Ebay Watch Nightmare

1. Person posts watch on Ebay (limited edition titanium about $2400)
2. We negotiate price and then I "Buy it Now"
3. A week goes by and no watch is received. Seller tells me he has been in car accident, and he is in hospital. He cancels deal and says he will re-list the watch. He checks in a few days to see if I received my refund (I did). I tell him to issue me an offer for the same price, and I will rebuy the watch.
4. Seller re-lists the watch, I offer him the same price and he accepts.
5. Seller offers to sell me the watch outside of Ebay for lower price. If I "trust him" I can pay via PayPal goods and services. He sent me email on my personal email. He deduces my email address from PayPal somehow.
6. I pay normally via PayPal on Ebay.
7. Watch is sent without bracelet. WTF. What I received does not match pictures. After close inspection, the second posting has a line in small print that bracelet was not included. The original posting did not have this line. Also, there was a full paragraph in the listing describing the great bracelet (that was not included). There were also multiple photos of the watch on a bracelet.
8. At this point I request a refund and want nothing to do with this seller. The seller does not offer me the bracelet, but insists I got a "good deal" because he did not include the bracelet. Why would I pay the same price the second time for a watch that did not include the bracelet? I say I did not receive what was in the listing and I want my money back.
9. Seller agrees to refund (Ebay tells me this)
10. I send back watch USPS fully insured ( I figure if he lies about receiving it, it would be a federal crime).
11. After seller receives watch, he opens dispute.
12. Ebay says money is coming my way.
13. Two weeks later no money..I call Ebay and they say eCheck from seller has not cleared.
14. I call Paypal, and they say money is not coming my way and that Ebay has decided in Seller's favor. Keep in mind that my Ebay account still says the refund is coming my way. WTF!
15. My credit card statement shows two PayPal charges and one refund. My PayPal account shows only one charge and one refund. WTF!
16. I spend 90 minutes on phone and was able to finally get an Ebay rep and a PayPal rep on at the same time.
17. The discrepancy on the credit card statement vs. PayPal was because two of my transaction were via PayPal (funded by credit card), but the other transaction was via the credit card direct to Ebay but PayPal was the credit card processor. Huh?! I guess it sort of makes sense though.
18. The seller's eCheck bounced and somehow the Ebay and PayPal system cleared the dispute (I think? I am still confused about this)
19. I went up two more levels on Ebay and they agreed to reimburse me. I got my money back.
20. Ebay and Paypal do answer their phones.

So....was this guy scamming me? I really don't know. I think the guy was just a horrible seller.

Everything after step 2 is a mistake. Re-buy after he cancels a good sale? You were asking for trouble. Scam, Scam, Scam. You were lucky to get your $$$ back.

EBay has the world standard ration of honest guys to liars and cheats.

I have learned lessons and I suspect that you now have too.

Here's a simple rule of thumb: if the monetary value of the transaction or the inherent worth of the goods you are selling is significant to you do it all by the book, read and re-read, ask questions and be prepared to walk away if the answer feels wrong, do not go off-piste, record everything, video everything. When your package arrives video it before opening it, weigh it and compare the weight to the weight on the postage label. If anything looks suspicious or goes wrong get EBAy or paypal on the phone straight away. Caveat emptor.

The car accident excuse is world famous. Apparently he wasn’t in a coma. Why wouldn’t he say “I’ll ship when I leave the hospital tomorrow”.

People want to renegotiate and ship outside of eBay all the time to save the 10% ebay fee. You’re lucky eBay covered you on this one because they can balk if not done through their system

I think on this world exist some strange persons...look what found on ebay.

1. I purchased on Omega Planet ocean chronograph with box and papers (all three cards). with the payment direct through PayPal.
2. The seller send me the watch but with other cards.
3. I ask him about that and told me that he sent everything and not reply me anymore.
4. I Open a dispute on paypal and after that he reply to me and agree that he made a mistake and he sent me other cards but will send them later. (Very important send me a pictures with the correct number on the cards)
5. I believe him, close the case and again very bad reply and tell me that he moves and all the things are mixt up..etc.
6. After a month I just bought other item from that seller on ebay (which I didn't need it) just to ask him to put the cards in the same package.
7. After a long time I received the item with the 'other cards'...which was real other cards..😀
8. So he sent me twice other cards and insist that he sent me the right one..and what intrigues me most was that he actually sent me the pictures with the right ones....
9. Again didn't reply me anymore so I give it up, left negative feedback on ebay for the second item and forget about it...

So I my opinion are some strange people on ebay...😀

I agree it was a big mistake. He sent me a picture of his crashed car! His email with crashed car pic was sent via Ebay so they have "proof" that this happened. He could not try this ruse again if it was not true. I think the "scam" was to try to sell outside of Ebay to save the fees and avoid any returns. My scam antenna went up when he contacted my outside of Ebay (I was surprised he was able to deduce my email address from PayPal). I had actually paid already via Ebay before I saw the sneaky offer on my personal email... I would have cancelled the transaction if I saw the illicit offer first.

His Ebay profile had good reviews with only about 12 transactions in the past year with a couple of lower priced watches. After some cyberstaking, he does seem to have a very small presence on a couple of watch sites. I also identified his Linkedin page, and he seems to have a normal professional job. I am leaning toward eccentric/cheapskate/weirdo vs scheming criminal. I think much of the problem was the collapse of the Ebay notification system to me. Their conflict resolution system failed spectacularly. For a short time, I thought the seller was gaming the system.

If his original intent was to have me pay outside of Ebay and not ship the watch, that would be really stupid. I did have his home address and that seems to be a real risky thing to do in the world: give people your home address and then screw them over. Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap!!

eBay is just Wild West territory. I avoid it except when shopping for things like bolts, wire, and other cheap consumables.

I'm pretty sure that I was selling a watch (or something) when I was involved in a head-on collision in Dec 2014, and I was having to get my son to go into my safe and get everything together to ship for me, while I was laid up in the hospital for 3 weeks. It was horrible trying to put that all together during that time.

Oh, to make this double watch related - I was on the phone on hold with my watchmaker when the other car came into our lane and hit us while my daughter was driving... He picked up after the crash and got to hear us screaming.