eBay purchase weirdness

[fenchurch]

I've had an account at eBay since 1996, and have had only positive experiences so far... and this one may not wind up being bad, but it's the first time anything has ever gone wrong. I bought a large Tupperware tumbler and sandwich keeper (don't care about the sandwich keeper, but I really wanted the tumbler) a week or so ago. A package arrived from the seller today and right away there seemed to be something wrong. For one thing, the tumbler I bought is a huge 30 ounce one, and the package was a standard Priority Mail box, without a tell-tale bulge.

I just opened it up, and it's a Tupperware kid's cup and sandwich keeper... NOT what I bought, by a long shot. Now, I just checked out at the seller's site, and s/he's got several of these up for auction right now, so I suspect s/he just got my package mixed up with someone else. I've sent off an email asking about it and am now waiting to hear back... but this is the first time in ten years that I've ever had anything go even remotely wrong with an eBay purchase, so it's got me a bit nervous.

Comments

[elsaf]

The vast majority of my eBay purchases have gone just fine, and on the odd occasion when there was a problem, most of the sellers have made the problem go away.

Last summer, I ordered a candle lantern for my patio, and instead the seller sent me a totally kitch ceramic plaque of praying hands and cherubs. When I wrote her back, she sent me the lantern, and let me keep the plaque (I guess she didn't want it either).

In another case, I ordered a laptop power adapter that was listed as "like new" and came obviously the worse for wear (the case was cracked, and it was very beat up). I contacted the seller, who refunded my purchase price, plus shipping, plus 10 percent for my trouble.

The worst problem I've had though, was a seller who sent out a large number of items to different people and didn't get the right item to anyone. She contacted us and asked us to send our item to the right person (she sent out lists of who got what). This, of course, meant that the buyers were stuck for the extra postage. Needless to say, she got an avalanche of negative feedback.

[matt1969.livejournal.com]

didn't get the right item to anyone

That takes some doing! I can understand one or two items, but the entire lot? That takes mathematical calculations!

[matt1969.livejournal.com]

The very first time I bought something the seller sent the wrong item. He was very apologetic, let me keep the first item - which was a similar magazine - and then sent out the correct item FOC.

I've also had a photo lost in the mail. The seller sent out another one asap.

But this is why I always read feedback comments before buying. You can get a slightly better idea of whether or not the error is genuine.

[fenchurche.livejournal.com]

This seller actually has very good feedback, which is why I suspect it's just a mix-up... still, it's the first real snag I've run into.

Well, not quite true... now that I think of it, I did have one seller who wound up not actually having the item in question, was very apologetic and sent me a refund immediately. So, a somewhat bad experience, but it was all taken care of so quickly that I never had time to worry about it.

[matt1969.livejournal.com]

And how do you list something you don't have? I always have the item by me as I list it, so I can weigh it, take a look over it, etc.

[fenchurche.livejournal.com]

Well, I could sort of understand in his case... he ran a brick and mortar store, and it turned out (or at least he claimed) one of his employees had sold the item, not realizing it was up for auction. The way I figured it, he'd refunded quickly enough (quite literally within half an hour of my payment going through) and apologized enough that it really didn't matter. The timing was such that I'm guessing he got the notice for the payment, went to get the item to package and spent the next half hour trying to figure out what happened to it. :-p

Still no word back on the mistaken Tupperware item, though. :-(

[http://users.livejournal.com/opalescence_/]

I hope it works out for you! I had two horrible experiences, both dealing with Coach purses that were fake from sellers. I left negative feedback and they retaliated with the same. I can't get them removed. The postmaster is after one of the women because it's mail fraud, and I got my credit card to reimburse me the other sale. The negative feedback really bothers me as I did nothing wrong. :-( Good luck!

[matt1969.livejournal.com]

I got neutrals after I left neutrals for a seller. That irked me. She called me impatient and a slow payer... but I've got all the evidence proving I paid in good time. Not my fault if she won't check her post office box regularly and only accepts personal checks from US buyers! I just made sure I had responded to her feedback so potentials could get my side of the tale.

Some sellers are just... bad. They won't leave feedback unless you do and then they respond in kind. That's why, as a seller, I'll leave feedback as soon as I ship out the item. I refuse to stoop that low *g*

[mistraltoes.livejournal.com]

I had a similar situation re the feedback. I left neutral feedback (after a fairly negative experience) and the seller responded with negative feedback and namecalling. Since I have fairly few transactions and he has thousands, it makes a lot of difference to me and none to him. It's made me wary of leaving honest feedback. I wish they had a system where you couldn't see the other person's feedback until you'd left yours.

[queenofattolia.livejournal.com]

Wow, you are the only person I know who's never had a problem. Friends of mine have had to go to the Postal Service and FBI to file fraud reports on sellers. Myself, I've been ripped off (granted, not for a lot, but still), been sent wrong items because the seller completely misrepresented them, had pottery items arrive in, like, a billion pieces because the sellers decided to wrap them in two small pieces of newspaper and nothing else, etc. ad infinitum. The only seller who actually refunded my money because of a bad transaction was a guy in Montreal; all the other American sellers told me in effect to go f**k myself, bad feedback or no.

I'll bet everything will come out all right for you, though, because you have Good Ebay Karma. ;)

[fenchurche.livejournal.com]

Heh! Well, now I'm starting to feel a bit silly about wringing my hands over this (virtually speaking). After all, even if I never hear from the seller again, I've at least got a fairly nice Tupperware product that is worth the money I sent. While it's not anything I would have normally purchased, it's new and decent enough that I can toss it in the Gift Drawer for a possible future gift-giving opportunity.

Sounds like I have been pretty lucky so far, though!

[fer1213.livejournal.com]

I guess I've been really lucky so far as well. Everything I've won, to this date, was basically as described and arrived in a reasonable amount of time. I'm not expecting my luck to hold out, though. ;)

Good luck with the Tupperware!

[rahirah]

If her feedback rating's good, it's probably just a mixup.

I just bought a copy of Morrowind: The Elder Scrolls from a guy with only one previous sale, so I'm a tad nervous about that, but everyone's got to start somewhere.