Memiors of a Dancer

To Ship or Not To Ship that is the Question?????

It seems everytime I have an auction where the winning bidder is from overseas it seems to be more problems then what the item is really worth. Now I'm not saying that all over seas bidders are problem bidders but unfortunately there are a few bad apples. Allow me to explain:

I would say over a month ago I had an auction for a Dell labtop computer. Now I've been a seller on ebay for quite some time to know better than to not describe items as accurate as possible because it only ends up biting you back in the behind. Anyway, upon receipt  of the item the buyer sent me an email stating the listing was inaccurate. The item was not only inaccurate according to the description but the buyer had several different excuses none of which panned out on there behalf. The first was the item was crack and I did not advise this in the listing. What the buyer did not plan on was me taking photo's of this item prior to being shipped out with time and date to assure it's appearance would not be in question. (I advise the buyer that I could not be responsible for damages done through transit, that is why insurance is purchased and requested) The second was that the item as described did not have a CD/DVR combo, which with the proper paper work I had available (during the time I purchased it) proved otherwise. And third, that the hardrive which was advertised as a 60GB was a 40GB. Again,  with the proper proof and notorized affidavid's I manage to obtain written proof from Bestbuy, Geek Squad that the item was as described. In an earlier email this buyer had sent she tried to bribe me to refund a $100 of the purchase price for the accusations. I declined and advised the buyer that if they where not happy with there purchase to please send it back. She instead opened a dispute with paypal, which I then sent the same info via by fax for them to view and advised them to offer a refund including shipping so that I can move on. I advised paypal that the buyer would need to return the item at her own expense and it should be received in the same manner inwhich it was delivered. They agreed! Well not a few hours later I received another email from the buyer asking for a $100 refund for the missunderstanding.  I'm thinking, "what misunderstanding?" I rather refund the total purchase price and resell and send proper paper work than be bribed by a dishonest person. What funny, is this very same person gave me issues to finalize payment, I even had a feeling that this was going to be a problem transaction that is why I was amost insisting on having all my duck in a row because I had a feeling. I even later received an email from this person stating that the cost of living in the Ukraine was bad and that she was a mother of two and could not afford the labtop. I didn't respond because I didn't want to throw more fuel to the fire, but, "why bid on an item you can't afford?" And in the USA, is it really any differant. I know several people who are also suffering from the cost of living here in our very own home town. That doesn't mean you'll see them bidding on item they can't afford.

4343martino
its a quandry for sure..people that cant honor thier bid should not bid.Period. but a good 40% of my business is international , and i learned early on that there are things you can do to protect yourself, first if your shipping to what you deem a high risk country, ship by ups as they have a program that allows you to recall a package you have shipped at anywhere along its route and have it resent back to you..this is particuallarly usefull when a package has sat in customs too long and the person wants out of the deal, but you know they wont return it from customs in another country, unless you have some provision for it..and the customer is going to get a paypal refund and the goods will eventually be delivered..always have mandatory insurance for overseas packages..if the usps wont cover it there are other ins. companies that will..
Mark
May-06-08 16:59:33 PDT Report this comment

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