Article Surfing Archive

You finally decided to sell your grandpa's old 'Goyzen Plemmer' (What is a Goyzen Plemmer? Well, if you have a Goyzen it will Plem it.) You dug it out of the trunk in the attic, shined it up, and took pictures of it that are good enough to appear in Vogue magazine. You listed it with a well written description, and diligently attended to the auction and the questions of all of the buyers until, at last, the old thing sold to an elated winning bidder for $300.00 more than you ever expected. After the sale you sent the buyer an invoice with a note about your preferred forms of payment and a confirmation of the company that would be delivering it. You even closed with a kind word of thanks. Then, you waited for your happy buyer to send out his payment. And you waited. And you waited.

A week after the buyer's payment should have arrived you contacted the buyer again and found that he had innocently forgotten to send the payment out as he had agreed. Being the professional and compassionate eBayer you are, you accepted his apology and told him that you would be happy to let him send out the payment at this time. You assured him that you would send the item he had purchased as soon as you received his payment. Then, you waited to receive it. And you waited. And you waited.

After another week elapsed, you contacted the buyer once again. This time, however, the buyer was not so pleasant about the matter. In fact, he told you that he had changed his mind about making the purchase and that he didn't intend to send you a dime. Furthermore, he told you to quit harassing him about the matter, and that he didn't have any obligation to follow through with the purchase if he didn't choose to do so.

eBay doesn't agree with buyers like this. eBay's User Agreement is very specific about the commitment and the legal obligation buyers assume and agree to when they register with eBay. eBay's Unpaid Item Policy and User's Agreement make clear that buyers must pay for the items that they commit to purchase.

There are four steps to eBay's Unpaid Item process as follows:

1. Sellers begin by filing an Unpaid Item Dispute.

2. eBay will contact the buyer and remind him of his obligation and how to proceed.

3. The buyer is presented with prefabricated options to communicate to the seller.

a. I want to pay now.
b. I already paid.
c. I want to communicate with the seller to resolve the problem.

4. The seller can choose to close the dispute after the buyer has responded, or if the buyer has not responded after 8 days.

There are some other details that are important and you should make it a point to review them. eBay also provides free re-listing for the seller. Unpaid Item strikes do not affect a user's Feedback Score or Feedback Profile.