What is the difference between Cancel Sale and Lodge Unpaid item case for the seller?

[kikiboon]

Hi,

As the title says ... Buyer does not respond (nor pay), but ebay charged me the final value fee. Ebay advised me to initiate a 'cancel transaction' and NOT an unpaid item case. This is mind blowing to me ... as I did not want to cancel my sale at all!

Any ideas??

Thanks!

[i-love-my-sheep]

If the buyer hasn't paid and it's been 4 days since your item sold, open an unpaid dispute. If it's not 4 days, open when it gets to day 4. Then close it 4 days later if they don't pay.

I would advise against offering a cancellation because if they decline it, you lose your FVF and then can't open an unpaid case. They can also leave you a negative feedback, whereas they can't leave any feedback once an unpaid case closes without payment.

Once you close the unpaid case, your FVF will be credited back to your account.

[kikiboon]

Thank you so much for your reply! That's what I thought .... until I contacted ebay (after trying to contact the buyer and waiting some 7?? or more days after the "sale") and that's the advice I got from them - to cancel trx from my side!! I also thought that I should open "unpaid item" but apparently they are saying that the only thing that's going to happen is that the buyer will get an unpaid strike (or something like that) which could limit "buying ability". Weird. Also, I don't have PayPal account. So, if I do open an UPI case, and if the buyer then tries to pay using PayPal, what would happen?? I specified bank deposit as payment method for posting inside the ad. Ebay then also automatically added PayPal as payment option (I could not remove it) and also displayed a warning something about I should not discourage payments via other means ... I can't remember exactly ... any clues??

[designers*n*more]

You have to offer a secure payment option, like Paypal or Paymate. You're not supposed to refuse Paypal which is why your listing would have Paypal accepted on it. Ebay brought this in sometime ago because buyers were getting scammed, sellers wouldn't refund items not as described etc so now if a buyer lodges a dispute and wins Paypal will take the money from your Paypal account.

It's a no no to refuse Paypal or the like.

[phorum_junkie*]

You have to have one of the safe payment methods, Paypal, Paymate or merchant facility for direct card payments. Unless you have another account you do not have enough trading history to open a Paymate account so you have to offer Paypal. You must have given an email address for Paypal payments when you listed and if the buyer tries to pay to that the payment will stay in limbo until the buyer cancells it or 30 das pass and Paypal will return the funds to the buyer. You will almost certainly get a neg and be reported to ebay for not offering a valid safe payment method.

[putney32]

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@kikiboon wrote:

Hi,

As the title says ... Buyer does not respond (nor pay), but ebay charged me the final value fee. Ebay advised me to initiate a 'cancel transaction' and NOT an unpaid item case. This is mind blowing to me ... as I did not want to cancel my sale at all!

Any ideas??

Thanks!

---

you have to follow ebay procedure on ALL steps of an ebay transaction

that starts with you as the seller offering a safe (to the buyr) payment method

perhaps your ''non payer'' has indeed paid via paypal and realized you dont have  an a/c and wont deal with a seller who tried to bend the rules?

get yourself a paypal a/c

open the non payer dispute

after 4 days close tje dispute if they havent paid

then you can relist the item

[cherry*135]

Maybe the buyer didn't want to pay when they realised there was no Paypal option. Buyers shouldn't be forced to pay by bank deposit.

[springyzone]

If you only have a rating of 1 and no paypal account, then I as a buyer wouldn't be paying you either, but I would have contacted you by now to tell you why.

To put it bluntly, how is a buyer to know you won't just take off with the money if they pay into your bank account? It has happened to me before, when a seller told me their paypal account was 'playing up' and my payment wouldn't go through. I paid into their bank and that was the last I heard from them.

It won't happen ever again to me.

But putting that aside, if you DO have a paypal account and the buyer has just not bothered to pay, then ebay should be hauled over the coals for the reply they gave you..

It stinks.

First up, if you simply ask for a cancellation and the buyer doesn't reply, you are stuck with paying the fees and as others have said, you can still get negative feedback.

Second, if you lodge an unpaid item dispute, yes, it could 'limit the buying ability' of your buyer.

But isn't that the point? I would call limiting their buying ability a consequence of wasting everyone's time and money by bidding when they have no intention of paying.

So ebay or their rep needs a good kick in the pants for their uncaring response (if you have a paypal account). They want your FVF even if you were unpaid, plus they couldn't care less if buyers bid and don't pay.

If you do have a paypal account then I would report that rep actually, it is unfair advice.

[kikiboon]

Hey guys, thanks very much for your advice and thoughts. I appreciate every bit of insight as this is not what I expected!

Firstly, the facts are indeed:

1. that I do not have pp account (ebay allowed me to create ebay account without having to open pp as well).
2. text in my ad specifically said that I dont have it and in case of posting, the buyer would need to pay via bank deposit. Of course, 'local pick up with cash only' was another option I offered.  .... Come to think of it, if "cash only on pick up" is OK (over paypal payment with local pick), why is "bank deposit only in case of posting" not? Does the buyer has the power to ignore payment options specified in the text of the ad? 
3. the buyer completely ignores my repeated mssgs, all while he is super busy buying and leaving feedback even as I write this! So clearly he is online all this time. He is very experienced, hundreds of feedback, all excellent. Also looks like he only buys posted items - never picks up.
4. ebay reply was hard to understand, incredibly poor command of language!! So I have to fill in the blanks and guess what they meant.
5. I have no idea I could complain about a staff member who replies!
6. Finally, the point is not in WHY the buyer decided to ignore to pay, ignore to reply and ignore to read my short and clear ad. The point is in ebay taking the fee and leaving me with the only option of having to ask the buyer to cancel the sale. All while there is the other option of simply creating an unpaid item case. Why, oh why!??!

Anyway, just thinking about this:

"First up, if you simply ask for a cancellation and the buyer doesn't reply, you are stuck with paying the fees and as others have said, you can still get negative feedback."

My understanding of this ebay rule:

"To cancel a transaction, open a case in the Resolution Centre. A few important notes:

• The buyer has up to 7 days to respond to your case. To receive a final value fee credit, the buyer must agree to cancel the transaction. If you haven't received a response after 7 days, close the case and you'll receive a final value fee credit."

is that I would still get the fee back, why do you think I would not? Am I missing something??

And by the way, where is that Resolution Centre?? I cant find it.

I am buffled, still not sure what to do.

[i-love-my-sheep]

I am very surprised that eBay let you set up a selling account without having a PayPal account. It is a requirement and you have to have one. Whether you choose to use it or not is another matter. You shouldn't have been able to get to the point of listing without having an account. I didn't want one either, but couldn't start selling until I did. You have to offer it as a secure payment option for the reasons already mentioned above. For a lot of people, it is the only way they will pay. You also can't demand that people pay by bank deposit only.

Most important thing you should know is, most buyers don't read the ads, let alone any payment/shipping details. They look at the subject and the photo. You could spend a week typing up everything you want people to know and 1 in 10 will read it.

Re the cancellation, what you wrote is correct. If they ignore it, you can close it in 7 days. However, if they hit the decline button, you lose and you can still cop a negative.

To find the resolution centre, go to your sold item on the selling page and next to it will be a drop down box. Click on that and you should see 'resolve a problem'. That is the easiest way to get to the resolution centre when dealing with a transaction. There are also links to it up the top of the page under one of the drop down links.