Q: When an eBay (or other) buyer is presented shipping options and he himself chooses to decline tracked delivery postal service, why is the buyer penalized through forfeiture of any Seller Protection? Both eBay and PayPal will give a refund to the buyer when the seller cannot prove that the item was delivered, even if the seller has proof of postage such as a Canada Post postal acceptance receipt (bearing the unique shipment code matching the barcode on the PayPal-printed shipping label). Surely the buyer should forfeit any right to claim an "item not received" if they choose to NOT pay for a shipping service that includes delivery confirmation. (note: I believe that if the seller dictates the shipping service used, then all risk should be entirely on the seller). If Canadian sellers insist that international (overseas) buyers pay for a shipping service WITH delivery confirmation, so that they are protected, then the actual shipping cost to overseas buyers in most destinations will be approx C$50 for a relatively small 500g parcel!... and 3-4x that to certain other countries!! So with the exception of some high-value items (to which a high shipping cost may be trivial), that makes it cost-prohibitive for overseas buyers to buy from us, or it means that we Canadian sellers take all the risk and will NOT be protected, despite PayPal's "Seller Protection: Eligible" notification (appearance) that they are. Background for my question: Back in December, I listed a number of identical items on eBay. I am not a store, just a private seller, who had sold perhaps 10 items in 15 years on eBay, but who saw a window of opportunity to make a small profit by selling a new-to-market item (wireless headphones) that were currently only available in limited quantities here in N.America, by making them available to overseas buyers. eBay.ca's built-in Shipping Tool was having issues with International shipping (not providing sufficient options when Canada, USA and Worldwide were selected) when I first listed, so I diligently looked up various Canada Post shipping options for numerous countries around the world and shared the costs in my listing, saying to contact me if you were bidding from a country not listed. After selling a few through auction, I listed another via BuyItNow. It was quickly purchased by a buyer from Pakistan, which was a country that I had not posted shipping costs for. The buyer had been registered on eBay since 2010 and had a Feedback score of 48, all Positive, I was happy to see. In a number of back-and-forth messages that followed prior to payment, we discussed shipping options. I gave the buyer the only 4 CP shipping options available (note: prices were actual cost, current at the time, which have gone up since). C$22.30 for Small-Packet-International-Air (untracked) C$53.47 for International-Parcel-Surface(insured but not tracked) C$75.35 for International-Parcel-Air (fully insured but not tracked) C$176.86 for Priority Worldwide Pak, the ONLY Canada Post option that included international tracking (and/or delivery confirmation). - The buyer rightfully dismissed the insured options as what does he care about insuring his purchase when both eBay and PayPal do that anyhow, at no extra cost to him. - He dismissed the Priority Worldwide tracked/delivery option due to the extreme high cost, which was almost as much as his item cost. Consider also that in many countries (including Pakistan), import tariff and local taxes are assessed on postal imports, often on the shipping-inclusive total. So a low shipping cost is generally of great importance when buying internationally. As a direct comparison, a US seller using USPS's First-Class-Package-Int-Registerered (that is signed, delivery confirmation) could send the same package to Pakistan (or nearly anywhere else in the world) for approx US$37/<C$50. There's no way a Canadian such as myself can compete with that! So, HE CHOSE the most economical option, the C22.30 untracked Small-Packets-Int. Air service. He paid his total via PayPal and I saw that my sale was "Seller Protection: Eligible". Good, I thought. Having printed the PayPal shipping label, when I went to the post office the next day, I asked for a Postal Acceptance Receipt from the clerk, as proof of mailing (the receipt shows the Canada Post location, the time/date, and the scanned-at-the-counter barcode matching the one on the shipping label, naturally). When I came home, I messaged the buyer through eBay, attaching a photo of the postal receipt, which I thought was a decent thing to do in lieu of no tracking/other online proof of shipment, and proved to eBay/PayPal that the item (or at least an item) was on its way to the provided address. I did the same for all of my other similar items sold (before or after this sale), which were sent to UK(x3), NL, AUSTRALIA(x3), NZ and MALAYSIA — and my buyers all appreciated it, and they all received their items without issue. Long story short(er): 5 weeks after purchase, the buyer filed an eBay Case, saying my parcel never arrived. Despite the messages I left in the Case file saying that I had contacted CP (Ref# included) and the International Mail Office in Pakistan and was waiting to hear back from them, eBay filed in his favour and his C$252.30 purchase total was taken from my bank account and refunded to him. Canada Post eventually told me they could see in their system that my parcel had arrived at the local sorting facility (Pearson Airport, Toronto), but they couldn't even tell me what city in Pakistan it departed for (which would help me in perhaps locating the correct PK customs office), and CP's final answer was "this shipment wasn't tracked"—as I expected, really. Nobody in Pakistan ever replied, despite my repeated attempts. A few days later, he messaged me saying that I "cheated him" because he had just bought an identical item from another Canadian eBayer and this seller had given him a tracking # and only charged him C$40 for shipping. That made no sense, given the CP options available, and the (tracked) UPS/DHL etc estimates I'd looked at that were also in the $180 (or higher) range. I located the only other Canadian eBayer who had sold the item in the last few days and messaged him to ask if what I'd been told was true. He confirmed it was the same buyer and told me the buyer paid $88 for shipping. It turns out that CP's International-Parcel-Air(and Surface) service includes tracking service but it is 'events in Canada' tracking ONLY—there is no tracking after it leaves Canada—and certainly NO delivery confirmation. So, it appears my buyer wasted his money on more expensive shipping, and it also did the seller no benefit as he too was without Protection (despite thinking that he was Protected) and his eBay/PayPal fees will have slightly increased due to the increased Final Value amount. I monitored both Feedback pages (seller and my buyer) to see if/when the re-bought item arrived safely in PK. Neither ever provided Feedback for the other, suggesting that parcel also did NOT arrive. My buyer has never messaged me to say that my parcel ever arrived, or that the other one did and mine didn't (which he probably would have, as he seemed to believe that I never sent anything). I wrote to both to ask what happened, and never heard back from either. Either the buyer scammed us both, or neither parcel arrived safely, through no fault of his own. I honestly don't think he is a scammer, based on his Feedback history and corruption that I've since learned is rife in Pakistan's postal system. Then again, neither of our two "Item not received" cases show up on his record because, as I found, you can't leave Feedback when you lose a case. I am out my item cost, my shipping cost, my shipping materials cost, my eBay fees, my PayPal fees, my profit. Where is the advertised PayPal Seller Protection? According to the terms, I have to provide Proof of Delivery in order to be "protected". But now that I think of it, a buyer paying for a shipping option with delivery confirmation only benefits the seller IF the item shows as "delivered" AND IF the buyer files a claim saying he never received it. Which is unlikely from someone with a good eBay track record, such as he had. If the item goes missing at any point prior to delivery, the seller has NO Protection! In any case, why would any buyer choose to buy from a seller who insisted on using an expensive delivery-confimation shipping serivce when doing so only benefits the seller? There's no benefit to him, as was proven when eBay/PayPal required *zero* proof that he didn't receive my item and refunded him his money. So the buyer will choose to buy from a seller who (unwittingly, like me, perhaps) offers economical untracked shipping. And I think that point takes us nicely full-circle, back to my opening question.
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