Yeah, I got turned over by a fool.
Using a wholly fabricated metaphor because I have no real desire for people to find this individual. Someone with a VHS tape purchased a Blu-ray player from me, discovered that VHS taps don't work in Blu-ray players and then proceeded to make this my fault. He's spent the last month making demands, crying, changing his mind about what his actual complaint was and the response that he wanted from me until eventually settling on me funding the full item return and paying him compensation.
He then gave this all nonsense to customer services who never asked my side of the affair and who promptly sided with this guy less than an hour after he made the complaint. eBay refunded him under buyer protection - immediately - only for me to put in my appeal as soon as eBay had generously informed the buyer that he was to send it all back to me at my expense. Once I had it back I made a video and put it online of said fictitious DVD player proving that it 100% worked and that there was no way it would or could ever work with fictitious VHS tape.
By this point I've got him spouting off legal threats, eBay making legal threats, eBay ignoring their own terms and conditions
(ha
) and what's their line? Rulings are final.
Once customer services read the conversation logs over private message between us and saw the video
(and understood what he was pulling
), funnily enough they changed their mind on their final ruling, however because they violated their own terms of service, didn't engage due diligence and THEY refunded the buyer themselves they are holding me liable for their losses over the mistaken refund. They have removed the negative feedback
(I'm 100% positive
), all negative account points are gone and have been transferred to the buyer. He has also be pushed up to an escalation team and will hopefully be banned. However, I now apparently have to take the financial responsibility for the whole sordid affair instead of the buyer.
The buyer ultimately returned the item
(against my wishes
) so should have got the item cost back. The rest of it, the shipping, eBay fees and PayPal fees is going to have to be my loss or apparently they are going to pass my details to a debt collection company. As far as I'm concerned, the buyer was a moron who wasn't big enough to admit his mistake and took it too far. eBay on the other hand should have offered mediation, should have spoken to both sides before acting and certainly shouldn't have gone through the process of complaint received, one sided outcome made, refund issued in less than an hour
(11pm at night I might add
). If they had done it properly, they themselves wouldn't have been out of pocket and I wouldn't be fuming.
Of course if the buyer had simply said to begin with, 'look, I've made a mistake will you take it back?' I would have said yes and refunded him on the proviso that he paid the shipping. Instead he decided to start inventing stories.
) 
Helluva terrible ebay story, Chris. I've always admired Rich's intrepid forays into the land of selling. I'll only buy; the selling seems so problematic. 
