Chasing Ebay GSP to Germany

[Andrew]

So, this isn’t actually a customer issue. It’s more of an eBay issue, but one that is directly affecting my customer.

About 3 weeks ago, I sold an item to a gentleman in Germany. A race track set, vintage item from the 80s. This was a Global Shipping Program item, so very easy on my part.

After it arrives, the customer sends me a nice email saying that it arrived damage. I say nice, because it had the air of commiseration and not blame. So, I ask him to open a return case on Ebay and ask if he would put up some pictures.
He does so within a day, and very clearly it is not in the original shipping box we sent to GSP, and also clearly that shipping box is torn open on one side and there are several broken parts.

So, I think okay this is a GSP issue and I call Ebay to get it resolved. The CSR totally agrees with me, but says that it has to go through Ebay.DE, since that is where the buyer purchased it from. She says that some one from Ebay.DE will call in a day to resolve the issue.

That was over a week ago, and now I have called Ebay several times, and finally today they got someone from Ebay.DE to email me (since they don’t speak English). Of course the email is also in German, and in order to answer their emails, I have to set up an account on Ebay.DE. So I am google translating my way through a conversation in which I have to explain everything all over again for the nth time to yet another CSR.

Is this really how resolving a GSP issue works? Something here just seems to stink big time. Every one at Ebay.com says they have to have someone at Ebay.De resolve the issue, and communicating with folks at Ebay.DE is just plain difficult and time consuming.

In the meantime it has been about 9 days since the customer first contacted me with the issue. I am tempted to just refund them since I know I myself would be pretty upset if a refund was taking this long.

So, am I missing something, or is there a better way to resolve GSP refund issues?

[Jay]

We’ve never had to deal with a specific country rep with a GSP case. GSP just handles it.
I would call a US rep again and say it’s up to them to deal with it since you got it to the GSp warehouse: http://pages.ebay.com/seller-center/faq/global-shipping.html#lost-damaged-undeliverable-items

“As between you and your buyer, the risk of loss or damage to a GSP item shall remain with you until the GSP item is accepted at the Global Shipping Center or has been returned to you by Pitney Bowes from the Global Shipping Center. As between your buyer and Pitney Bowes, risk of loss or damage to a GSP item shall transfer to your buyer from Pitney Bowes and/or its third party parcel processing service providers when the GSP item leaves the Global Shipping Center.”

[Ryanne]

yeah, i would call again, they are supposed to deal with a refund right there on the phone, that’s my understanding, they should just close the case and refund your buyer immediately.

[Andrew]

Thank you both for your responses. I have called Ebay about 6 times since my initial call last Thursday (the day the customer opened the case). The story that I got from several reps was that since the buyer purchased the item from Ebay.DE, one of their CSRs would have to resolve the case.

I called 3 times today, and then just now the case was resolved. I also got an email from someone at Ebay.com saying that the case was resolved in the buyers favor, but with Ebay paying the refund, fees, et al.

But I did have to make a hobby out of calling them today. They transferred me to a German rep at one point today as well – which was great fun since neither of us really spoke the other’s language. And then a few emails auf Deutsch as well.

It looks like a Ebay.com supervisor made the decision in the end, but it is hard to say now since I have been talking to both .com and .de off and on all day.

Weirdness!

[Incompetent Picker]

Just an aside, but Germany is known to have one of the best Parcel/Postal delivery systems in the world. The GSP is a very good program for reasons J&R have stated here many times, but I purposely exclude Canada, Germany, UK and Japan from the GSP and ship direct. Awesome buyers with deep pockets. The key is to properly package with a sturdy plain brown box, common sense padding depending on item, correct formatting of address on label (include a packing slip!) and no falsifying info on the customs form. It’s easier than it sounds. The idea is to make your package as nondescript as possible so it will fly through customs.

[Author]

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