Hello,
I was wondering if anyone can assist with this or offer some advice. On 8th August, my mother sold some of my old golf equipment on eBay that I had left at her house. Normally I would have sold it on mine, but I'm extremely busy at the moment and she was helping me out.
One of the items was a club that sold for £137 including postage. The buyer paid straight away, but interestingly sent a message a day later asking if payment had gone through okay as nothing was showing on their bank account. She responded confirming it was fine, but on reflection felt this was a bit strange as surely you'd see on PayPal that the payment had been made? I shipped the club with tracking and it was delivered successfully, positive feedback was received.
On 29th August my mother got a message advising that the payment had been frozen as the buyer had reported a fraudulent transaction to their bank or credit card. We provided proof of delivery and several days later the payment was unfrozen. We also contacted the buyer and they responded that they had received the club and were happy with it. They denied opening a case, but strangely signed off the email in a different name to the name that I had shipped the club to. As the money was unfrozen we thought that was the end of it.
On 29th September she received another email saying that the case had been closed in the buyers favour and they had returned the £137 to them. I am therefore left with no money and no golf club. We contacted PayPal and have been advised that as the decision to reverse the payment was made by the bank or credit card company and not PayPal there is nothing they can do and I should contact the buyer. I sent a message on eBay but haven't had a response yet.
I decided to do some google research on the buyer as they have quite an unusual name. I found them straight away through companies house and saw that the address for them was correct and matched the name of the person we received payment from. They were listed as no longer working for the company on companies house, but it was clearly a family business and people with the same name were shown as directors. I contacted the business and spoke to one of the family, they advised that the person who sent me a message in a different name was also part of the family and that the account was that persons fathers. They said that he had probably used his dads account to purchase the club. I'm speculating, but it looks as if his father has disputed this with his bank as it could have possible been purchased without his permission. I passed my details on requesting this family member makes contact, but I haven't heard back. To clarify, this is not a child or teenager, but a man and his elderly father.
I'd like to know what my options are here as PayPal have been less than helpful. I cannot understand why we haven't been compensated through seller protection. If it's this easy to scam sellers then surely PayPal isn't safe at all. I know it's not a huge amount of money, but I hate been taken advantage of and will pursue this until I get my money from somewhere. I will look to settle it via civil court if need be.
Thanks,
Tomds
