seller agreed to refund without return but, paypal wont refund... help please

[L33r0y3]

Hi All,

I purchased a new set of curtains from a Chinese supplier only to receive a hoodie instead. Having spoken with the supplier they kept bouncing around with their resolution until I put a dispute through PayPal. After this they agreed to do a refund and when asked if they wanted the incorrect item back, they said no.

I have provided all this information to PayPal and yet PayPal refuses to provide a refund, why are they insisting I send back something that the seller doesn't want and has communicated in writing (which has been provided to PP) before they will take any action? I have tried to get support through their message us option and everyone who has responded has never read any of the messages one, of them even read the suppliers offer of "resending the correct item and a 5% additional refund" and attempted to settle the claim on a 5% refund with no replacement. How can I get this resolved without having to send the item back, the return costs are expensive (almost 35% of the initial price) and the seller doesnt want the item back? I have even asked PP to just refund the difference between what the charge was minus the postage and they havent responded. the claim will expire soon and I wont be able to send it back in time due to being interstate (paypal promised they would have responded before I left about if I had to send it back).

[kernowlass · Accepted solution]

@L33r0y3 

The dispute stage of any claim is for any negotiations between you and the seller, in that stage the seller can agree to a part refund or full refund, return or no return, then the dispute would just time out at 20 days.

HOWEVER if you escalate to a claim then paypal get involved, IF you win that claim the only option that they give you is to return the item back to the seller (trackable to prove delivery) for a full refund. Paypal do not get involved in part refunds or any other agreements once its a claim, that should all have been done in the dispute stage.

If the seller really wanted to refund you then they can easily just do so and then the claim would auto-close when you didn't bother returning the item.

A seller can refund if they want to at any time, the fact that the seller has not done so in the dispute stage OR claim stage seems to indicate they do not intend doing so and they know perfectly well that paypal will require return of an item before they have to refund. 

[L33r0y3]

Thanks for your response. That was what I was assuming was going to be the case. The seller would only refund on the condition I closed the case. Sadly I had no faith in their ability/willingness to provide the refund if I did. I had hoped that PayPal would take into consideration that the seller had agreed to a refund without a return but, they are being sticklers to their process (not necessarily a bad thing, just annoying). From what I can see it looks like the seller never responded to PP and as you suggest is just going to leave this to PP to resolve and force the return. its a shame it costs so much more for return postage than the original postage. Postage costs in Aus have been getting really bad over the years.