Abusive return and dispute closed in the seller's favor | Safety on eBay

luckylukecollectibles · 2025-04-14T16:55:24.232000Z

Professional colleagues, here’s a little mishap that just happened to me:A US buyer buys an item from me for €40 after tough negotiations. Two silver-plated metal dishes, 5 kg Colissimo, charged €93 in the listing so I could cover the €75 postal cost (yes, I do mark up on service providers, no choice if I don’t want to be hit with 20% eBay fees for international sales). 24 hours after paying, the buyer comes back to me complaining that the shipping costs are, in his view, excessive. No matter how much I explain my calculation to him, he won’t budge, practically calling me a thief, and asks to cancel the order. I had just packed the parcel (important to ensure optimal protection for such a long trip), and I was at the shipping kiosk in my post office (really!). As a precaution, I ask for help from an eBay advisor, who to my great surprise tells me to ship it. At that point the buyer threatens me that he’ll “anyway send the item back to me at my expense.” A week later I do indeed receive a return request with the reason: item arrived damaged, with a few photos of the scratches and small knocks that I had taken care to illustrate and describe precisely in my listing. Confident I was in the right, I again ask for help from an advisor who tells me he actually completely agrees with me, that it is an abusive return request, that the buyer will have to send the item back at his own expense, and that he will take care of it. Today I’m surprised to see €133 disappear from my account, because eBay.com (the US side) ruled in the buyer’s favor, and I had not offered a return solution in time. For the record, in the meantime I had still taken care to ask the customer what he was asking me for the return: €93, surprise surprise. Conclusion: I should have lost €75 for the outbound trip + €93 for the return, all that just to get back an item worth €40. On top of that, eBay doesn’t even deduct their commission because it’s a dispute I lost. So while I received €118 from the transaction, they take €133 from me…Since this morning I’ve been trying to insist with eBay to report this abuse and ask for a goodwill gesture, but all I hear is “I’m sending a note to the relevant department, they’ll get back to you.” I do indeed receive emails from eBay.com telling me each time that I should have paid for the return…Conclusion, I am devastated by the situation!I had been working with this platform in good faith for 17 years, my turnover kept growing and so did their commission, not to mention the store fees. Has this happened to anyone else, and if so do you have any advice to give me so I can get justice?I get the impression there isn’t really a complaints department…Thanks for your help. Signed, an eBayer who is very eager to close his shop today.

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Abusive return and dispute closed in the seller's favor | Safety on eBay | eBay France