Home › Forums › How Can eBay Improve? › I Want to Refund my Buyer, but Ebay Won’t Let Me
- This topic has 7 replies, 5 voices, and was last updated 4 years, 2 months ago by Timo.
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08/15/2020 at 1:17 am #80680
Someone returned a vintage 1950’s dress. (long story) Didn’t fit. I received the dress back in perfect condition. I went on Ebay to issue a refund but just kept getting an error message. I thought… I’ll try again tomorrow. Tried again today, but still had the same issue. Ebay wouldn’t let me do the refund. I tried calling customer service. Got a recording. Ended up creating a new personal PayPal account and transferring my money over from Paypal, then logged back into my main Paypal account and refunding through PayPal. I don’t want any black marks, as I’m a single Mom, and this is how I survive. Ebay finally cancelled the return. What is gong on? I ended up refunding the buyer the full amount paid, including original shipping, even though the reason was because it didn’t fit. I had to take action by August 17th.
Anyone else experiencing problems with ebay, refunding customers?
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08/15/2020 at 8:13 am #80682
No issues on our end. So eBay “cancelled” the return? But didn’t your refund “close” the return?
Some people use eBay’sFacebook page for help: https://www.facebook.com/eBayForBusiness
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08/15/2020 at 9:34 am #80683
Sorry I meant they closed (not cancelled) the return. I was so frustrated with that last night LOL. Glad I had somewhere to vent :).
The most frustrating thing for me was that I couldn’t get ahold of anyone on the phone to help me. They used to have really good customer service for issues like this.
I was worried that I wouldn’t be able to issue the refund on time, and when that happens, from what I understand, Ebay counts that again your seller level. (That’s what I meant by “black marks” LOL… sorry I was tired and frustrated last night so the way I phrased that sounded a little funny.) I work so hard to maintain “Above Standard”.
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08/15/2020 at 11:20 am #80687
It sounds frustrating. Glad you figured it out. That’s all we do week to week. Not everything is perfect, but you do the best to keep the business going.
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08/16/2020 at 9:46 am #80705
the only thing i can think of is that they paid with paypal, and then you got switched over to ebay managed payments in the meantime and something got wonky on ebay’s end?
if you can’t get through on the phone try messaging https://www.facebook.com/eBayForBusiness
i’ve also heard you can email ebay right now and they’ll get back to you https://www.ebay.com/help/email?initFrom=HOME
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08/17/2020 at 12:37 pm #80744
Thanks for the replies! 🙂
I will try the Facebook site and e mail. Maybe it is some glitch in the system, since they are switching to managed payments. I tried signing up for managed payments, but got a message saying that I can not sign up, because they are switching sellers over in phases or something. I can’t remember the exact wording, so I’m still using Paypal.
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08/18/2020 at 9:48 am #80787
I was on chat with ebay about this issue this weekend as I had two returns that opened shortly after going to managed payments.
I contacted both customers and asked them to be patient as I worked with ebay to figure it out.
On return that showed up first, ebay put a 3 day hold on the return. Then the rep sent me an email with “instructions” on how to refund the buyer. They told me to directly send the customer paypal funds, document the transaction, and send proof to a provided ebay email address.
That’s great….but ebay and paypal BLOCK the actual email address of buyers!!! I literally couldn’t do this. So next I sent funds from my bank account to my paypal account. After I did this I got a message that it would take 4-5 business days before the funds were available to use.
The day after I did this ebay closed the return and refunded the buyer in full (should have not refunded shipping costs due to return reason). Ironically ebay had no problem auto debiting my payment method to get THEIR money back. I argued to no avail with ebay – they said it wasn’t able to be appealed.
I’ve again messaged the other return buyer and requested they don’t escalate the return and that I’ll refund them as soon as the money shows up in paypal. I transferred the money last Tursday morning and it STILL isn’t available.
So long story short: You are basically screwed with any return that was purchased prior to managed payments implementation. It will be impossible to get the money back into your paypal account quick enough to avoid issues. Your only option is to clearly communicate with the buyer and hope they don’t go ahead and escalate the case after 2 days.
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08/18/2020 at 10:20 am #80788
@retro-treasures-wv
It’s true that eBay hides buyer email addresses. I think they are only on the orders page and then for only 14 days and disappear after that. Some sellers (and software packages like Sixbit) capture or download the email addresses during this period.There is also a trick to obtain the buyer’s paypal address. Use the email that paypal sent you regarding the funds and click reply-to-all in your email client. This will show the email address.
Perhaps you have a friend that can send/loan you some funds from their Paypal account. If they have funds in their Paypal, you will have immediate access to this when it hits your account. Not sure what happens if they fund it from a credit card or their bank account.
We all need to be aware of this predicament. eBay switched my main selling account on 7/24, so same thing could happen to me. Thanks for the tip and I hope the 2nd return works out better for you.
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