I recently refunded a buyer, but now know item was delivered. How do I get my money back?

[claire5513]

I recently sold an item.  The buyer did not inform me that it hadn't arrived, and instead opened a claim for reimbursement. 

I refunded her money immediately because I had mislaid the Certificate of Posting and couldn't check. 

Less than an hour later, I found the C of P and checked Royal Mail Track and Trace.  It showed the item HAD been delivered, 2 days prior to the buyer opening her claim.  I was unable to contact the buyer, and so made a report to eBay. 

Now I can't find out what, if anything, is going on?  If the item had been delivered, then it's no longer the seller's responsibility to refund and the buyer needs to take it up with Royal Mail if, indeed, she does not have my item (which I have no way of knowing).  Try as I might, I can't contact eBay to ask if my report will result in action, and the website makes it impossible for me to contact the buyer (the system will not allow me to send her a message, l assume because of her claim against me?).

What's my next move, or should I kiss my money goodbye?

[m25jet · Accepted solution]

Did you upload the tracking number to eBay after you posted the item?  If you had done so then even if you had misplaced the receipt you could have referred to the tracking number on eBay, in which case you would not have had to refund the buyer in the first place, as the tracking would have proved to eBay that the buyer had indeed received the item you sent her, in which case you would have won the case and would not have had to refund the buyer.

If you have not already done so add the tracking number against the item in your Sold Items section, as once you've added the tracking to eBay PayPal should also be able to access the information.  Once you've done that contact PayPal UK's Customer Support Team on 0208 080 6500 or 0800 358 9448 and explain that the buyer opened an Item Not Received case against you on eBay and so you refunded the payment, yet when you checked the tracking number after finding the receipt that you'd misplaced you found out that the buyer had actually received the item she had claimed non-delivery against.  Make sure that you've got the receipt to hand so that you can give PayPal the tracking number in case they can't find it on their systems, then ask them to put a trace on the tracking number.  PayPal tend to check cases far more closely than eBay do, so once they check the tracking number and see that the item was successfully delivered to the buyer at the address given on the PayPal confirmation of payment e-mail ask them to reinstate the refund back into your own account given that the buyer has fraudulently claimed a non-receipt related refund for the item, despite having received it prior to opening the Item Not Received case on eBay.  PayPal should then revoke the refund and reinstate the funds back into your account, in which case you won't end up out of pocket as a result of this dodgy buyer's behaviour.

Finally, make sure that you add the buyer's User ID to your Blocked Bidders List so that she cannot purchase anything else from you in the future and cause you any further aggravation.

[claire5513 · Accepted solution]

I'm new to selling and didn't realise I had to add the barcode number on the certificate of posting to the item and that this serves as tracking info (I do now!).

Thank you for suggesting I contact PayPal. I would never have thought of this and will give it a go.

Good advice all round. Much appreciated!

[claire5513 · Accepted solution]

Turns out PayPal won't help because the money has already been refunded. 😕

[ruby*tuesday]

There would of been No Item Not Received Case if you had added the Tracking to Dispatch when you Posted the Item. All you can do now is send your Buyer a PayPal Invoice. Find Send/Request. 

[m25jet]

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@claire5513 wrote:

I'm new to selling and didn't realise I had to add the barcode number on the certificate of posting to the item and that this serves as tracking info (I do now!).

Thank you for suggesting I contact PayPal. I would never have thought of this and will give it a go.

Good advice all round. Much appreciated!

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If you're unfamiliar with how to add a buyer to your Blocked Bidders List click on this link htttps://offer.ebay.co.uk/ws/ebay/isapi.dll?bidderblocklogin and a new page with a big white box on it will appear on the screen.  Add the buyer's User ID to that box and then click on the Save button beneath it.  As soon as you have done that the buyer will have been successfully added to your Blocked Bidders List and from that point onwards will no longer be able to purchase anything else from you.

If you haven't already done so go to the option to leave feedback.  Look for the "Report Buyer" option.  Once you've spotted that option file a report against the buyer so as to ensure that there is an official record against the buyer of her abuse of the eBay Money Back Guarantee.  That way if she tries the same trick on any other sellers and gets reported too many times then eBay may well close her account and chuck her off of the site for good.

No matter how angry you may be feeling about the buyer's behaviour, don't feel tempted to leave her a negative feedback comment.  It's been against eBay policy for sellers to leave anything other than positive feedback for buyers for over a decade now due to the fact that many bad sellers would often use the threat of negative feedback to deter buyers from leaving them well-deserved negative feedback.  As a result eBay changed the rules and put a stop to sellers leaving anything but positive feedback for buyers, which unfortunately has resulted in a very buyer biased feedback system, in that the seller doesn't get the opportunity to leave truthful feedback from as to how he/she felt the transaction went if the transaction could not be described as a positive transaction from the seller's point of view.  If you were to leave a buyer a negative feedback comment under the guise of a positive feedback and the buyer reported it to eBay then the comment would be removed at the buyer's request  and your account would end up getting hit with a black mark relating to breach of feedback policy.  Therefore, when it comes to feedback, if a transaction goes badly for you the best option is to refrain from leaving the buyer any feedback at all and reporting the buyer if appropriate.

[claire5513]

I have used the Feedback option to report the buyer already. I was able to explain the situation and provide the tracking info (already logged against the item). I was naively hoping that eBay would then sort it out as it's a simple enough case, but now I realise this won't be happening as nobody has been in touch since the automated email saying they would look into it.

I think I'll have to give this one up as an expensive learning experience.

[moldosgifts]

First thing you do is meesage the customer with a screen shot of your proof od delivery. You can also add tracking details at any time.

And a paypal invoice.

Wait a couple of days you most likley will not get a reply.

Secondly you write via normal mail a letter in it you put a disclaimer/declaration of none delivery and a return envelope with stamp. ( have copy of decleration if you need one.)

Last contact with thyem will be a letter before action.

[claire5513]

Unfortunately I cannot message the buyer because eBay won't allow me to make contact with her. I assume this is an automatic block that is put in place once a claim is opened in order to avoid unpleasant disputes between buyer and seller?

I cannot send a PayPal invoice without the buyer's email address, which I don't have.

I could send an invoice and explanatory letter by post, but I can't imagine this would result in any positive action from the buyer.

That's a good idea, to ask the buyer to sign a disclaimer 're non-delivery to return to me, which I guess she is more likely to do than automatically repay the money and tackle Royal Mail herself as she ought to do.

It's not worth taking more formal action over, I just was hoping there would be a polite way that I could reach out to the buyer via eBay, or for eBay to take action over the report I filed. However, it would appear that neither option is possible.

Thank you for your suggestions.

[rusticrye]

In future, add the tracking number to the Ebay transaction once you've posted. You won't then have this problem.

All you can do is send the buyer a PayPal invoice (from your PayPal account), with a note saying you're pleased to see her item has now arrived (include a link to the tracking number), and that you look forward to receiving cleared payment within the next 7 days. If she doesn't pay, you can send her a 'before action' letter by Signed For post, telling her she has 7 days to pay from receipt of letter, or you'll be forced to take legal action to recover your money plus all court and other costs.  If she still doesn't pay (unlikely, as this is normally enough to put the fear of god into small-time scammers, if that's indeed what she is), take her to Small Claims court if you wish. The process can be started online.

Having said all that, she may well not have received the package. But that isn't your problem when tracking shows delivery to the address on the PayPal payment confirmation email. You can't lodge a claim with Royal Mail to recover your loss because tracking proves delivery. It is up to the buyer to lodge a claim with Royal Mail under these circumstances.

And note that you should keep all your Proof of Posting receipts safe for 13 months. A POP is the only thing a payment processor will accept for an Unauthorised Account Use claim. These can be made for up to 13 months because many people only receive their bank and card statements annually.

@claire5513