How to get a refund for a purchase with a fake tracking number (not of your purchase)

[anwsmh]

Your situation is this: you have bought an expensive item that has not been
delivered despite the seller providing an Australia Post tracking number that
shows delivery in your suburb.

Since this is sufficient proof of delivery (under eBay's money back guarantee rules) what do you do ?

Firstly, perhaps the fraud could have been prevented had you been careful about determining
whether it was at all likely the seller actually had the item (which is hard to get elsewhere). Is their
answer believable ? A question to the seller before purchase may have saved a world of pain eg
"How can you have these laptops when the Australian distributor has no stock ?"

Unfortunately knowing what should have been done is no help now.

At this point, don't do any of these

1 Complain to anyone likely to listen or may have an interest in the matter

2 Imagine that the item has been mislaid or has been "left in a safe place"

3 Open an eBay case for item not received since the seller has proved that the
item has been delivered (and if the tracking number is for an Express Post envelope,
delivery to a letter box is "proof of signature") and you will lose it. Don't consider an appeal either.

What you should do is this (eBay will eventually tell you, but it will take
time for them to do so and they will probably say it in such a way that you won't want
to do it). Go immediately to an Australia Post mailing centre (not a Post Office) and
say what's happened and ask about the tracking number.

Australia Post will tell informally you whether the delivery was a Parcel or an Envelope &
also whether it was delivered to your address. At this point, it should be clear if the
delivery was nothing to do with you (ie you have been scammed by the seller) or if there's been
a genuine mishap. Since Australia Post have GPS evidence of high value deliveries, there's
little doubt about what they say.

Next, if the delivery was not for your item, open a case with Australia Post (via
a MyPost account - whose delivery history would already have shown that the tracking number
from the seller had nothing to do with you) stating clearly

1 What you bought in enough detail to be clear about the item's size and weight.

2 That the sellet said the item was sent with this tracking number

3 Would they please confirm what was delivered (Envelope or Parcel) and that it was delivered
"as addressed and not to your address" ?

You can then send their email response to eBay to disprove the sellers claim that the
item you paid for was received. Eventually you will get a refund.

[*sons_and_daughters*]

It's not always a bad thing to buy high priced items on ebay, you just have to be careful. Very careful. Exceedingly careful. Know who you are buying from. Check them out both on and off ebay.

Several years ago now, I was wanting to buy a CCTV system for my home. I didn't want cheap Chinese garbage. I wasn't interested in the Chinese seller's glossy photos. I knew exactly what I wanted (I nearly destroyed Google), and that's what I searched for. During my researching, ebay kindly offered me a site wide 20% off voucher. Bonanza!!!

I am in NSW and I settled on a seller that I had also looked up off ebay. They had a reputable B&M store in Sydney, which had been in operation for well over 20 years. They had their own website, where their prices were the same as their ebay prices. Of course I bought on ebay because I had that 20% off voucher! After the discount was applied, my purchase was around $950. I was stoked with that. I got top of the range.

After all these years, the cameras are still going strong. They managed to get 4 thugs arrested that did some break and enters to my neighbours (they came into my yard, entered my shed and stole a can of clear spray paint..........left all the other colours. Idiots then tried to spray the neighbour's back gate and realised they stuffed up. I was lucky, they chose not to try to break into my house......maybe because I'd just got home? They did choose to look directly at my cameras though!).

I've had to replace the power cable to the HDD, which apparently is a common thing with Swann systems, but apart from that, still deliriously happy. I also knew that being an authorised reseller, I had a warranty should I need it. They actually sent all the warranty details about a month later, regardless of the card that came in the box.

It can be very safe, just research and research and research. Never EVER fall for the glossy photos plastered through a description. Research the seller. I was lucky in that the ebay username is the same as their store name, but you can still research who they are. Reputable Australian sellers will often have their username the same as their B&M shop name. They are the ones to go for, even if they are a few bucks dearer.

[springyzone]

Wow, paddy. I hadn't looked at the feedback. I am at a bit of a loss to explain that seller's behaviour. They registered quite recently (only this year) and then seemed to develop a great track record. Most of the things they sold were medium sort of pricing but they did sell a couple of much dearer items, no trouble.

But suddenly they seem to have gone rogue & for the same high priced item. I can't figure out why a seller would put all that work into developing what could have been a steady stream of sales on ebay, a nice little ongoing business, then throw it away like this.

If they have managed to scam ebay out of funds, then with the amount of money involved, I'd think ebay would follow it up.

I'm with jellybird in that I don't think ebay is the place for buying high priced items.

[anwsmh]

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@springyzone wrote:

Wow, paddy. I hadn't looked at the feedback. I am at a bit of a loss to explain that seller's behaviour.

---

Me too. The first thing I looked at was the sellers feedback and it seemed good. But, I think what was different in this time to former successful purchases of laptops from eBay, was the lack of a good initial question that would test the seller's truthfulness.

However, the degree of preparation needed for this scam and the coolness of the seller's replies to me, suggest that they have already gone a long way down the path of thinking that can do anything they like without consequence. 

Likewise if there really had been some glimmer of hope that the seller was other than determined on scamming, there may have been a "sorry, what can I do ?" message to the victims (at least one, maybe 2). There was no such message to me.

[anwsmh]

For those interested in the the chronology of this scam,

1 After payment the seller offers a refund saying that he can't send the item until he gets paid and 
"eBay system maintenance has delayed payments until ..."

(Sadly, eBay customer service can only say that in general delays in payment to a seller are possible; they will not confirm if there was a delay in paying this seller)

You want the item, the seller's reply includes pictures of "the item" bubble wrapped apparently ready to be posted, so you agree to the delay.

This helps the seller convince you of their probity;  convinces the seller that your gaze is fixed firmly on the item; but most of all, allows time for the seller to get a tracking number of an item that was posted sometime after the payment date and was delivered to the same suburb as the buyer.

The seller needs time until,  by some means or other, he can get the tracking number of a delivery in the buyers suburb that occurred after the payment date.

The seller will claim that the item was sent with this tracking number.

2 You wait and eventually when the delay ends, you ask and the seller replies that the item will be sent that day. You ask for a tracking number and get told one that doesn't work (Australia Post tracker says invalid number etc). 

3 You wait again  because the seller says the item was posted and you don't want to make a fuss unnecessarily. Finally after 2 or 3 days you ask again and the seller gives you another tracking number and tells you that the item has already been delivered, as indeed the tracking history confirms.

Now you know something is wrong: there was no advice from your Australia Post MyPost account (customary email or text prior to them delivering to your address); you have been circling the letter box like a vulture but no parcel delivery van has showed up; you ask neighbours (and amazingly enough, the tradesman who has been working all that week near the letterbox.) You are pretty sure that nothing has been delivered.

But, at this point you are toast and the only possible way out is by hopping down to the mail centre and finding more about this tracked delivery: what did it look like and was it delivered to your address.