Seller Never Showed. Seller Not Responding.

[nikkoaza]

I wanted to buy an item 5 mins after it was posted on FB Marketplace.

Seller is an hour away and said item was hot and to hold it I could pay him via PayPal and then head up.

During the transaction he said the goods and services options takes 21 days to clear so that would not work for him to hold until I got there. 

That said I used friends and family since I was going for the item the same time.

Since then the seller has stopped replying and PayPal is not allowing me to open a dispute.

I tried contacting PayPal within the hour to let them know of potential fraud.

Shouldn't PayPal be capable of retrieving that money and/or opening a dispute against him?

How can I file a dispute and escalate it to a claim? There are no options available for that in the resolution center for me.

Thanks for your help.

[kernowlass]

@nikkoaza 

A friends / family (or gift payment) is intended as a transfer of funds from family or friends to one another. For this reason, there is no processing fee when payment is made with bank or PayPal balance.
However as it is a gift payment, there is also no Buyer protection as no goods or services should have been exchanged.

If he was not a close mate or family member you should never use that option as it enables the seller to evade paying his paypal fees and negates your buyer protection at the same time.

You would also not be able to open a dispute apart from one citing an unauthorised transaction but that would be automatically closed as you did authorise the initial payment.

Be careful as using that option for purchasing goods is against Paypal rules and can lead to account limitation.

If you funded your paypal payment via a credit card then contact your card issuer and see if they will help you but unfortunately they may decline as well as it was a gift payment.