erroneous tracking records or doorstep theft of parcels after delivery are very common. It's one of the risks of buying on eBay.

[conniesparris93]

The tracking says the item, with ref no, delivered to her address at 10:43am, on 22nd June by Londonderry DO.

That’s the thing, while I feel bad, but we can’t rule out it wasn’t a doorstep theft, and she won’t even check with next door neighbours as she now believes it’s at the other address. She even said in the email that this has happened to other parcels recently.

I feel like if she knew parcels were getting mixed up, she could have pre warned me and told me to write on the label instructions for the postman like ‘Bright red door’ or ‘detached house with blue car on drive’ like any identifying sights to assist in the delivery. It’s like being set up to fail lol

[tobiasd4]

As buyer knows that parcel could have gone to the other town, then she should check with RM.
However, if RM know address is an issue, then postie should check the addressee's name on parcel,
if regular postie, they would know their customers.

[conniesparris93]

Yeah that’s true the postman would know the customers, when I spoke to the post office the customer service lady said there was delays in her area so I’m thinking maybe there wasn’t the regular postman and maybe staffing problems? I think my next step is to try claim compensation from Royal Mail and give that to her.