Buyer won auction in July, paid by check, never picked up, what can I do?

[jenilu1163]

I sold an expensive piece of equipment in July, the buyer was contacted 8 times since then to pick up his item.  He sent payment by personal check in September, with a promise to pick it up September 15.  He did not show, then promised it would be two more weeks, again, no show, no contact.  Nearly 3 months went by without hearing from him.  I contacted him again in December and he promised "definitely by the end of the year".  Still, he was a no show.  I sent an email to him January 17th and he did not respond.  I've called his cell phone and left messages and I'm stumped.  We're talking about a $3500 piece of equipment that is taking up space on my company's loading dock and it's been 6 months!  I'm not crazy about refunding that chunk of change and having to go through this all over again.  And, I can't believe someone plunked that kind of money down and is not following up. I'm getting ALOT of heat to get that thing out of the way, what do I do?  I've been advised to send a registered letter giving him one more chance to pick it up, or I should  put it back on the market or put it outside with a tarp over it.   Any suggestions?

[springyzone]

You would have to look into the legal aspects.

The registered letter sounds a good idea.

I am presuming that the letter would be to the effect he only has a limited time left to collect the goods or they would be put back on the market.

It could be he forfeits them, but if not, if he is after a refund, then I think it would be possible for you to first claim expenses-storage, mail, time spent contacting him etc

Maybe if he knew he couldn't just get ll his cash back, that there would be a chunk taken out for expenses, he might put a move on.

Or perhaps in the letter you could write that as it is now well overdue for pick up, storage fees will be XX amount per week from now on.

If you had no response to that and he left the item there another month or two, then if it did come to the crunch and you had to offer a refund, you could well be justified in subtracting the storage expenses first.

[phorum_junkie*]

Laws are different state to state in regard to how long you have to keep articles and what you have to do before you can considee them abandoned so if you want to keep it stricktly legal perhaps contact Fair Trade or your state version and ask them.

If it were me I would send them a registered letter saying they had 7 days to collect and if it is not collected by then you will start to charge storage at $XX per day. Say that after 30 das you will put the item up for sale and if it sells for what they paid you will send them a cheque minus ebay and storage fees.

Depending on what Fair Trade say you may be able to consider the property abandoned in which case you can do what you like with it including re selling or ditching it.

[beautbots01]

Jenilu this is an eBay Australia member to member forum.  You need to log out and log back into the US site assuming you are talking about someone from the US coming to pick up their purchase and not Australia.  

[jenilu1163]

Oh geez.  Newbies, I tell ya!  

I'll do that!

Thanks,

JB