Just like many other ebay users, i sell and i buy from ebay. But as much as we want to be a honest seller, to give a 100% true and full account of the item we are selling, we expect other sellers to be as honest as we are. However, we need to know that there are dishonest sellers around!
Having many unpleasant encounters with dishonest sellers, the thought of giving up on ebay crossed my mind. However, instead of withdrawing from my bad experiences, i decided to write them and advise other ebay users of how they can protect themselves!
Recently, i made a purchase on ebay for a bag. Looking through the photos almost 20 times to make sure that the item is not a imitation or a fake, i decided to buy it. When the item arrived, the alignment of the print is completely out and it is obvious an imitation, a fake! But because the seller indicated 'do not accept returns', i could not do anything or report this seller to ebay!
What can you do to prevent things like this from happening?
1) Make sure that you check through the photos and the materials used to be real before even bidding for the item or make a purchase
2) Check whether seller accept returns, it is ok if seller DO NOT accept returns
3) Make payment with paypal and only in a single payment. DO NOT accept oversea sellers offering you a discount to make payment via transfers at a discount, especially if item is expensive
If after you have done all the above, but still you encounter the same situation as me, what should you do?
1) Contact seller and communicate with seller
2) Indicate to the seller the reason why you think it may be an imitation or a fake
3) Try to come to an agreement with the seller that you will be satisfied with. Whether is it a full refund, a partial refund or other agreements
4) In the event if seller is not responsive to your messages and have indicated clearly that they DO NOT accept returns, try reporting to ebay
5) However, there maybe times where item is not under the ebay buyer protection. Do not be despair. You can go to paypal solution center and file a case against the seller via the transcation
6) If seller still does not response to paypal solution center, you may then escalate to a paypal claim where the money will be withheld from both the seller and the buyer till paypal review the situation and come out with a reasonable payout
7) Be patient to let paypal review the situation but at the meantime, try to keep record of as much evident as possible, as paypal might ask you for some information
Unless seller tell you personally and guarantees that item is authentic, do not assume that it is authentic. There are many replica nowadays that comes even with the authentic card, so even if the seller has an authentic card, it no longer guarantees that the item is authentic anymore. So unless you get a personal response from seller that item is authentic, do not buy.
My 2nd case is as such. i asked the seller whether item comes with authentic card and seller replies yes. However after the first case, i wrote to the 2nd seller immediately to ask whether item is 100% authentic and his reply was that it is from a private seller and it comes with the authentic card. After prompting further, he could not give a 100% yes and say that if i receive the item and still do not like it then i can send it back but i will have to pay for postage and bear the cost of sending the item back.
SO BE VERY CAREFUL WHEN YOU ARE PURCHASING ONLINE. Make sure the seller could tell you and assure that it is a 100% authentic even before you make the purchase so that it will save you all the postage fees and the trouble of sending the items back. Postage fees can easily cost up to $100 per time, so be wise!
However, there are some items that you can live with even if they are not authentic, just like those i mentioned in my previous post on
Real or Fake.
