Should I Bite the PayPal Bullet?

[MAubrey]

I've only had one bad experience as a seller using paypal...out of maybe 30 or 40 sales.

I sold my black Contax G2 & Planar 45mm f/2 to someone, who then claimed all his images were out of focus and then forced a returned of the camera 4 months later. I'm currently finishing a test roll through it to see if its true. It certainly worked last summer. I'm convinced that he either doesn't know how to focus a Contax G2 at all or he just bought the camera to use for his trip to Europe and then returned it...basically making it a free rental.

The main problem I have is the *amount of time* available to buyers to start a complaint about a purchase. Four months is a long, dubious amount of time.

[Audii-Dudii]

I sold my black Contax G2 & Planar 45mm f/2 to someone, who then claimed all his images were out of focus and then forced a returned of the camera 4 months later. I'm currently finishing a test roll through it to see if its true. It certainly worked last summer. I'm convinced that he either doesn't know how to focus a Contax G2 at all or he just bought the camera to use for his trip to Europe and then returned it...basically making it a free rental.

The first of my two situations was similar. I sold someone a vintage Minolta lens and two months after he received it, he filed a dispute with PayPal claiming it didn't work properly and wasn't in the condition I had claimed. I didn't recognize the lens in the photos he provided to PayPal showing its condition -- it was indeed quite scruffy, as he claimed, whereas the lens I had shipped to him was in mint-minus condition -- but PayPal sided with him regardless and after I received the lens back, it turned out to have a different serial number than the one I sold him! (I kept records for insurance purposes, so had a record of the serial numbers for each of my lenses.)

I contacted PayPal about this and they contacted the seller, but he claimed the lens he returned to me was absolutely the same lens I had shipped to him and if there was any fraud involved in the transaction, it must be on my end, not his, as I obviously must have shipped him a different lens that I had advertised!

The second incident involved a Minolta XK body and having learned my lesson with the lens debacle, I took a photo of it in the shipping box with the serial number showing. Well, to make a long story short, the same thing happened again and when I sent PayPal the photo of the camera in the box, they still found for the seller, because my photo of the camera in the box wasn't considered to be irrefutable proof that it was the same camera I had actually shipped ... wtf?!

Now, for higher-value items, I leave the box open until I'm at the Post Office and then make a video of the box being sealed and passed to the clerk behind the counter. I haven't had any disputes since I started doing this, so I don't know if PayPal will accept these videos as proof of not, but if not, then I have no idea what evidence will ever satisfy them.

<sigh>

[Alan Klein]

The first of my two situations was similar. I sold someone a vintage Minolta lens and two months after he received it, he filed a dispute with PayPal claiming it didn't work properly and wasn't in the condition I had claimed. I didn't recognize the lens in the photos he provided to PayPal showing its condition -- it was indeed quite scruffy, as he claimed, whereas the lens I had shipped to him was in mint-minus condition -- but PayPal sided with him regardless and after I received the lens back, it turned out to have a different serial number than the one I sold him! (I kept records for insurance purposes, so had a record of the serial numbers for each of my lenses.)

I contacted PayPal about this and they contacted the seller, but he claimed the lens he returned to me was absolutely the same lens I had shipped to him and if there was any fraud involved in the transaction, it must be on my end, not his, as I obviously must have shipped him a different lens that I had advertised!

The second incident involved a Minolta XK body and having learned my lesson with the lens debacle, I took a photo of it in the shipping box with the serial number showing. Well, to make a long story short, the same thing happened again and when I sent PayPal the photo of the camera in the box, they still found for the seller, because my photo of the camera in the box wasn't considered to be irrefutable proof that it was the same camera I had actually shipped ... wtf?!

Now, for higher-value items, I leave the box open until I'm at the Post Office and then make a video of the box being sealed and passed to the clerk behind the counter. I haven't had any disputes since I started doing this, so I don't know if PayPal will accept these videos as proof of not, but if not, then I have no idea what evidence will ever satisfy them.

<sigh>

I once returned an item that was worth around $30 paid without Paypal. The seller said he never got it. BS. I just chalked it up to a lesson learned. This is the reason I won't sell or buy big ticket items on ebay. Too much of a hassle. I've bought stuff but have limited it to let's say a hundred dollars. Also, I check the seller's rating to make sure it's 99% positive.