Seller wants return I want refund

[lizd160904]

I've purchased several items from China that are quite large (light but cumbersome) to recieve them and be unhappy as they are poor quality and not as described.

I started a return, asking for a refund and the seller messaged me saying they would agree if I sent them back. The cost to send back to China would be the same as the refund if I even got it.

What are my rights here? Will ebay generally just award a straight refund or do I need to send back?

[digital*ghost]

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@letscleanupmycupboards wrote:
I would think Australian consumer laws cover items purchased here though, not in China.

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On a theoretical level, ACL applies when goods are purchased overseas, on a practical level, it is difficult to enforce, if not impossible if the seller is not willingly compliant, because in order to take things further if they are not compliant, the seller has to submit themselves to Australian jurisdiction. 

Valve, a US company (they own Steam, and operate solely in the US, however Australians can have accounts and purchase / download games) had to pay out $3 million in penalties for breaching ACL, but they are a huge corporation and the ACCC took them on - by which I mean to suggest that interest in forcing compliance and payouts is unlikely for low value, one-off private sales. 

With regards to return costs under ACL, however, in the vast majority of cases, the buyer is required to pay them up front and can seek reimbursement if the goods are found to be faulty. "Prohibitive" can be argued to be subjective, but the wording in this version makes it a little bit more clear, and clearly has very large, heavy items in mind. 

[amber-eyed-girl]

Thank you Digi. In theory, is the point I was trying to make. Also that a polite discussion with eBay, Paypal can often work in one's favour, with a little reasoning 🙂

[digital*ghost]

Buyers can certainly be in a better position buying via eBay due to eBay's own policies, but refunds without return are still pretty much discretionary and usually limited to specific circumstances (such as if the seller said the items were in Australia but wants them returned to China), and forcing payment of return shipping up front is problematic at best (so opting into PayPal's return offer is of benefit in cases like these, as you suggested above).

eBay / PayPal will usually enforce (where possible) the consumer law applicable in the buyer's country (eg they will uphold the EU's distance selling regulations when an EU buyer purchases from a non-EU seller), but - again in theory - that means they can't genuinely force sellers to pay return costs up front in most cases, if the buyer is in Australia. In practice it's kind of hit and miss, and the policy itself (which relates to sellers paying return shipping) seems frustratingly intermittent, as it was there when the MBG was introduced, disappeared for a while, then (last I checked) came back again, so calling CS involves a bit of luck (which is still kind of true in the best of circumstances, unfortunately).