How can I prevent this scam when selling on eBay? 1 1

[Ivan Ivanovitch]

This is my hypothetical nightmare scenario:

A bidder wins my $2000 coin.  I send the coin insured with tracking via registered mail.  The buyer is a liar who receives my coin but claims the package was empty or had a junk coin to weigh it down.  Buyer complains to PayPal who usually sides with buyers. PayPal takes the money from me and sends it back to him. Tracking and insurance is useless because the package was successfully delivered.  So I'm out $2000 and the precious coin.  How can I protect against this scam?  And why isn't it happening constantly?  I considered making a video of me placing the coin in the envelope, sealing it, and handing to the USPS employee all in one continuous take but I was told eBay and PayPal don't consider this sort of thing as valid evidence in legal disputes.   

 

Edited April 14, 2021 by Ivan Ivanovitch
Small error

[bsshog40]

It's hard to prevent scammers from trying. The best I can suggest is to limit your buyers to people with at least 100 feedback! Also, when there is a bid, check out what feedback they have already for red flags. 

[Ivan Ivanovitch]

Good idea.  I was thinking a 0-feedback user can always sniper bid at the last second and win the auction, thus not giving me a chance to cancel his bid. 

[Coinbuf]

There is very little that you can do thru ebay if this situation occurs, however you are not totally without recourse.   You have the buyers name and address so you can pursue legal action against the buyer, granted that is the absolute worst case and biggest pita for you but it is an option.   As Bobby noted pay attention to any bidders that do bid and their feedback, again this is difficult to manage if there is a flurry of bids at the last moment.   But if you feel uncomfortable in any way cancel  a bidder if something seems off or even cancel the sale after the auction ends if need be.  Luckily this happens in a very tiny percentage of ebay transactions, not much comfort if it happens to you but life is full of risks.   You also have the option to sell via an auction house like Great Collections or Heritage, you will likely see a lower net on the sale but that is the offset for the safety of having the auction house sell it for you.   And you can also sell it directly to a local dealer again you will not maximize your return but there is no risk in that type of transaction.

[Ivan Ivanovitch]

All good ideas, thanks Coinbuf.

[GoldFinger1969]

3 hours ago, Ivan Ivanovitch said:

How can I protect against this scam?  And why isn't it happening constantly?  I considered making a video of me placing the coin in the envelope, sealing it, and handing to the USPS employee all in one continuous take but I was told eBay and PayPal don't consider this sort of evidence in legal disputes.

I would think an actual video of the actual coin being SEALED in the USPS mailer would suffice.  A friend could help you and then you hand it to the USPS guy behind the counter.

But you raise some questions I never thought of before.  Damn good questions....

[Coinbuf]

8 minutes ago, GoldFinger1969 said:

I would think an actual video of the actual coin being SEALED in the USPS mailer would suffice.  A friend could help you and then you hand it to the USPS guy behind the counter.

But you raise some questions I never thought of before.  Damn good questions....

It might be useful in a legal courtroom, but that is a big maybe and will depend on the rules of the court.

[JKK]

You could partly protect yourself simply by not selling it internationally (assuming you are in the US). That way, any bad actor would be exposed to the consequences of the same legal system within which you'd operate. I mean, if someone in Myanmar screws you, it's not like you're going to fly over there and hire a lawyer. But within the US? You'd have a name and address.

The reason it doesn't happen that often is probably because there aren't that many chiselers prepared to act that blatantly. People won't fight much over a $15 item, but make it four figures and most people will drop those gloves.

[Conder101]

On 4/7/2021 at 5:35 PM, Ivan Ivanovitch said:

How can I protect against this scam? 

You can't really.

On 4/7/2021 at 5:35 PM, Ivan Ivanovitch said:

And why isn't it happening constantly?

Because fortunately, believe it or not, most people are actually honest.

[Henri Charriere]

Submitters to one of the top [generally regarded] two TPGS are generally unaware that on one, sending a remittance in "cash" is an option. I took that option reasoning that while they could claim they received the coins, it was highly unlikely they would claim they were unaccompanied by any payment, cash or otherwise.  Could a business that routinely handles some of the rarest coins in the world worth millions be trusted to handle a cash transaction?  I took that gamble, and won.

On eBay, review the reviews and ratings and pay heed to the sound advice, backed by experience, of the members above.  

[Ivan Ivanovitch]

On 4/8/2021 at 3:28 PM, Conder101 said:

You can't really.

Because fortunately, believe it or not, most people are actually honest.

Yeah I know most people are honest, it's the dishonest ones I'm worried about.  

[Ivan Ivanovitch]

On 4/7/2021 at 6:03 PM, JKK said:

any bad actor would be exposed to the consequences of the same legal system within which you'd operate.

That's true and I'm selling domestically only.  But what legal action could I possibly take if the buyer claims the package was empty?  Any judge would not know whom to believe. It's just my word against his.  There is no proof either way because hypothetically, I could have sent him an empty envelope.  How would the judge know I didn't ?  How would anyone know?  Seems there is no way to prove anything.  I just have to trust that the buyer won't rip me off for $3000 or however much the coin costs.   I see people selling $50,000 watches on eBay and I don't understand why crooks aren't constantly buying them and claiming the packages were empty because PayPal sides with buyers in such cases.

Edited April 14, 2021 by Ivan Ivanovitch

[JKK]

You're asking (mostly) non-lawyers for legal strategies. Your concern is not without validity, but if you want a solid answer, you're going to need to pony up to one of the people who have JD after their names.

[Gluggo]

Well this actually happened to me but I was the buyer.  It was a DVD and when the package arrived it was empty.  When I made my complaint to EBay they sided with the seller.  Now that was 20+ years ago and the DVD was only $20.00 so I gave up and moved on.  I guess since they had the tracking number to prove I got the package Ebay sided with the seller.   Fast forward to 2021 has things changed?  

So far I have been lucky everything I have sold have been to honest Ebayers.  Good luck try not to worry to much. 

[Ivan Ivanovitch]

7 hours ago, Gluggo said:

Well this actually happened to me but I was the buyer.  It was a DVD and when the package arrived it was empty.  When I made my complaint to EBay they sided with the seller.

Did eBay explain why they sided with the seller?  Is there any rhyme or reason to their decisions?  I would imagine there is some logic to their dispute resolution process but I'm sure they will never make it public because then people can plan to abuse it even more. 

[Coinbuf]

5 minutes ago, Ivan Ivanovitch said:

Did eBay explain why they sided with the seller?  Is there any rhyme or reason to their decisions?  I would imagine there is some logic to their dispute resolution process but I'm sure they will never make it public because then people can plan to abuse it even more. 

Ebay has never been consistent with how or who they side with when these issues arise, it used to be that Ebay almost always sided with the seller, then at some point they began to move more to the buyer side on disputes.   It is a case by case decision but it does seem that from the stories I have read/heard Ebay will side with the buyer in many cases in recent years.

[Alex in PA.]

Very sad situation.  Sorry about it.

 

Edited April 14, 2021 by Alex in PA.

[Jason Abshier]

Few weeks ago my sister ordered something on eBay she said there some scammers on ebays selling products you pay for they show it shipped to your house (ghost package) she never received she was out of $200 however she contacted ebay they wouldn’t help her it shows she got her package they sided with the seller mostly all the time however she contacted FedEx they said they weren’t able to give out the (senders name) there wasn’t a package at all anyways,  it was confusing the seller closed their account to cover up their tracks seems like 2020-2021 all scammers are taking advantage of people . I’d be ticked of furious if this was a coin I paid a lot for it never came in the mail however hard lesson learn for my sister don’t do business with low rating sellers , what’s a shame it makes it harder for a true honest new ebay seller to gain reputation when there a bunch of scammers all over ebay screwing people over .

I hope you get your situation fixed seems likes there are dirty scammers on both sides buyer and sellers ebay and PayPal need take more responsibility in this matter $2,000 and no coin was shipped back to you ? That’s Bulls**t sounds real fishy Ebay would do that to you 

[Hoghead515]

11 minutes ago, Jason Abshier said:

Few weeks ago my sister ordered something on eBay she said there some scammers on ebays selling products you pay for they show it shipped to your house (ghost package) she never received she was out of $200 however she contacted ebay they wouldn’t help her it shows she got her package they sided with the seller mostly all the time however she contacted FedEx they said they weren’t able to give out the (senders name) there wasn’t a package at all anyways,  it was confusing the seller closed their account to cover up their tracks seems like 2020-2021 all scammers are taking advantage of people . I’d be ticked of furious if this was a coin I paid a lot for it never came in the mail however hard lesson learn for my sister don’t do business with low rating sellers , what’s a shame it makes it harder for a true honest new ebay seller to gain reputation when there a bunch of scammers all over ebay screwing people over .

I hope you get your situation fixed seems likes there are dirty scammers on both sides buyer and sellers ebay and PayPal need take more responsibility in this matter $2,000 and no coin was shipped back to you ? That’s Bulls**t sounds real fishy Ebay would do that to you 

It's a shame there is always a dead beat crook out there taking advantage of honest people. I wish they would put stiffer penalties on these crooks. Seems like they got more rights then honest people anymore. 

[Gluggo]

Ivan sorry it took so long to figure reply but I cannot remember exactly if Ebay told me why.  20+ years ago don’t think I can look that information up.  Sorry