Latest Ebay scam using valid tracking # to wrong address

With the terrible smoke in CA (and elsewhere) air purifiers are hard to find in stock. I bought one from Ebay because I couldn't find it in stock on amazon.

Seller took a while to ship, and had to write them multiple times. Finally uploaded a tracking number (UPS). Few days later tracking number shows as delivered, but no package. I call UPS and they say that tracking number was sent to a different name and address, but in the same city and zip code. For security reasons UPS will not provide the name and address where it was sent, they only provide this to the shipper. They will also not provide this info, or any info, in writing, but they say ebay can call them to confirm it was sent to a different address.

In the meantime, the seller starts getting lots of negative feedback, including like 6 other negative for this exact item. Clearly running a scam (feedback profile was at 100% when I made the purchase).

Open a case with ebay. They deny it, say the tracking shows the item was delivered to me. I appeal, saying UPS says it went to different address, the seller has tons of negative feedback for this exact item, etc. They deny it, tell me to file a police report that the package was stolen or provide proof the package was delivered to a different address, within 10 days. Ebay customer service was a complete waste of time, useless.

After multiple calls with Ebay and UPS, gave up on them and called paypal. Finally got US based customer service who researched the issue and processed the refund within a few minutes. They said this is a common scam now, using "valid" tracking numbers.

Interesting to see how such a simple scam has ebay tied up in knots, they can't even make a common sense response. I don't know if it takes huge numbers of cases and $$ for them to adapt. Hopefully buyers don't get screwed along the way.

Scams are bad, but scamming people in disaster situations is super low.

I would not have gotten refund if was up to Ebay. Seller account has 10 negative reviews and counting in the last two weeks, many of which are for this EXACT item, with buyers all saying they never received it, and Ebay denies my claim. And the appeal.

Honestly I think Ebay's behavior is almost as bad as the scammer. They should have caught the scam fairly early, but certainly once multiple buyers started reporting it, I should have been refunded on the spot. Unbelievable. Best case scenario they are just completely incompetent, but perhaps more likely they just don't want to pay out ?

I've been buying and selling on ebay for over 20 years and never really concerned before, honestly I was shocked on this one when I realized they were literally not going to refund.

AND they removed my negative feedback for the seller when they denied the claim

Another thing that really chaps my ass is they clearly had already suspended the seller account when I filed the claim (and paypal told me they had already suspended their ability to process funds), so ebay clearly knew/suspected they were scammers. And then they deny the ebay buyers guarantee to everyone that got burned. WTF. You know your are in bad shape when best case scenario is rampant incompetence, rather than something more sinister.

It's like my father used to tell me when I would find ways of not doing my homework- "if you only put half as much effort into actually doing your work as you do trying to get out of it, it would be done by now".

I'm not sure about all of them, but many services (UPS, USPS) only show the city state and zip code on the tracking info. They do not show the actual delivery address. Actually I don't see why this doesn't happen more often. All ebay wants to see is a valid tracking number that shows as delivered, but they don't have any way of knowing WHERE it was delivered. The only way they could know that for sure is if there was closed system between ebay and the creation of the shipping label, where they knew for a fact the only shipping address that can be used is the one on file. By allowing people to upload their own tracking numbers, seems like they are wide open for this type of scam.

i doubt it. I think most of the scammer accounts are used short term only and then dumped to start fresh ones

Actually they do, smoke eaters are designed to filter the actually smoke like you would see in tobacco shops or clubs. Standard Hepa filters can't actually filter smoke quickly, but they can filter fine particulates like ash. Granted they are only able to cycle a finite of air in a given space per hour, but they are better than nothing.

That said, the amount of accumulated ash we are seeing in photographs would clog a hepa in no time, obviously a contained environment like a home has a better shot if the intake filters are also cleaned regularly- in this case at least weekly.

Just a short update, since I had already appealed the case with Ebay before getting the refund from paypal, ebay wrote back and said I have to file a police report, because they think the package was stolen from my porch, or I have to provide written proof the package was sent to a different address (which UPS will not provide for security reasons). I have 10 days to provide these two forms of documentation or the case automatically closes.

UPS will only verify that package was sent to a different address on the phone, but ebay will not call them. (Paypal was happy to call UPS and verify this, then give me a refund).

Anyhow, pretty disappointed with ebay, I thought this obvious of a scam would be an open and shut case in favor of the buyer. Lucky that it worked out with paypal. Definitely gives me pause going forward........