To request a bigger refund from eBay seller?

[WhoseBadgerIsThis]

This is my first AIBU - please be gentle, but if I am BU, please tell me - I trust the wisdom of the MN masses!

I bought a relatively fragile item (plastic, but with sticky-out bits) on eBay from overseas (America). The cost of item was £25, with postage of £20. The item arrived in a box with one side squashed in. The item hadn't been wrapped so much as had wads of paper put round it. Not enough to protect it, and one of its sticky out bits was snapped off. I notified the seller and requested a partial refund. They apologised for the breakage but didn't really address the refund issue. I emailed again requesting they refund the postage, which seemed fair to me as they should be able to claim that back from the shipper. No reply to that, but I have just seen they have refunded me £7, which seems too little.

So MN, do I accept this, or raise a formal dispute with eBay and take it further? Thank you!

I'd have expected a full refund, to be honest. It's the sellers responsibility to ensure an item arrives on time and in the condition as advertised. I'd open a dispute.

Thanks! If I open a dispute, is there anything that prevents the seller leaving me negative feedback?

According to eBay...
Why are sellers allowed to leave only positive Feedback for buyers?
Sellers used to be able to leave negative Feedback for buyers. Unfortunately, we found that when buyers had bad experiences with sellers, they were often reluctant to leave neutral or negative Feedback out of fear that the seller would retaliate by leaving negative Feedback for them. And when buyers did receive unfair negative Feedback, they usually decreased their shopping on eBay. Overall, it became clear that the fear of retaliatory negative Feedback made it more difficult for good sellers to distinguish themselves from not-so-good sellers, and made the Feedback system as a whole less reliable.

pages.ebay.com/services/forum/changes.html

HTH

Superb, thank you! Dispute process here I come!

Well yes, as Amantes says, the seller cannot leave you negative feedback.

As to what would be fair compensation, surely it depends on what the item is and the effect of the damage on its form and function.

Who cares about negative feedback anyway? I for one would never think to check it

Flomple, that is a relevant point, and something I should have mentioned initially. The item is an ornament, and while it can be glued, it's not the same as having a perfect and unglued item. It's not destroyed however, which is why I wasn't asking for any refund on the item cost, just the postage costs (which I assume the seller can recoup anyway, so should not end up out of pocket).

Stubbed - good point and one that made me laugh - I'm probably just being precious about my 100% rating

You do realise if you open a dispute you will be expected to return it to the seller tracked to qualify for a refund?
£7 buys a lot of glue. It won't however buy much tracked postage back to the USA....

A lot of overseas sellers do this - they keep the price of the item quite moderate, then jack up the postage, and assume you'll never stump up to post it back tracked.

E.g. watches from Hong Kong that cost a few quid but the postage is £25. Would you spend another £25 to get a couple of quid back?

You might strike lucky and eBay issue you a postage label but I have no idea if they do that for overseas items.

No seller can leave you negative feedback so I would not worry about that.

Was the item shipped through EBay's global shipping program? £25 is over the customs amount so if shipping included customs clearance they will have used EBay shipping. If so they could have refunded you their shipping costs as they didn't post to you they posted to EBay who then sent the package internationally.

Contact the seller for clarification and if needs be contact EBay. If you feel the packaging was adequate but it was poorly treated during transit then it is eBay's problem not the sellers. It should be EBay refunding you not the seller.

Just for clarification if you don't know about the global shipping program:

1. I list an item for sale and offer international shipping through eBay's global program.

1. I put in a price for domestic shipping and the weight, dimensions, value of the parcel.

1. EBay calculates the cost of international shipping and customs charges and displays this price to the buyer.

1. When an item sells internationally most buyers don't notice their payment is broken into two parts, a payment to me and one to ebay.

1. As a seller I get a label with a code and post my item as normal. It goes to a UK address and the code tells eBay where to send it to.

1. I am responsible for getting the parcel to eBay, they are responsible for what happens after.

Thanks for the extra messages! No I didn't realise I'd need to return it tracked (and as you say, it'd be cheaper for the glue!), and I only found out about the global shipping programme this afternoon (had I read these extra messages before now, I would've known even sooner!), which was indeed used in this case.

Given that, it's now clear to me that the seller has refunded what they owe (and pretty speedily and gracefully too!), I need to read the small print more carefully, and any issue, should I decide to raise one, would be with eBay/the GSP.

Thanks everyone for great advice and raising things I wouldn't have thought of and didn't know! I knew I could rely on MN

Watching with interest as have almost identical situation with damaged item from Ebay (albeit not overseas). Please update when you have decided what to do OP.

What do you mean by global shipping arrangement? And why do you know feel £7 is enoug?

2mins, please read unicorns brilliant explanation of global shipping. It explains everything.

The buyer paid $7 shipping to US seller, the remainder of the shipping costs go to eBay directly and they then organise the delivery.

You don't necessarily have to return the item, I've had a similar problem, and been issued a full (inc p&p) refund from ebay itself.

Ring them in the morning. It's always best to actually talk to someone. If you can't ring, use the chat facility.

OP

Not the exact same situation as yours BUT I bought a wedding dress from ebay last summer. Long story short it was not as described so I asked the seller for a refund. They refused so I lodged a dispute. Ebay found in my favour and refunded me (the dress cost and original postage) AND sent me a prepaid postage label to print out so I didn't cost me anything to send the dress back.