Paypal issue re seller protection

[kyjati]

We had a strange thing happen a couple weeks ago with paypal, leaving a very bad taste in my mouth.  Had a buyer purchase a poster and pay through paypal, paypal showed that payment had come through.  OK then, no problem. So being a curteous seller and wanting to keep customers happy, posted item within 2 days.  So far, so good.  Then about 5 days after it had been posted, paypal sends a message saying that

"You have received a payment that we believe may not have been authorised by the PayPal account holder.".

So then paypal said we had to respond within 7 days to fill out there questions about said poster.  We stated that it had been posted, payment had been made via paypal and paypal had cleared the payment.

Result:  Paypal took the money for poster and postage out of our paypal account to refund the buyer, so then we were left without the poster, and a loss of $18.90.  So was very unhappy with this and asked paypal if they were going to repay us themselves as they were the ones to clear the payment, which is why we sent poster in the first place, and it took them 5 days after payment was received in order to find a discrepency with the buyers account. 

bottom line is that paypal took 5 days to realise a problem, and because of this, it has left us out of pocket.  We did everything right as a seller, basing our posting on the fact paypal gave the all clear for the payment.  Is there anything that we can do about this?  Where is my protection as a seller when paypal make a stuff up??

[banf15]

Sounds to me like a juvenile used their parents paypal account to purchase an item online, and we are in school holidays. This has happened to me in the past but the amount was for over 1k for virtual items ( yes gamers will pay big money to be unique ).

End result it is not Paypal's fault but rather the parent for filing a claim that someone other than themselves (the account holder) has accessed their paypal account. But it is just plain rude to claim a refund and not return the items.

If nothing else you should be able to open a dispute with paypal to have the poster returned although I hate to think the condition it would be returned in.

[phorum_junkie*]

Please don't blame Paypal for this, they have done exactly as they have to as stated in their terms and policies.

They have to refund the cardholder if the payment is querier or cancelled by them, IF you have posted by a Paypal qualifying method then you are entitled to Paypal seller protection  and they will refund the payment instead of you but unfortunately if you choose not to register or use click & send then you have to pay the money.

If it appears the buyer has done this to many then sellers should get together and make a joint complaint to the police, if it is somebody who is actually in Australia who thinks they can get things for nothing by doing this then a word from the police may just persuade them to repay the sellers.

My first step would be a letter to the buyer stating that unless they repaid me the money within 48 hours i would be going to the police, of course it may be somebody who isn't even in this country and they have hacked a bank account or are using a stolen credit card.