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eBay scams
a Few weeks ago, I bought an e-book reader on ebay. Paid for it straight away. I did not hear anything further from that seller. The next day I also decided to buy a second reader for my wife. I bought it and also paid for it straight away. So that's two readers, two different sellers, two consecutive days. Seller 1 was in Brisbane and Seller 2 in Sydney. All good so far.
Two days after paying for Item 2, I reveived a "Your message has been posted" email from eBay. Nothing from Seller 1 though.
When the estimated deliver for 1 came and went I gave it a couple of days and sent her a message via eBay saying where is it. If you can't provide me with proof of posting, I want a refund. Within 24 hours, I received a message (not from her but from eBay) saying "your item has been posted. But later the same day I also received a PayPal advice saying I had received a full refund from that Seller. Still never heard anything from the seller herself.
That left item 2 coming from Sydney and when it's due date had come and gone I wrote to him asking where it was and asking for proof of posting. Two days later I received another PayPal notification of a full refund. Again, nothing from the seller himself.
And now, a week after all that, neither parcel has turned up at my place. That suggests either that both parcels have been separately stolen from some point along the 2 entirely different postal systems (Brisbane and Sydney) or neither parcel was ever posted notwithstanding the 2 separate eBay messages saying they had been posted. The first one seems too much of a coincidence to be worth much credit.
The second one (which I believe the more likely) is troubling. It means that eBay's system allows people to post false reports of posting items. Why would they do that if they were willing to make refunds later? That's a mystery I can't resolve yet. And why have I encountered two seemingly different people in two seemingly different states on two consecutive days doing the same thing?
Any ideas - is this some kind of scam or what?
Peter
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