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Absurd ordeal to request order cancellation, seller unreachable.
Summary: kurasshu08 raised an issue about the difficulty of canceling an order because the seller was unreachable. marioelegio took part in the discussion, prompting further comments and insights from kurasshu08 and cizeta1964. The interaction highlights a frustrating problem encountered in customer support and in communications with sellers. The conversation appears focused on the negative experience and the search for a possible solution.
Hello, I'm writing here because with regret I’ve noticed that eBay chat support has been eliminated over the years.
I won’t go too much into detail, but I ordered an item I needed with a certain urgency because I had to give it as a gift. I placed the order 2 days ago, relying on the wording "1 business day required for packaging and shipping". Keep in mind that I placed the order early in the morning, so I gave the seller plenty of time to meet that "business day" stated in the listing.
Now, if I’m not certain I can handle the order within 24 hours, I’m not going to write "1 day" in the listing. Or at the very least, within those 24 hours I try to communicate with the buyer in case there are delays. Having sold here on eBay, I’ve always made sure to warn people if something wasn’t going right, but evidently not everyone takes it that seriously.
Anyway, I had to make do by ordering elsewhere and the order placed with the new seller has already been shipped, but now there’s the issue that eBay won’t let me proceed with the cancellation of the order. It says the case has been opened but is "awaiting the response" of a seller who will never respond, since they’ve been inactive for days and don’t seem the least bit interested in their profile or their items for sale. I know this because I had a similar experience in the past and even today, after 3 years, that seller still has the same items for sale with no changes whatsoever to the listings.
Just to be safe, since in the past I got burned and lost about a hundred euros because I opened the dispute "too late" (4 months had passed, and as far as I know PayPal should cover up to 6 months... I don’t know), I decided not to take any risks and I also opened a dispute on PayPal for "item not received," specifying that I tried to contact the seller and attaching screenshots of my messages with no reply at all.
Is this the right procedure? Fortunately, PayPal temporarily refunded the amount of the purchase, but I don’t know if that will cause problems with eBay. Should I take any further steps? Unfortunately, I’m not able to communicate verbally, which is why a chat customer service would have been more convenient for me.
Unfortunately, I’m forced to say that this site is no longer as safe as it used to be for buyers. Before, it was possible to contact an eBay representative via chat to try to speed things up on similar issues. On other platforms, without naming names here, getting in touch via chat with other agents takes no more than 5 minutes and problems are resolved more quickly and effectively.
marioelegio
Mentore1 year agoEbay has different procedures than PayPal.
https://www.ebay.it/help/buying/returns-items-not-received-refunds-buyers/ottieni-aiuto-per-un-oggetto-che-non-arrivato?id=4042
At the bottom there was also the link to have customer service call you.
hi
mario
kurasshu08
OP1 year agoAs I specified in the post, it’s impossible for me to communicate verbally because of physical limitations, and I don’t want to delegate certain communications to third parties. I don’t understand the platform’s hostility toward text communications, even though I did find, hidden at the end of a chain of pages, a link to communicate by email.
Support basically replied that these are eBay’s timelines and nothing can be done, blaming me for not reading the shipping timelines when I reported a completely different problem. Then eBay itself closed the cancellation process with the following reason: "We were informed that you opened a dispute with your payment provider." Nothing wrong with that, I’d say — in fact, thank goodness for PayPal, otherwise who knows when, and IF, I would have seen my money again.
eBay washes its hands of it, in short, implying that I didn’t read the entire listing (which I always do, and VERY carefully) when the problem here is the seller’s lack of communication.
Great seriousness for a platform of this caliber, I have to say. (If it wasn’t clear, that was pure sarcasm)
This way, I’m only being pushed to do sales and purchases elsewhere. Absurd.
cizeta1964
Mentore1 year agoSupport basically replied that these are eBay’s timelines and nothing can be done, blaming me for not having read the shipping times when I reported a completely different problem.
Because from the day after the supposed delivery you can open a dispute for item not received, the seller has 4 days to respond, after which you are automatically refunded by eBay.
Then eBay itself closed the cancellation process with the following reason: "We were informed that you opened a dispute with your payment institution." Nothing wrong there, I’d say — in fact, thank goodness there’s PayPal, otherwise who knows when and IF I would have seen my money again.
They’re referring to PayPal, of course (they can’t know which payment method you linked to PayPal); if you open a dispute through PayPal, the one with eBay is automatically closed.
Actually it’s all very simple, and eBay is completely biased in favor of the buyer.
kurasshu08
OP1 year agoI don't know... if it were really in favor of the buyer, I wouldn't have found myself forced to turn to PayPal after receiving an answer from eBay support that was totally out of this world.
The shipping time indicated doesn't matter much; if the package isn't shipped on time (we're already at 3 days with NO COMMUNICATION) that's already a first, more than justified warning sign, and in almost 10 years on the platform, if there isn't even a message from the seller, that item will never be shipped. I'm speaking from experience, definitely not hearsay.
I repeat, the problem here is the fact that the seller didn't make himself heard, nor will he reply. For heaven's sake, he's a private individual and maybe he has his reasons, but it's clear that since he hasn't updated his profile for 10 months, all his still-active listings are the result of eBay's automation (and here too, if it is noticed that a user hasn't logged in for at least 30 days, why do his listings remain active? That only turns into a waste of time for potential buyers who then have their money "locked" for at least 2 weeks) and he is in fact not at all interested in taking care of them. Ergo, why should I leave my money in the hands of someone who has no interest in making sure I get what I bought?
I repeat, thank goodness there are more serious e-commerce platforms that are quicker at solving these problems.
cizeta1964
Mentore1 year agoI’ll say it one last time, just because otherwise the wrong message comes across to those reading that eBay doesn’t solve this kind of problem, whereas that’s not true at all, you just need to know how to use it properly:
- if you order an item with guaranteed shipping in 24 hours (or even more, depending on the listing), that same listing shows the estimate eBay makes for delivery times. Example: from August 15 to 20
- whether the seller has shipped or not, whether they can be reached or not, starting the day after the last date expected by eBay - in the example case, August 21 - you can open a dispute for item not received
- the seller has 4 days to respond, but if they shipped and it didn’t arrive or - worse - they didn’t ship at all, eBay refunds you on the 5th day
- if unfortunately you let the 30 days pass (not one, 30) from the date expected by eBay, there are the 180 days of PayPal and the 365 days for the credit card chargeback
- if then you think that, despite all this, eBay can also push the seller to ship within the expected times, it does that too, because it bombards them with emails until they’ve shipped, and if they’re late they’ll have a performance defect that, in the long run, will lead to the suspension of the account
- the only thing eBay can’t do is go pick up the item from the seller and deliver it to you personally; nor can it affect the courier’s delivery round to force them to deliver faster. It sets a delivery time - clearly stated in the listing - and if it’s not met, you get a refund.
- last but not least: all of this is easily accessible and manageable in an automated way within the site, there’s no need to call, chat, or write emails.
If that’s not being biased in favor of the buyer...