@puppe_luv,
Sometimes these things happen. There is nothing precluding a seller from advertising an item for sale in various places - although eBay did attempt to enforce that some years ago. (I suspect that they were advised it was an unlawful requirement.)
Of course, it disappoints a buyer to click onto Buy it now and find that the item's no longer available - but that's the worst that you will suffer. The seller, in contrast, has the negative feedback you've given, and will probably have been given chastisement by eBay (possibly restricted from selling). That's far worse than anything you will suffer.
That seller is completely inexperienced - did you not note that? He/she appears (from feedback) to have neither bought nor sold on eBay before, so your negative has given them -1%. I would have given the seller some slack, given their inexperience, and simply explained to them that they should have ended the listing on eBay as soon as the item was purchased by someone through whatever other means it was advertised - Facebook, group, notice on local community board, whatever it was.
Re the seller's inexperience - did you note that the seller included "Cash on delivery" as one of the payment options? COD is definitely NOT what the seller thinks it is! COD is a costly Australia Post option which wouldn't even be available for something like this! Cost = $13.75 COD fee + cost of postage + payment for the item... and you can try to imagine what the "cost of postage" would be. It isn't the same as COP (Cash on Pickup) but is frequently confused with that on eBay. eBay should make it clearer for inexperienced sellers when they are creating the listing; I favour a huge pop-up sign saying "CAUTION! BEWARE! Are you SURE? This is not the same as cash on pickup; it's a relatively costly Australia Post delivery option - check the AP website here for further info!!!!!")
The seller probably hadn't any idea that not ending the listing was important. I have heard more than one person explaining that they thought that listing an item on eBay was the online equivalent of putting an ad in the paper... and of course eBay members find over time (and/or through exhaustive reading of eBay's Help pages) learn that there are important differences!
I wouldn't have purchased anything like that without a lot of additional information. The description on the listing was almost non-existent. No mention of brand of mattress, maker of the furniture, how old it was, how often used, whether the mattress was soft, medium or firm...
I'm sure you know how to get a refund if you paid by PayPal. If you intended paying cash on pickup, even better - no need to wait for a refund.
63BvfpBLfoK7wO6Q~~_7.JPG "whiznumber6"){kind=avatar}
