Two Paypal chargebacks by two separate buyers in one week!?

[kitty-kat-kollection]

I'm annoyed.

First I get a buyer who purchased a face cream in mid November, paid the next day, I posted it, they received it and left positive feedback the next week, and then last week after hearing nothing all this time, they claimed a chargeback case saying they did not authorise the transaction.

Hello? Was your account compromised / hijacked the day you bought the item, the day you paid for it or when you left positive feedback a week later? And did you not notice "someone" had bought this item for almost three months?

Then yesterday I get another buyer I sold an Xbox digital game download code to back in early December, also claiming through paypal that the transaction was not authorised.

Hmmmmm. They purchased the game download code, I sent them an ebay message thanking them and also confirming that I would send it to them when I got home from dinner. They then sent me a message in not very good English asking for the code to be emailed to them, which I did but I also sent it in a message within ebay.

So now almost three months later again, this person is saying he didn't buy it? Someone else bought it, did they? Funny that the person who bought it did not speak English well, had the same email address when asking me to send the code as the person lodging the chargeback, who happens to live in Europe, and the chargeback is in Euros. Huh?

Even IF any of these people really DID have their ebay accounts compromised, HOW IS THIS MY RESPONSIBILITY?!

Am I their parent!? UGH!!!!!!!!

[davewil1964]

If you have proof of postage, then a) should go in your favour. As you don't have proof of postage for b) you will lose. If you don't accept the chargeback and refund voluntarily, you will also get hit with a $15 fee from Paypal.

With a), if you don't have proof of postage, you can try messaging/emailing them and see what sort of resolution you can get. You can also report them to ACORN.

With b), that is a risk you take selling intangible goods and there's not much you can do. ACORN only operates in Australia and it is unlikely Interpol would get involved for this sort of thing.

[countessalmirena]

Resolving disputes, claims and chargebacks.

You will need proof of shipment or service delivery.

For items you ship

At the very least, your documentation must include:

• The date the item was sent, and
• An official acceptance by the shipper, such as a postmark or online status. A status that shows the item was delivered is also acceptable.

It must also include either:

• The recipient’s delivery address, showing at least the state, city and suburb (or international equivalent), or
• A receipt from Australia Post showing at least the recipient’s suburb, city or postcode (or international equivalent).

Examples include:

• A copy of the shipping receipt or shipping label that includes the delivery address, or
• For Australia Post eParcel customers, a copy of the consignment information page which shows the delivery address and the online tracking code that can be used to confirm delivery, or
• A shipping code PayPal can use online to view the shipping status and delivery address. You can get this from TNT, DHL, FedEx, Skippy Post and other carriers, or
• A receipt issued by the carrier, signed by the recipient acknowledging delivery.

For everything else

You’ll need to provide compelling evidence that the item was delivered or the service fulfilled. Compelling evidence is any evidence available to prove that your customer received the goods or services, or otherwise benefited from the transaction.

Compelling evidence could include a system record showing the date the item was sent and that it was either:

• Electronically sent to the recipient, or
• Received or accessed by the recipient.

Examples include:

• An extract of an online booking system for the issuance of tickets, or
• An internal system record showing the deployment or retrieval of a digital item.

Get on the phone to PayPal once you have your evidence ready. Make sure your evidence meets the standards required by PayPal. Be courteous and calm, and focus on the evidence.

[kitty-kat-kollection]

Thank you. I've actually responded to both matters already. For the first one I sent a screen shot of the buyer's positive feedback to show they obviously received the item.

The second one, I sent in screenshots showing the ebay messages sent between myself and the buyer, one clearly showing me sending the download code to the buyer. Thus, they received it.

The thing is though, that neither is claiming they didn't receive the items. They are saying they did not mean to purchase them in the first place and had no control over their account.

[repentatleisure1952]

" For the first one I sent a screen shot of the buyer's positive feedback to show they obviously received the item."

Feedback does not mean they received the item...just means they left feedback...which may have been for the wrong seller/item.

[digital*ghost]

The thing to keep in mind about unauthorised use chargebacks is that it's not the buyer necessarily saying their account or card was compromised, it is the account owner / cardholder saying it, which may or may not be the buyer.

Without knowing who the account owner or cardholder is, sellers have little in the way of being able to defend against them, since you can't provide significant proof the account owner / card holder did authorise the purchase.

It's not a matter of responsibility but liability, which currently falls to the seller unless they can provide that level of proof (causing the bank or PayPal to deny the claim), or if they instead qualify for seller protection via PayPal, which will mean even if the bank allows the chargeback, you don't lose the funds (PayPal pays the amount).

[countessalmirena]

kitty-kat-kollection, you cannot use a screenshot of feedback as evidence.

Look again at what I posted from PayPal's page. You must at the very least have documentation proving that the item was sent on a particular date PLUS proof of delivery or proof that Australia Post (for instance) accepted the item for delivery. One such proof is online tracking.

The documentation must also include the "recipient's delivery address", to the level which PayPal states it needs. (That means at least the suburb/city, state, postcode.)

If you didn't send the item by some form of tracked postage, you are very much less likely to have proof the reaches the level of PayPal's requirements.

Bookmark these pages for future reference:

What type of postage proof should I submit to PayPal under Seller Protection?

What kinds of transactions are not eligible for PayPal Seller Protection?

You say that you emailed the code to the buyer. To which email address did you send? How was the buyer able to communicate the email address? (Was it by text message after getting your phone number? Was it through eBay messaging?) How can you demonstrate that the email was received by the buyer? Do you ensure that you get a Delivery Status Notification when you send anything via email? Do you also ask for a Return Receipt?

You may have difficulty with the second item, atlhough at least you would have the Sent email, I presume. You had best hope that the email address given to you by the buyer is the same as the email address used for the PayPal account. You must prove to a level that satisfies PayPal's policies (requiring "compelling evidence") that the item was electronically sent to the recipient, because PayPal must provide that evidence to the cardholder's bank.

[kitty-kat-kollection]

With regard to the second item, the buyer after paying for the code, sent me an ebay message asking me to send the code by email (the same email address the person is using now for the chargeback) which I replied to via ebay message, sending the code that way and also by email. To the same email address the buyer now still has.

So there's the proof I sent that, and had communication with the buyer.

In terms of if the actual credit card being hijacked by the ebay buyer, wouldn't that mean that the chargeback would be lodged by the card owner? Both of these chargebacks are both coming from the actual same buyers I sent the items too.

[kitty-kat-kollection]

Oh, the first buyer left feedback 5 days after I posted the item out. They have a grand total of 3 feedbacks in the last year, one of which is from me.

[digital*ghost]

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@kitty-kat-kollection wrote:


In terms of if the actual credit card being hijacked by the ebay buyer, wouldn't that mean that the chargeback would be lodged by the card owner? Both of these chargebacks are both coming from the actual same buyers I sent the items too.

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You actually have no way of knowing that, because the whole point of PayPal is to not provide online merchants with the card details - all you get is an account name (if the buyer has a registered PayPal account), and a delivery address. 

PayPal's email is misleading, if it is still worded the same as the ones I got (2017), which started out as "One of your buyers filed a chargeback with their credit card provider. The buyer stated that they didn't authorise this purchase."

If the buyer used a stolen card, or borrowed one*, they don't have the authority to initiate a chargeback, only the cardholder does, which again may or may not be your buyer, you just don't know.

Basically, what is happening here, is one of two versions of credit card fraud, but you can never be 100% certain which version it is:

• Version 1 - a person bought something, later decided to get their money back, and fraudulently claims the transaction is unauthorised.
• Version 2 - a person obtains and uses credit card details that don't belong to them, and when the cardholder finds out, they dispute the charge. 

It is often said that sometimes the banks just initiate chargebacks without the cardholder's knowledge, typically because the buyer overspends and the bank does it to get their money back -  the seller contacting the buyer about it is supposedly the first the buyer hears about it. I take this theory with a huge grain of salt (as in, I don't really believe it at all, based on experience and advice from banking reps - I leave about maybe 10% room to believe it, just for the possibility the reps lied). There was one instance a few years ago where a banking error initiated a bunch of chargebacks, and occasionally if someone reports their card lost or stolen, some recent but genuine purchases can be inadvertantly disputed, but in that case the buyer would be aware and if honest, would make an effort to report the transaction as authorised and stop the chargeback - otherwise the common catchcry from buyers that goes "oh no! I had no idea! 😮 I'll contact my bank and see what is going on!!" is just a token gesture to save face. IMHO, anyway. 

One of the advantages of PayPal is actually seller protection - you would be completely on your own if it was a card payment through online merchant facilities, as there's zero protection for those kind of chargebacks. 

I don't know if it will make you feel any better, but these things often seem to come in small bursts - I went years without so much as an INR or INAD dispute via PayPal etc, but then over the course of just a few weeks in 2017, I had 3 credit card chargebacks and 2 unauthorised use of PayPal account 'reversals'. Every single buyer who replied to my inquiries (4/5) claimed to have no idea what was happening. They all also claimed they would sort it out. None of them did - I won 3/5 chargeback cases, at least, and haven't had one since (touch wood). One cheeky bugger actually messaged me a few times asking me why they can't buy from me anymore (they were a regular until the chargebacks  ). 

*This is really common, too - the kids or some other family member / friend buys something, a couple of months later the parents or whoever go through their statement and don't recognise the charge.