eBay / Paypal dispute

[Pixieandpud]

Hi ladies,
Just after a bit of advice. I sold my kitchen on eBay recently and got a winning bid of £3700. The winner informed me he couldn't pick it up due to family issues. In the meantime, the person that had won the bid for the floor tiles (£0.99) contacted me to arrange pick up of th tiles and to inform me how sad she was for not winning the kitchen (her max bid had been £999) She asked me to let her k ow if the sale fell through. I duly contacted her offering it to her at the price of the second best offer £3600 rather than offering it to the 2 nd highest bidder and she agreed. She sent someone to pick it up today (so she hasn't actually seen it herself by this stage). He arrived in a little van on his own so my builders spent several hours helping him load everything into his van, wasting hours if building work. He couldn't take the floor tiles as he didn't have enough space). The lady has since contacted me to say she is disappointed with the kitchen and it was not as advertised. She has opened up a paypal dispute requesting a £2600 refund.

I have been into the resolution centre on eBay to deal with this and am uncertain how to proceed. I declined to give her a refund and the next options were to re main in contact with her or to escalate to a paypal claim. I am not sure what the latter entails - any ideas?

Has anyone been in this situation? I feel very sad she is not happy with the kitchen but strongly feel that it shouldn't have been taken away if it wasn't in good shape ( it was removed after I left for work so can't comment if it was damaged on removal or in transit).

Any advice on how to proceed much appreciated!

[AveEldon]

why did you accept paypal? it should have been cash on collection

[Pixieandpud]

Yes, in hindsight perhaps cash on collection would have been the most sensible option.... Thought it might be tricky to get hold of that kind of cash at short notice!

[AveEldon]

you can't prove delivery of the item so ebay/paypal may refund her the whole amount

[AnchorDownDeepBreath]

Yeah using Paypal wasn't great - you can't prove delivery if she decides to say she hasn't received it.

To be honest, it might be easiest to agree that if she returns the whole kitchen in good condition, you'll refund the £3,600. Then you can either offer to the second highest bidder or relist. There's no way of claiming back the hours for the builders helping him load it, unfortunately, and as she's paid through PayPal, if you attempted to hold back some of the price to account for the hassle she could just ask them to release it.

If you escalate to a PayPal claim, they are likely to ask her to return it anyway - they will ask her to use a trackable method and will refund when she enters tracking information.

[mishmash1979]

Just so u know Anchordown; during a dispute if eBay find in buyers favour (they always do) they will refund money immediately. I am in that unfortunate position now of them having refunded buyer 2 months ago and she obviously never returned item and has stopped answering my emails.

[Pixieandpud]

Amazingly both EBay and PayPal ruled in my favour! Sorry to hear of your rubbish experience mishmash...