How to avoid getting ripped off on the internet

[sedgdog]

Originally Posted by Tomis17

I just want to share a story of how you cannot only get scammed as a buyer but also as a seller. I recently sold an electric drum set a couple weeks ago and shipped the item out to the buyer. The buyer got it a couple days ago and claimed that some parts were missing. I told him to check the box again because I am certain I sent him all the parts. To make a long story short he wants me to either pay for the replacement parts or give him a full refund. There's insurance with UPS on the item but he refuses to go through UPS. What can I do? The replacement parts are not that much to replace and I wouldn't mind paying for it but it's the whole principal of the situation. If I pay for the replacement parts it be like me admitting that I didn't send him all the parts. What I am thinking is that he's just saying that parts were missing just so he could get a refund and then ship the item back to me while keeping the parts he needs. Any ideas on how I can resolve this issue?

How about offering to provide replacements for the missing parts. (Kinda like giving the guy who "will work for food" food instead of money). That way if he is being legit he should be happy. Just an idea.

Tim

[Tomis17]

He wants me to refund $30 to replace the part and I would do it but if I give him what he wants, it would seem like I am admitting that I made a mistake with the shipment. I am positive I sent him everything. This guy is out to rip someone off and I happen to be his victim. It just pisses me off cause I gave him such a good deal. Some people, enough is just never enough...

[Rattman]

Originally Posted by The Antipop

I would request this become a sticky... it is a really good post

This post is on-par with the thread about "all about ohms" and "speaker impedence" EXCELLENT info.. thank you!

[EduardoK]

This sure is a great and very useful thread!!!

[Bassman62]

I have just recieved an offer on a 1962 Burns Bass that I have advertised in the Vintage Guitar magazine for £2000.
A guy in the US is owed £7400 by a client in the UK, once they have my name and address the UK guy sends the cheque to the US guy who then sends it to me and so on and so on.

[SirBass]

Originally Posted by Bassman62

I have just recieved an offer on a 1962 Burns Bass that I have advertised in the Vintage Guitar magazine for £2000.
A guy in the US is owed £7400 by a client in the UK, once they have my name and address the UK guy sends the cheque to the US guy who then sends it to me and so on and so on.

sounds like a scam to me. i wouldn't do it.

[DeepBass9]

Originally Posted by Tomis17

He wants me to refund $30 to replace the part and I would do it but if I give him what he wants, it would seem like I am admitting that I made a mistake with the shipment. I am positive I sent him everything. This guy is out to rip someone off and I happen to be his victim. It just pisses me off cause I gave him such a good deal. Some people, enough is just never enough...

Dude, don't fall for it or give in. If you know you included the parts then you did. I'm sure you've double checked around the house; if you didn't see them, then you sent them. Why is he refusing to go through UPS...was the box in perfect shape...if not, then that's where his fight starts and ends...with UPS, not you. Tell him if he doesn't want to hit UPS then he can return everything and you'll refund his money, less the cost of the replacement parts you'll need to buy. I'll doubt you'll hear from him again.

$.02

[jgbass]

I am thinking of upgrading my membership again and selling some stuff here on TB. I never had any problems requiring PayPal, but now I am wondering if this is the best option, because it seems like there's a difference between PayPal accepting it and the payment actually clearing.

Is PayPal the best way to go here?

[BobKos]

For those who might be interested, PayPal isn't bulletproof either. Sellers are vulnerable if they're not paying attention. There are a couple scams that could cost you your bass or other gear. Someone negotiates a deal with you and offers to pay by PayPal. Most people here accept that. The buyer gives you shipping information and pays via Paypal. You ship the gear and it's a done deal.

Not so fast.

One of two scenarios can happen here:

1) The buyer has given you a ship to address that is not the 'CONFIRMED' address PayPal sent you on the receipt of payment notice. The buyer gave you his brother-in-law's address, his work address, or any other address except the 'CONFIRMED' address. After a while, he tells PayPal that he never received the gear. PayPal smacks you on the ass and asks you why you didn't ship the item to the 'CONFIRMED' address like you were supposed to? Buyer keeps your gear and gets his money back. :-(

2) For US sellers - a foriegn buyer will buy your gear and pay with PayPal. He'll request that you ship with US Postal service because they only charge about 1/3 of what UPS charges. You agree. He pays for the gear & you ship it. In a while he complains to PayPal that he never received the gear. PayPal tells you to cough up the online traceable tracking number. Hou say 'HUH?' because you can't. US Postal svc only offers this for domestic shipments. PayPal spanks your ass again and tells you to read the rules more carefully. Again, the foreign buyer gets your gear and his money back.

This is all terrible, but it is necessary to keep buyers semi-protected from abuse by unethical sellers. Sellers using PayPal as a transactional portal should be up to speed on the ways they can be screwed out of their gear.

Hope this helps someone save their cherished bass from being 'stolen' from them.

Peace...

[oldrocker]

Originally Posted by BobKos

1) The buyer has given you a ship to address that is not the 'CONFIRMED' address PayPal sent you on the receipt of payment notice. The buyer gave you his brother-in-law's address, his work address, or any other address except the 'CONFIRMED' address. After a while, he tells PayPal that he never received the gear. PayPal smacks you on the ass and asks you why you didn't ship the item to the 'CONFIRMED' address like you were supposed to? Buyer keeps your gear and gets his money back. :-(

If we ship the item insured for full purchase price would we be covered?

[BobKos]

Originally Posted by oldrocker

If we ship the item insured for full purchase price would we be covered?

No - the shipper has proof of delivery. The complication with the delivery falls outside of their responsibility. They did their job correctly. Additionally - for foreign shipments - insurance tracking through the US Postal Svc is not acceptable because it cannot be done through the internet ( at this time anyways ). More on that - if your foreign shipment gets lost or damaged but you declared it to be worth $10 on the customs form so the recipient could avoid customs / duty taxes, that creates a complicated situation that will not likely end up in your favor.

[oldrocker]

Originally Posted by BobKos

No - the shipper has proof of delivery. The complication with the delivery falls outside of their responsibility. They did their job correctly.

Bummer. I see the importance of shipping to Confrmed paypal adresses.

Thanks for the heads up.

[Temcat]

Originally Posted by BobKos

2) For US sellers - a foriegn buyer will buy your gear and pay with PayPal. He'll request that you ship with US Postal service because they only charge about 1/3 of what UPS charges. You agree. He pays for the gear & you ship it. In a while he complains to PayPal that he never received the gear. PayPal tells you to cough up the online traceable tracking number. Hou say 'HUH?' because you can't. US Postal svc only offers this for domestic shipments. PayPal spanks your ass again and tells you to read the rules more carefully. Again, the foreign buyer gets your gear and his money back.

So, being from Russia, I may be refused the option to pay via PayPal and ship using USPS? That sucks royally... Because, first of all, UPS and Fedex are outrageously expensive to ship here by, payment by Western Union leaves me as a buyer completely unprotected (and charges a few dozen bucks for the service), and add to that the 30% flat rate customs duty on items more than 10000 RUR (circa $380) worth... :-(

[Quadzilla]

This hopefully will help my fellow TBers with trades (and even purchases). Anyway, with users with 0-2 feedbacks, I generally ask them to ship to me first and then I ship to them after I have theirs. I can get away with this because of my number of feedbacks and they typically have a level of confidence from this.

Another option that I've done is if the user has a little more feedback (2-4) and/or they truly instill my confidence, I ask them to ship first and then when they provide a valid tracking number that can be viewed (typically it takes several hours for the tracking number to show up in the system) I ship my item. This usually means that my item is a day or so behind theirs and worst case if the item I get from them is not what they say it is, I can call the shipper and ask them to turn my item around back to me.

The good news is that I've had very few bad experiences here. Do yourself a favor and get as much information about the person as you can. Ask for their home number, their work number, where they work, are they paypal confirmed, etc, etc. Even ask whah the name of their band is and if they have a webite or myspace, etc. In a couple of situations where the person had not shipped my stuff for weeks after, I've used this information to my advantage and called their work, contacted the other band members, even a girlfriend linked on the myspace, etc. If several others around them come down on them to do what they are supposed to do, they typically do the right thing in the end.

Hope this helps!
Fred

[ubado]

Originally Posted by BobKos

For those who might be interested, PayPal isn't bulletproof either. Sellers are vulnerable if they're not paying attention. There are a couple scams that could cost you your bass or other gear. Someone negotiates a deal with you and offers to pay by PayPal. Most people here accept that. The buyer gives you shipping information and pays via Paypal. You ship the gear and it's a done deal.

Here's another way you get screwed by PayPal and the Seller.

The seller ships you the wrong thing...

You contact PayPal, and they contact the seller.
They only ask for a tracking number to see if it was shipped...to whom and from where, etc.
They give PayPal the tracking number (which might just be for a box of rocks)...PayPal is happy...closes the case.

AND YOU GET SCREWED...since they could prove that they sent something to you.

IF you can...pay the extra $$$ for the PayPal Buyers Insurance!

[BobKos]

Originally Posted by Temcat

So, being from Russia, I may be refused the option to pay via PayPal and ship using USPS? That sucks royally... Because, first of all, UPS and Fedex are outrageously expensive to ship here by, payment by Western Union leaves me as a buyer completely unprotected (and charges a few dozen bucks for the service), and add to that the 30% flat rate customs duty on items more than 10000 RUR (circa $380) worth... :-(

Yep - That's the way that it is. And truthfully, everybody didn't just wake up one day and decide to limit their sales from the US to other countries. This has come about due to the number of times US sellers have been screwed over in the process of shipping to other countries. Look through eBay's US site and see how many people refuse to ship overseas. A HUGE percentage will not or will only ship under predefined circumstances. I personally fall into the latter category, but a buyer will need to have pretty good credentials before I'll ship anything worth more than $25. The risk of the deal going sour is too great. I'm sorry that's how it is. I understand your frustration.

[Antman3820]

I bought an item from a TBer recently, via Paypal............I paypal the cash, and wait for the item to arrive............After 3 weeks.............no item............Countless emails and PM, none of which were replied to.........So we go the Paypal dispute route...........I get an email today telling me that they have ruled in my favor.............They refund me $0.48 !!!!!! I am assuming this is all he has in his Paypal account, and they will not allow him to use their service........Was not alot of money, but it is the principle....If you would like to know who the TBer is, feel free to PM me.....Would not want this to happen to someone else here.

[EduardoK]

Antman3820,
That's a terrible situation and Paypal's refund is simply absurd !
Are you sure Paypal's refund policies are based on refunding only what the guilty party has available at his Paypal's account? That is ridiculous !
Haven't they got a way to charge the seller for the total amount you payed or even cover the $ themselves???
I mean, after all that should be a part of why they charge a high commission for their services, don't they?... terrifying
Though I have never been ripped off like that, I am in the process of selling a lot of gear and am seriously considering not accepting Paypal.
I think you should contact the seller with an ultimatum to refund your money or ship the item. If he doesn't respond I would post and spread the word and boycott this guy at every music Forum on the Planet (starting with TB) to let everybody know about him.
Do you know his real name?
PM me.

[rodneyat]

The persons PayPal account should be linked to their checking account and/or credit card. PayPal can (and will) take money from those if your PayPal account does not have the money to cover it. I am speaking from experience here. I will share my little story on that. I decided to help out a friend of mine who did not have any ebay or PayPal account and sold an 80's vintage PRS on ebay for them. It sold for $2000 and they paid via paypal. So, the guitar gets shipped to the guy and there was a problem with one of the pickups. The guy immediately files a dispute with PayPal. Well, I had already moved the $2K out of my paypal and into my checking account and even written a check to my friend for the guitar. Anyway, when the guy put in the dispute PayPal immediately took the money out of my checking account. So, here I was left with $2K out of my checking account. Fortunately, I had it or I would have been sunk. We eventually worked it out. Needless to say, I will also never sell anything for anyone ever again. I also make sure that everything is good on both sides before I move the money into my checking account.

All of that said, PayPal can and will take the money out of your "personal" funds if it is not in your paypal account. Now, if the guys checking account was empty, it may be a different story.

[Dragonlord]

Originally Posted by Antman3820

If you would like to know who the TBer is, feel free to PM me.....Would not want this to happen to someone else here.

Well... why don't you also leave him negative feedback, so that others who won't pm you know as well? I thought about pming you, then I thought "why bug him when I can see the feedback he's left for others, he'll be the one with the negative feedback" but found only positive.