Online theft, thinking of doing something about it

silviasol

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A buyer abused an ebay return and stole $50 worth of items from me. http://imgur.com/a/o5uQ3
I sent an email to the local police department and disputed the return with ebay. This has happened a few times before and never ended in my favor, I would say the money and item is as good as theirs.
So I was thinking of trying something. Mailing all neighbors on their block and informing them what this person did. Would that be against the law or a good human service, I would want to know if a thief was living near me. Defamation comes to mind though.
 
silviasol said:
A buyer abused an ebay return and stole $50 worth of items from me. http://imgur.com/a/o5uQ3
I sent an email to the local police department and disputed the return with ebay. This has happened a few times before and never ended in my favor, I would say the money and item is as good as theirs.
So I was thinking of trying something. Mailing all neighbors on their block and informing them what this person did. Would that be against the law or a good human service, I would want to know if a thief was living near me. Defamation comes to mind though.

It's not illegal, but it is sueable. That is, you might get sued, lose the case and then get to pay money for damages to their reputation. You may or may not have any reason to fear said lawsuit. Lack of income and assets; no fear of getting anything stripped from you. Really don't think they're going to file a lawsuit? It's a risk you can take.
 
silviasol said:
A buyer abused an ebay return and stole $50 worth of items from me.

Unfortunately as a seller you have essentially zero recourse with eBay. Sucks, but true.

eBay made a conscious decision a couple years back that really put all power in the hands of the buyer.
Most buyers don't abuse it, but if a buyer wants to steal from you they only have to lie about a transaction (say they never received the item, or the item wasn't as described, or say they returned the item but actually return an empty box to you) and they get $$ back and can also keep the goods.

About the idea of leaving the thief negative Feedback? Can't do it. At the same time, eBay made a decision that sellers could only leave positive FB for buyers... negative FB would hurt buyers feelings. You don't even have the option of leaving negative. Sellers don't have to leave buyers any FB if they don't want to, but if they do... it can only be positive.

About blocking all buyers who have low FB? Can't do it. eBay removed the ability. You can block this one guy specifically, but you can't block everybody who has low FB.

About the most you could do on eBay is leave the thief positive FB, but with a vague negative comment like "I'll never sell to this person again." If you leave more direct negative FB like "This buyer is a crook!", it gets removed.

The eBay Feedback system is pretty much useless.
 
Forget the police, they just don't care. If he returned it by U.S. Mail, that's mail fraud. And they ENCOURAGE you to file complaints, a situation I thought would be way too obscure for them to think about they jumped right on.
 
Its expensive to sue. Worded carefully it could be effective. Or advise a family member you'd appreciate assistance.
 
marty said:
Give the buyer BAD feedback. In the future only sell to people with good feedback.
How Feedback works
I was wrong. Yea looks like eBay changed their policies.

Looked at the pictures. Did buyer return a empty box?
Others complaining about the same thing.
ebay+buyer+returned+empty+box

Do you have a phone number for the buyer? Call them. Do not accuse them of stealing. People at post office could have opened box and stolen stuff.

Contact other sellers that the buyer bought from and ask if buyer did the same scam?

Yes do contact the police and the post office.

Who owns the property that item was delivered to is public record. Could also mail a letter the the building owner.
 
footloose said:
silviasol said:
A buyer abused an ebay return and stole $50 worth of items from me.

Unfortunately as a seller you have essentially zero recourse with eBay. Sucks, but true.

eBay made a conscious decision a couple years back that really put all power in the hands of the buyer.
Most buyers don't abuse it, but if a buyer wants to steal from you they only have to lie about a transaction (say they never received the item, or the item wasn't as described, or say they returned the item but actually return an empty box to you) and they get $$ back and can also keep the goods.

About the idea of leaving the thief negative Feedback? Can't do it. At the same time, eBay made a decision that sellers could only leave positive FB for buyers...
negative FB would hurt buyers feelings. You don't even have the option of leaving negative. Sellers don't have to leave buyers any FB if they don't want to, but if they do... it can only be positive.

About blocking all buyers who have low FB? Can't do it. eBay removed the ability. You can block this one guy specifically, but you can't block everybody who has low FB.

About the most you could do on eBay is leave the thief positive FB, but with a vague negative comment like "I'll never sell to this person again." If you leave more direct negative FB like "This buyer is a crook!", it gets removed.

The eBay Feedback system is pretty much useless.

Exactly. I have sold on ebay since you could leave negative feedback for a buyer, things that went on back in the 2006 to 2009 days would get you suspended these days. Anyone who didn't pay you could leave the most nastiest negative feedback you could think of, anything at all you didn't like about the buyer you could leave negative feedback. In all fairness it is really not needed for negative feedback for a buyer, good buyers may be unfairly given negative feedback from a seller who was angry about a return or whatever, there are more shit garbage sellers then there are people who buy, even these days. It is all about selling fake items these days for an easy buck. The catagory I sell in there are so many people who sell fake shit, all fake shit, they rely on a china company who makes fake items specifically for the few who will lie their way thru everything. For example, these guys have some junk that doesn't sell then fake headphones and fake iphone chargers and usb, they label them all as authentic but are all fake. http://www.ebay.com/sch/flash_deals15/m.html?_nkw=&_armrs=1&_ipg=&_from=
I have a big list of people who sell fake beats by dre urbeats, all in california. The scam is actually pulled from a third party who seeks out local people who have a low sale volume, they tell them they have "authentic" urbeats, they buy them locally and sell them either knowing they are fakes or maybe don't know. These people get their accounts pulled in 3-6 months, but the company just searches for other people as they get pulled. I just searched my current list of 8 sellers, one was removed from ebay, and another has no items so was most likely suspended indefinitely from selling, which is usually 1-2 years. I am trying to find this company and report them to the police, just removing them would drop the sale of urbeats by atleast 75%, they actually control 75% of the sales of urbeats and they are all fake. And I would make so much more money on the real authentic urbeats I sell.

But some good news, ebay actually sided with me.
https://postimg.org/image/yalx964y5/
 
I am just on fire with ebay! I have been buying the fake urbeats headphones just to have some proof and try to get the police involved. I only did a simple ebay report thru the auction page and it is gone! Trying another seller. This one is huge, has already sold 2000+ of them. This will piss him off 8)

http://www.ebay.com/itm/182297573440
 
HAHA! Another one bites the dust. All his auctions were removed. All but one! On to the next fool! I didn't even report this one, it is like they are watching me and pulling down anyones auctions I purchase. Is ebay hiding something??? On to the next scumbag seller! Best $80 I have ever spent, even though I threw it all away buying fakes.

https://www.ebay.com/sch/m.html?_nkw=&_armrs=1&_ipg=&_from=&_ssn=logus.niropl

I wonder if they know they are all fakes, like anyone with half a brain would. And maybe ebay figures I am working with authorities or something so covers their own ass by removing these auctions I purchase.
 
I'm glad it was resolved in your favor. Next time you find someone that you have no other recourse with, you could send them a glitter bomb: https://www.ruindays.com/collections/all?sort_by=best-selling

You could also DIY, but using this service leaves a layer of protection. But then again, a careful person could DIY without leaving evidence. :twisted:
 
So if this third counterfeit item seller I am buying from has his auctions removed there must be something ebay is up to. I have bitched and complained in my auctions descriptions for years about fake headphones commonly being sold on ebay. I think ebay has taken notice. They know who is selling fake items but would rather just take the money that sellers pay them in their absorbent fee's then remove their auctions... that is until someone actually tries to do something about it, then friendly old ebay would never participate in any counterfeit item sales. So it comes down to they have been monitoring people who sell real items vs people who sell fake items. What a world we would live in if that is the case. Time will tell, I will keep buying from all the sellers who sell fake headphones and hopefully watch them drop out one by one.
 
I just recently was out $65 dollars from selling a Modded Gameboy, it was delivered to a PO box and signed for...But then the customer disputed ever getting it and Ebay immediately refunded them the money and the Gameboy is supposedly "lost" but im sure he is at home playing it....

Took me over an hour to clean the stupid screen on the thing too
 
I've been scammed by fakes on eBay so often, I've stopped buying from there. It used to be that if it was too cheap you'd just assume it was fake and avoid it. But recently I've bought things which say genuine, is only 5-10% cheaper than genuine and turn out to be fake.

The final straw was a Samsung charger. There were ones that looked identical to Samsung genuine that said Samsung compatible for $3, and one marked Genuine for $30. I bought the $30 one. I gotta admit, it was a pretty good copy until I put it on the bench. The voltage sagged 50% on my phone, were as genuine barely moved 0.2v. It got hot, had no safety cut out. It was so bad, that after all the people who had died from cheap imitations the previous years, I didn't feel I could just leave feedback, so I reported it to eBay, no response. Reported it to consumer affairs, it is an electrical issue, reported it to the electrical safety commission, its a consumer issue. In the end, I reported it to Samsung and a week later, he changed his listing to "Samsung compatible" and removed the photos with the Samsung logo on it.

So, I guess it comes down to that... It's just an intellectual property issue, and these chargers will keep killing people.

I now mostly buy from authorised resellers now. It costs me an arm and a leg more, but its a lot less stressful.
 
Yep, all fake headphones sellers also have tons of "OEM, Authentic" chargers and cables. They lie thru their teeth responding to any feedback, whatever to keep people thinking they are real. Scumbag sellers, they will do anything for the free money that comes from using ignorant buyers. Cables, chargers, cell phone accessories are what they live off of. It is a terrible section of ebay, probably the most terrible for fakes.

Interesting about the last auction I bought
www.ebay.com/itm/132075934683
Ebay either shut down the auction, but didn't remove it completely, or he canceled the auction himself and started a new one(perhaps he is running scared since I bought from him?). He put up a new auction which is stupid because that resets your best match searches which is key to sell more.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/132244192102
Doing a search now it looks like best match searches are free of these fake auctions so ebay must have just sucked it up and removed all fake urbeats auctions that it new about. So in vision I am now the best seller for best match searches. Not sure what I hate more now, ebay for knowingly allowing fakes to be sold or these sellers.
 
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