eBay issue, what would you do?

[Brady]

I purchased a name on eBay earlier today, and ran into an odd problem.

For the sake of the seller, I edited the domain and their name, as I don't want to hurt their reputation in the event that this is all a misunderstanding that gets resolved.

I have contacted eBay and am awaiting a reply.

The name is worth fighting for, what would you do?

SENT TO EBAY

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Purchase: 4:23pm EST
Paid: 5:01pm EST

As per "Seller Non-Performance," http://pages.ebay.com/help/policies/seller-non-performance.html, this seller has violated our contractual agreement.

As per "Offers to Buy or Sell Outside of eBay," http://pages.ebay.com/help/policies/rfe-spam-non-ebay-sale.html, this seller has violated eBay policies by entertaining and accepting an offer from a third party, whom, according to her, was watching the eBay auction and submitted payment via PayPal, after she accepted my bid through the eBay auction interface.

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I am BUYER, the winning bidder of DOMAIN.TLD.

You should have received the funds via PayPal by now.

I have an eNom account and a GoDaddy account, since the name is registered at eNom, it will probably be easier just to push it.

Email is ADDRESS and username is USERNAME.

This is my first eBay purchase, so any feedback would be greatly appreciated

Brady

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SELLER (EMAIL) has issued you a full or partial refund for your payment.

Message from merchant: Complete refund of payment

Original Payment Details

Date Payment Sent: Jul. 29, 2008

Amount: $650.00 USD

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What is the reason for the refund of payment?

Brady

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Hi Brady,

There was a big problem transferring the domain. About 20 minutes after I accepted your offer, I received payment from someone else through paypal. Since I thought the payment was from YOU, I transferred the domain to this third party. Apparently they had been watching the domain. Now I have accidentally sold and transferred it to them and can't correct the situation. This is the first time this has happened to me in the ten years I have been selling domains, so I am pretty upset about it, as you can imagine.

I have refunded your total payment through Paypal. I sincerely apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused.

SELLER

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You can contact eNom and explain the situation, they can and will halt the transfer, you can refund the other party's payment and push the domain name to my eNom account.

We all make mistakes, so let's get this one resolved

Brady

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I am very sorry, but I am not going to be able to complete this transaction. Once again, I apologize for any inconvenience.

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I was the winning bidder of the domain name, you expressed such in your email to me where you stated that you accepted my offer 20-minutes prior to accepting payment from a second party.

Rectifying this situation is quite simple, I have explained how in my previous message to you. The only practical reason that I can come up with for your selling the domain name to another party after you entered into an agreement with me is because you received a higher offer privately post-sale, which I certainly hope is not the case, as it would reflect very poorly on your morals.

I will be in touch with eBay shortly to discuss your error.

EDIT: Seller info added below

 

[copper]

Never heard such story before.
Seller has high feedback?
If so, you may have small chance.
But I doubt you'll get your domain.

Much luck to you

 

[Brady]

Yeah, 7026 Power Seller with 100% positive feedback.

For $650, it is a sweet domain... hopefully eBay can get involved and make something happen, as she seems to be a legitimate seller who made an error (or possibly got a higher offer and took it, since mine was rather low).

 

[copper]

Yeah, 7026 Power Seller with 100% positive feedback.

For $650, it is a sweet domain... hopefully eBay can get involved and make something happen, as she seems to be a legitimate seller who made an error (or possibly got a higher offer and took it, since mine was rather low).

Well, if that's the case...
1. She got substantially larger offer.
2. It's real mistake.

Either way, she's thinking she don't want to get into mess, so, she's hoping
you'll just give up. Let ebay get involved on your side and let her know
you won't give up no matter what.

Again, good luck

 

[Theo]

Sounds like a beautiful tale of eBay fiction.

 

[Brady]

Her asking price was 8x my winning bid, so it is certainly possible that somebody paid her much much more than me.

Everything seems to check out; whois matches the name of the seller on the eBay bio page, whois matches the email address that she is contacting me from, whois matches the name on the footer of the actual web page, whois matches the name on the footer of all of the actual web pages listed in Archive.org since 2000 and the emails are coming from somebody who speaks English as a first langauage.

Initially, I thought that it may be a compromised account and I was hit with fraud, but based on all the whois references above and based on a near immediate refund, I think she took a higher offer after she sold to me.

 

[draggar]

Leave negative feedback - you won the domain but she still sold it to someone else. if it was a "mistake" she could have had it fixed though NetSol.

I doubt eBay will do much since she did issue you a full refund (but I'm sure you got hit with at least one Paypal fee?)

 

[Theo]

Very interesting case - PM on its way.

 

[Brady]

Thanks for the PM Theo. I think we are on the same page about what happened here.

eBay wants a copy of all of the emails with headers attached, so at least they are acting.

 

[Nodnarb]

I think you should disclose the domain name so someone else here doesn't fall victim to the same situation on the same domain name.

Sounds like a bummer though - hope it works out for you.

 

[Poohnix]

Have you checked whois to see if it has been updated after the alleged push, so the domain in fact has been pushed to someone else, or is the sale/push to some other party a made up story covering the fact that it sold for much less than the seller expected?

.

 

[Theo]

As it happens, I know the new owner (according to the WHOIS). He's known to be an aggressive buyer and everything points to one thing: he went around the auction and bought the name directly, probably after it ended.

 

[Brady]

I think you should disclose the domain name so someone else here doesn't fall victim to the same situation on the same domain name.

Sounds like a bummer though - hope it works out for you.

The name has been transferred to the new buyer now, so it is looking less and less likely for her to make it right.

Since this is the exclusive forum, and not indexable (I think), I'll post details to protect DNF members from the same thing, as she has a few other big sales going on now.

Be advised that I am not alleging fraud or any illegal activity by this seller.

DOMAIN: Jewels.org
SALE PRICE: $650
ASKING PRICE: $5,000
SELLER: ClearanceSavings
NAME: Alana Jordan
EMAIL: [email protected]
WHOIS: I didn't save this when I looked it up

OTHER DOMAINS FOR SALE: Mom.org, Christians.net, Indiana.biz, etc

 

[Nodnarb]

The name has been transferred to the new buyer now, so it is looking less and less likely for her to make it right.

Since this is the exclusive forum, and not indexable (I think), I'll post details to protect DNF members from the same thing, as she has a few other big sales going on now.

Be advised that I am not alleging fraud or any illegal activity by this seller.

DOMAIN: Jewels.org
SALE PRICE: $650
ASKING PRICE: $5,000
SELLER: ClearanceSavings
NAME: Alana Jordan
EMAIL: [email protected]
WHOIS: I didn't save this when I looked it up

OTHER DOMAINS FOR SALE: Mom.org, Christians.net, Indiana.biz, etc

You don't have to allege fraud. An eBay listing is a contract for which specific performance is expected to be delivered to the winning bidder. Just as your specific performance is to pay for your winning bid. Entering into a contract and then refusing to deliver is fraud. Someone else has the domain which you have a contract to buy and the seller refuses to reverse the transaction with their registrar.

Personally, I'd rather them just say hey dude I found someone to pay me more than you. I would be annoyed but at least then you wouldn't have to deal with apparent dishonesty too.

 

[MerlinK]

I'd have a lawyer contact the new buyer and the seller and put some pressure on.

 

[copper]

Damn, now I know why you wouldn't want to let it go.
Nice domain especially for the price you won.

 

[Brady]

Damn, now I know why you wouldn't want to let it go.
Nice domain especially for the price you won.

Haha, yeah!

I am waiting for eBay to make a decision right now, they have all the facts.

 

[Brady]

UPDATE:

I was archiving emails tonight and forgot all about this thread until I saw a bunch of eBay emails and now want to give you an update

First off, I consulted my lawyer and he said that it probably wasn't worth the time/money/energy needed to pursue this, whether I'd win or not... quite frankly, I agreed with him, I've got better ways to use my resources than chasing some eBay idiot.

With that said, I sent eBay a large document with screen shots, emails with headers and eBay messages, etc of everything said and done in chronological order.

After a week or so, they found that the seller was at fault and in breach of contract.

They said that they took appropriate action, but could not disclose what that action was. After a little digging into the sellers account, she was not banned and did not lose her power seller status... looks like nothing changed in her eBay account.

I left her a very honest negative feedback and she left me an unpaid strike (eBay removed the unpaid strike after some terse emails)... however, due to a ridiculous technicality, my negative feedback was removed since I was not actually a customer of hers, so there is NO proof in her account of what she did!

Ultimately, I got my money back along with some canned eBay emails.

Don't do business with ClearanceSavings, she is still selling domain names and is dishonest:

Alana Jordan
[email protected]
PO Box 564
St Peters, MO 63376
636-936-8171

 

[Sonny Banks]

Thanks for share these info!

 

[Onward]

This really stinks...

Thanks for sharing your experience...