Paypal Dispute Runaround... Help Please!

kjcolby1978
Contributor
Contributor

Long story short, I bought an expensive watch from an ebay seller outside of ebay for $3500 which turned out to be a fake, the seller said he was unaware it was fake and to return it for refund and gave me return address (his original shipment did not have a return address).  Upon mailing it was marked undeliverable, and I contacted the post office wh informed me that house was vacant... I opened a dispute right away and escalated to claim.

 

The seller again claimed that was his address and his confirmed paypal address was his ex wife's house.  Eventually paypal granted refund upon return which I was very worried about.  I was asked to mail it to the confirmed address, signature required, which I did, and the seller picked it up 10 days ago (tracking shows he signed for it).  So I was just waiting for Paypal to refund the money at this point.

 

Next time I logged into my account it says the case is being reviewed by Paypal.  A call to customer service uncovered that the seller claimed the watch was returned broken!!  I was worried originally to ship it back because, being a fake, what is to stop him from just breaking the watch and claiming I broke it.

 

Now the case is "waiting for other party" and another call to Paypal says they are waiting for him to submit proof of damages, and he has 10 more days to respond!!!!

 

This has been going on since February 2 and it is for $3500.  Am I in danger of the seller providing some sort of proof of damage and losing my refund??  I have done everything asked of me by Paypal, I even have a documented appraisal claiming the watch is fake which I was never asked to submit.  


What can I do here to be sure I get my money back on this now that he has the watch back and I have no recourse??

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4 REPLIES 4

snowshoe
Frequent Advisor
Frequent Advisor

Perhaps a major problem, you stated:

 

 I bought an expensive watch from an ebay seller outside of ebay for $3500 which turned out to be a fake,

 

Was the item originally listed on eBay and for whatever reason, you completed the transaction outside of eBay?

 

If you did, discussion over, you have no Buyer Protection.

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kjcolby1978
Contributor
Contributor

You still have buyer protection outside of ebay for goods purchased.

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Unfairpractices
Contributor
Contributor
The buyer generally wins, PayPal case reviewers aren't idiots, they know people will lie and say its broken and take that into consideration. The watch business is very shady from the start with lots of fakes, PayPal is aware of this, you will probably win, but there are no guarantees. If it is claimed as fake and the seller agrees and says he didn't know and let's you return it, then he is agreeing it is fake and not disputing that and implying the watch is probably a 50$ replica, thus even if it comes back broken there shouldn't even be a debate about who gets the 3500$ because from the start it shouldn't have been his money. Hope this helped. I think you will probably win.
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kjcolby1978
Contributor
Contributor

@Unfairpractices wrote:
The buyer generally wins, PayPal case reviewers aren't idiots, they know people will lie and say its broken and take that into consideration. The watch business is very shady from the start with lots of fakes, PayPal is aware of this, you will probably win, but there are no guarantees. If it is claimed as fake and the seller agrees and says he didn't know and let's you return it, then he is agreeing it is fake and not disputing that and implying the watch is probably a 50$ replica, thus even if it comes back broken there shouldn't even be a debate about who gets the 3500$ because from the start it shouldn't have been his money. Hope this helped. I think you will probably win.

I was surprised Paypal had me return the item as counterfeits are supposed to be destroyed. 

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