Cancelling an order

[oddsandendsoz]

Hi all,

I recently had to cancel an order as there was an issue with the buyers address. eBay cancelled the order without a hitch but the PayPal funds are still in my account from the sale. I assumed cancelling would mean an automatic refund as has happened in the past with this but not this time. I am reluctant to call ebay as I am sure to get less than accurate advice. Does anyone know what SHOULD happen in these cases? Does a seller manually refund or is it usually automatic? Thanks and happy holidays to all. 

[lyndal1838]

You have to manually do the refund....nothing is automatic.

You had better do it quickly before a very irate buyer opens a dispute.

[gec2002]

No I don't believe that is correct

Provided the seller

Hasn't sent the item
or The buyer hasn't asked eBay to step in and help because they didn't receive the item
or You've opened an unpaid item case.

the Refund should be automatic

I would ring CS and see what is going on.

[oddsandendsoz]

Yes, thanks Gec!! That is my understanding also, as I have never had to refund manually, albeit in around 3 cancelled orders I have had to do over the last 4 years. 

It gets stranger though as looking at the eBay message when i cancelled the order, it does say 'you do not have to do anything as the buyer has not paid for the item yet'. However they must have paid after I cancelled, or at least right on the time of the cancellation as i can see the funds in PayPal. Even weirder, although it clearly states in the 'Sold items' list that 'you cancelled this order" it has another note saying "Send now past due"?

Only on eBay

[digital*ghost]

Cancellations usually can't happen without a refund if the buyer has paid (the submit cancellation button actually says "refund").

However, I have had buyers pay for items after they have been cancelled, sometimes in error, and other times because they decided they wanted the item after all (if the buyer doesn't confirm the cancellation, it remains active for 10 days before closing off, and can stay in their cart, sometimes resulting in them paying for it while checking out other items). To the best of my knowledge, the transaction remains cancelled on eBay, and when finalised the funds do not get refunded (which is only relevant if you'll be sending the item). 

[purplemon18]

I had a similar situation that turned into a headache and almost into a nightmare.

I had an order from Brazil where they cancelled the order (by accident I guess), and then paid for it. It was showing up in my orders the same way, a cancelled order that needed to be sent.

When I contacted ebay to ask them to fix it, I think they must have thought I was trying to rip the customer off because they flat out ordered me to send it.

So I did, even though I new that if anything went wrong it would be a nightmare to sort out since the customer would not be able to request a refund or possibly the customer did it on purpose so they could claim the money back or something. It was just screwy and felt dodgy at the time.

The nightmare part is that sure enough after a month I got a message from the customer asking where the item was. Thankfully it turned up a week later and everything worked out. Man, South America is slow. One more problem from that region and I will stop shipping to them.

That is probably of no help to you, other than to tell you to chose your words carefully when you contact ebay. Probably best to use the callback feature too, I used the chat.