Cruiser133

Guys,

I believe I posted about my misfortunes selling my E100 project on Ebay. I was pretty clear the project needed advanced modeling skills to complete and was being sold "as is". Well it was sold to Myung Chan Kim of 14452 S. Avalon Blvd. in Gardena CA 90248 with a ph# (562) 304-2595. He promptly received it and tracking showed it was accepted by a person at that address on March 31st.

Almost 12 days later he files a claim to Ebay that the tank was broken in shipping and he wants a refund. I asked for pictures which he provides. The pictures clearly show the box I shipped it in are unmolested and it is quite clear he attempted to pry off a part and broke it as the broken pieces are still under the tank on his work bench right next to the broken part. I called Ebay to report this fellow after communication with the buyer proved fruitless. The Ebay representative agreed with me but said I would have to accept a full return and then I could file a claim against the buyer for the damages, however, the buyer had 10 days to ship or he automatically forfeits any return claim.. With no other alternative I accepted.

I heard nothing from the buyer until the NINTH day when he sends me a message with a USPS tracking number which contains NO ADDRESS other than my city and state. He then claims a delivery attempt was made and no one was home to accept so another attempt will be made. When I get home, I ask the family if a delivery was made which they had no knowledge of. I then checked for a missed delivery card and nothing.

I have been down this road before where there is a scam where the fraudster will send an item, usually junk or empty box to an address in your city but not your home or they piggyback on to another unrelated delivery from another unrelated sender but so happens to be in your home town. The last time it was a McDonalds and it was a delivery not associated with mine. What tipped me off was the lack of an address on the tracking information.

So now I get to deal with Ebay on going after this person, in the meantime, my paypal has been locked down for two weeks. What a mess! Avoid this guy like the plague and if I crossed any lines by identifying this guy, I will remove it.

ausf

It completely sucks what you are going through, I understand fully and hope it clears up as soon as possible, but I don't think it's a good idea to post someone's name, address and phone number, no matter what they did. Username on eBay, sure, but publicly identifying him doesn't help since no one will cross reference that and possibly opens you up to libel.

Jarlath

Damned... I just Googled the address you provided and the number of E-Bay scam notes associated to that address is very high!

RCFlyerDan

My Feedback: (54)

Ebay is better then on here! I had a scam buyer on here too, because people are less likely to leave a feedback on RCU. On EBay, you can block those that don't have 100% positive feedback from bidding on your item. You can also delete the bids of anyone that you don't feel worthy of their bids on Ebay, and block them from further bidding. Hopefully, your tank isn't that expensive and lesson learned. Not EBay's fault that a faulty bidder bought your item. How was his feedback? If it was poor, kind of your fault too for letting him continuing the bid. Just my experience, and I have over 550+ 100% transactions on the Bay.

Cruiser133

He had a 100% positive feedback rating like another poster stated. Am I supposed to conduct investigations into buyers with that kind of rating before I sell my item? It was almost $600 by the way so it was quite a hit.

ausf

I guess I was wrong, if it uncovers something like Jarlath did.

This world is getting pretty confusing.

What was his feedback numbers when he bought the item?

ausf

Ebay has to get rid of the feedback based on buying. How does paying for something qualify the transaction?

welchgc

Wow - so much effort for a scam. What happened to honest work, honest living. Sorry to hear about the issues. Hope it resolves.

rgburrill

EBay protects buyers, not sellers. You can't even give a negative review of a bad buyer.

Panther F

That sucks what you're going through and wish we could help here as a group but even if eBay restores the balance of power on the feedback system, it would only work for the smaller majority of dishonest people as the more professional harden criminals would still be in operation.

I quit selling long ago not only because I wanted to protect my 100% and over 680 perfect transactions (not all at selling either), but the hassles of the deadbeat, non-paying, buyers-remorse people were getting more and more frequent and then the BIG change in the feedback system which is VERY unfair... my bank account was more important than making a buck.

I just hope things can remain civil here on RCU as I have sold quite a few things in the past and had no issues. But of course I only deal with those I really know and trust.

sgtparker01

I just did a search on ebay for kglpass and came up with 3 others with a name close to what his is, they all were from CA. and all had 100% feedback as buyers, no negatives at all. Very fishy, so I put them all on my block buyers list.

Cruiser133

Thank you so much for this information brother!!! I used it when I contacted Ebay to inform them of this scam. They told me they will resolve this within 24hrs...

RichJohnson

Wish you luck getting your money returned. Ebay needs to block the mailing addreses of this guy from being registered on ebay.
im close enough that I would likely visit the buyer if he did that to me. And I would probably take along a few friends, lots of evidence and either call the law, or just get medieval.
Good luck!

heavyaslead

I always force the buyer to buy shipping insurance for anything I sell over 100 dollars so their scam/claim is with the shipper, never with me.

Something that also helps is a true auction, that way no scammer sees a high price item that is an obvious target, no scammer is going to waste time waiting for bids or outbidding others.

Jarlath

NP Bro. We Tankers need to look out for each other!

rgburrill

It was said many times above but still people didn't listen. EBAY NO LONGER ALLOWS A SELLER TO GIVE NEGATIVE FEEDBACK TO A BUYER. 100% POSITIVE MEANS NOTHING!

People need to stop using Ebay to sell until they get their s--t together and allow negative reviews of buyers.

milly122

DO NOT SHIP TO 14452 S Avalon Blvd.
My ebay buyer's name METRAPLS3 did the exact same thing to me. He bought 1 $1000 chandelier, waited a few days to pay for it (while he was presumably seeing if he could get a potential overseas buyer). After he found a buyer he paid for the chandelier.
I shipped the chandelier to this warehouse at 14452 S Avalon Blvd and it was signed for and received. Surprise, a month down the road METRPLAS3 opened a case against me, ITEM NOT RECEIVED.
Freight is trickier to track than UPS, FEDEX or USPS. I had to plead with Ebay to look at the delivery confirmation and the paperwork where someone had signed for the chandelier at the delivery address. Ebay closed the case in my favor, but this guy may end up going through paypal. Who knows.
Thanks to your thread I was able to inform ebay of his behavior, they looked at the number of cases METRAPLS3 had opened against people as item not received, and ebay said they were going to shut down his buying privileges, but here it is a month later and the guy is still buying on Ebay.

GBiz

My apologies for resurrecting an older thread however I felt compelled to provide what seems to be some much needed information for you all. I run a fairly large eBay store and although this thread sounds like a major issue it seems there is an eBay policy that most sellers either are not aware of or have forgotten about. Sadly you cannot expect eBay to point it out either as they are far too concerned about buyers and not so much for sellers (as we are all aware). Although I would not say any of you are wrong to be worried about sending an item to this address you really do not have anything to fear so long as you have delivery confirmation to the address (this is important). The reason for this is that this address " 14452 S Avalon Blvd Gardena, CA 90248 " is a freight forwarder "aci express". What does that mean to you? It's very simple, as long as your package makes it to this address your job is done.

Here's the most important part: eBay does not protect buyers that use freight forwarders/re-shippers.
pages.ebay.com/help/policies/money-back-guarantee.html

If you ship an item to this address and the buyer turns around and claims it arrived damaged and/or opens a return all you need to do is call eBay and inform merchant support that the buyer used a freight forwarder to receive the item(s) and that you have no way of knowing what they could have done or how they shipped the item to the international destination. When a buyer uses a freight forwarder or re-shipping service they forfeit their buyer protection. It is documented on eBay's money back guarantee guidelines under 'not covered'. We have had buyers try this same thing in the past and all we had to do was inform eBay it was a freight forwarder/re-shipper and the case/return is closed. In fact the reason I found this thread was that we shipped an item to this address and I needed to verify it was a forwarder. It is a sad thing but you must use eBay's own policies to get through things like this and pretty much all difficult issues, it's just how you have to play the game. I cannot stress how important it is to know about all eBay policies in order to win fraudulent cases/returns. PayPal is an entirely different beast with it's own issues and a far more buyer first mentality than even eBay (as crazy as that seems) so winning PayPal disputes can be even more difficult.

Best of luck to all of you and this is my first time posting my apologies if the link included is not allowed.

tankme

I know what you mean about Ebay screwing sellers. I had a woman last year try to ream me for a simple mistake in a listing. Yes it was my mistake and it was fixed as soon as I found it. Long story short, she sent the item back. I had to refund the item price, her original shipping price, and the return shipping. She didn't repack the item in the foam so when I got it back it was broken. I couldn't even leave her any feedback after she filed the claim. She also never even talked to me about the item, she just filed the claim. I've been on Ebay for like 14 years and to have someone accuse me of trying to defraud them on a $10 item was just very frustrating. So all and all that $10 sale cost me $20 and I was out the cost of the item to because it returned broken. I sent an inquiry to Ebay about it and never heard anything about it.

Imex-Erik

You guys think eBay is bad?? Trying selling on Amazon

GBiz

For situations like this you can call eBay, ask to speak with merchant support. Let them know the item you took back for return arrived to you damaged or otherwise in a different condition than you sent it due to the customers negligence and they should (not always) reverse the outcome of the case in your favor. They essentially see it as yes you were wrong due to the mistake but the buyer still needs to get that item back to you in the same condition it arrived to them. Helpful factors would be if you had the buyer send a picture of what they received before returning it or if you have actual pictures in your listing (not stock pictures). When you contact eBay you will need to send pictures and a signed affidavit (they will send to you) and it should be taken care of for you. The real question is if the value of the item is worth the investment of your time on this one. A lot of sellers would chalk it up to a loss rather then sending a return label and just refund the buyer knowing they will be losing out more than they made by selling the item once you take into account original shipping, item price, return shipping. Regarding the buyer never talking to you they would have had to of opened a return case to send it back, that is your chance to speak with them, offer a partial refund, etc. If they refuse partial refund and you want the item back there is no way out of refunding everything and providing return shipping unless of course it arrives to you damaged.

I cannot stress enough, to not have situations like this happen to you, make sure you are up to date on all eBay policies. Regarding Amazon, they are worse in the sense they offer less seller support as they expect you know all Amazon policies, went through the Amazon university info and are on your game. eBay will at least help you through situations in most cases unless you are being unrealistic.