Posted 25 September 2021
EBay Scam - Received Empty Box from Seller
Hi just need some advice as I’ve bought an iPhone from eBay which was delivered to the neighbour, when I received and opened the box it’s a bottle of shampoo inside instead of a phone.
Does anyone have any experience dealing with this? I’m currently going through action fraud to report this, does anyone know if I should also report to the police? I read they don’t really look into this and won’t provide a crime ref number.
Also, when I open a case I don’t see the ‘not as described’ option, it only allows me to return for an refund? Does anyone know how I should ‘correctly’ open an case via eBay? I also did not see any option that allow me to call them? Any advices/ suggestions are greatly appreciated!
Does anyone have any experience dealing with this? I’m currently going through action fraud to report this, does anyone know if I should also report to the police? I read they don’t really look into this and won’t provide a crime ref number.
Also, when I open a case I don’t see the ‘not as described’ option, it only allows me to return for an refund? Does anyone know how I should ‘correctly’ open an case via eBay? I also did not see any option that allow me to call them? Any advices/ suggestions are greatly appreciated!
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41 Comments
sorted byOr get it delivered to Argos and open it in front of staff whilst filming it.
People from the UK are some of the worst sellers out there. For the following reasons.
Poorly spelt or worded listings,
Not using an actual picture of the item or stolen stock photos.
Lying about the working state and condition of items.
Poor communication skills.
Insufficient padding and packaging when posting.
You need to be careful when buying on eBay...
Check how long the seller has been on eBay (avoid new sellers with 0 or excessively bad feedback, except from china).
Check the sellers feedback carefully. Look for repeat feedback from 1 or 2 repeat names that might be just to pad bad feedback.
Examine the listing carefully, and read it more than once if there is a lot of text. Scroll to the bottom to make sure there is no hidden or small print.
Examine the pictures very carefully to make sure you know what your buying.
It's also worth messaging the seller to ask questions about items. If you get no response or some vague poorly worded replies, that is an indicator, you might have problems.
When selling items.
Try to take good clear pictures of the item from multiple angles and show any wear or damage.
Make a note of any serial numbers, but don't show them in your pictures or write them in the listing. State you have noted serial numbers to prevent fraud.
Try to be as honest as possible in your listing description. Include info about wear and damage if there is any.
When sending items, try and use plenty of packing and padding to protect the item. if its a game or dvd put some cardboard round the box before just using a plastic mail bag or padded envelope. This will stop pressure marks and dings on the sleave or box.
Ultimately you should treat other people with the same honesty, care, attention and respect, that you would like to receive if the position was reversed.
But unfortunately we seem to live in an angry, selfish post Brexit UK.
Seller sends a phone.
Pick one from below....
Shop he drops the phone off swaps for shampoo.
Local driver who collects and take to local distribution hub swaps for shampoo.
Local sorting hub swaps for shampoo.
Local sorting hub to national hub driver swaps for shampoo.
Gets swapped for shampoo in national hub.
Reverse the above for opportunities.
add, neighbour swaps for shampoo.
Buyer fancies trying his arm to get a free iPhone.
I am a top rated seller and someone tried this with me over a £80.
I said I'll report it/courier/situation for the police and requested the seller ask the neighbour for his Full name and address for the report/investigation.
Oddly, the buyer replied shortly after saying their Son opened the parcel and put the item safe, and all good..
Crazy.
Not saying this is the case with you, but you have to ask yourself why a good seller would bother to put their account at risk to rip someone off in such a way they will lose the buyers money if disputed. It's just not worth the hassle..
I think you will find the real reason is one of the list above, and not the seller wasting your time sending you shampoo..
The op didn’t reply properly to some comments so this situation doesn’t look right to me either.
RM list the weight, they ask the sender if there’s a battery inside so they don’t mention if there is a battery sticker on package and what shape is the shampoo bottle
I paid for a phone Huawei P40 pro but after paying i looked a bit closer at the pictures posted on listing and realised it can't be that phone.
I contacted seller 25 mins after paying at about midnight and told them not to send it as it's not the phone they described but they stated that it was too late and they marked it as despatched.
When I received the phone it was a crappy no name Chinese import.
I took pictures and sent them to seller via eBay showing the differences.
The seller ignored my messages.
After a month and numerous phone calls to eBay I received a refund.
The seller then decided to contact me and ask for his phone back.
Needless to say he's still waiting.
Yours might not be as straight forward but eBay usually takes the side of the buyer.
If you're struggling as a last resort, I'm up here so you can send me their address and I'll go and pay them a visit for a small fee
Your comment to me re: royal mail, I agree. Not much chance they have tampered with it to be fair. I've not had one problem with them and I ship everything through them.
You'll get your money back anyway but just a pain in the behind. Ebay is just a show at times, scam after scam. I am tempted to stop using it to be honest as I can't be bothered trying to dodge the scamming minefield every time I buy or sell something.
That is a remarkable coincidence!
If they need a police report number you are wasting your time they are not interested and fraud alert are useless report it online that way you will get a crime number regardless if it needs a police stamp on it just print the eBay form out put the crime number on it take it to local station and ask them to stamp it just state you have reported it just needs a station stamp to confirm you ain’t asking them to put pen to paper (edited)
Not sure about how you go about opening up a case but ebay always side with the buyer.
It may be prudent to setup a camera to record you opening packages in the future as a precaution, not that it's guaranteed to help but better than nothing maybe.
I’ve just won an iPad Pro.
I will record from the second the door knocks record driver and will keep the package in view until I open it.
Had four or five people to scam me last time I ordered one on eBay.
eBay seem more receptive to claims when you offer video evidence as proof
Who was it that delivered it?
Did the package look tampered with in any way?
I usually take a pictures and videos of my packages as a seller. The reason I ask is, it is not uncommon for delivery drivers or those in depots to swap out products, happens all the time. Not saying that happened with you but there is a small chance it wasn't the seller. Proving that is almost impossible though unless both seller and buyer take videos at either end to see if they match up.
Yeah the seller is based in Scotland so when I called the local police (in England) they've advised me to contact the Scottish police. To my surprise the advisor from Police Scotland took both mine and the seller's details (address on eBay), and said an officer will actually call me back on Tuesday so hopefully this will be looked into properly.
I have a concierge button on my contact options.
I just click that and get straight through.
Apparently I'm an old timer so I get it.
Not everyone has it I believe.
75+ feedbacks but only 1 as seller, just spoken with ebay and opened a 'not as described' case against the seller, also reported to action fraud
I don't believe so, it was a huge layer of tape and cardboard then tape and cardboard again so don't feel it's been opened before. It was via RM, if it's someone like MyHermes I think there is a bigger chance of the parcel being opened by the driver/ depot.
But yeah a bit late as suggested I always record opening it on high value items from eBay (and amazon warehouse deals etc)
could it have been your neighbour ???
No it isn’t. This is why you make use of the money back guarantee. People rip people off in the real world too. That’s a bit dramatic mate
I’ve had 300 amazon orders and about 20 eBay orders in 2021, you can be sarcastic all you like but I’m not the scammer in either instance
Yeah you'd need to send everything back as received.
Furthermore, I tend to not purchase such things from eBay no more. I can't be asked for the head ache.
Yeah I did but it was via a debit card, hopefully eBay can help resolve this, otherwise will have to go through PayPal as you mentioned
As I understand it, if the seller requested their not as described / incorrect item back, then ebay should send you a return postage label at the sellers cost and you have to return it within a certain number of days.
It might be worth speaking to ebay's support.
Not sure if this is relevant. ebay.co.uk/hel…066
If a seller makes a "mistake" then either he pays to get the item posted back, or says keep it, whether he accepts returns or not.
I would definitely contact ebay.
It was positive feedback because the stupid Ebay system nowadays only allows sellers to leave positive feedback to buyers even if they've had a bad experience. (edited)
These are the only options that can be selected
Yeah I always avoided any seller with less than 50 feedback and the item was 'buy it now' with a 'normal' price, so I didn't actual suspect it to be a scam to be honest, and the seller was quite responsive previously as well. Guess need to be extra careful and film everything
The shampoo is 300ml so plus packaging it’s just around 400g which is the weight showing on the RM sticker, there was no return address and no battery sticker, the item was posted via RM 1st Class instead of special delivery so no insurance, tracking provided via eBay was incorrect, need I go on?
Thanks, can you share the number you’ve contacted eBay with? I know they used to have that option but all I can see now is chat?
Thanks, I’ve opened a case after online chat with eBay and also got a crime ref number from Action Fraud, when contacting local police they’ve asked me to call Scottish police, I’ve got a call from them yesterday evening and they now say I need to open a case with my local police (because even though the address of seller is in Scotland they may be hacking someone else’s account so can be anywhere in the world), so will see how far that takes me.
No they are a old couple and I’ve known them for years, also the parcel doesn’t seem to be tempered with/ opened when I got it
Have you checked the sellers other items to see if they also sold the shampoo recently?
The seller may have mixed up the labels prior to dispatching.
Lucky outcome for the shampoo buyer if that is the case as I doubt they's report wrong item sent!
No shampoo sold lol, he did sell another iPhone a few weeks ago (different colour/ capacity) and received no feedback, but left feedback to another buyer and called him/ her scammer ( it was a positive feedback as well).
Yeah I messaged the seller and he said it was done by mistake and he doesn’t accept returns, therefore he accepted the return but did not provide a return label. He said he’ll call eBay about this, not sure if there is any loophole around this but will also contact eBay just to be safe.
Hmmmmm
I agree that there is plenty of scope for someone other than the seller to have substituted it, but the OP does mention this seller has only 1 feedback as a seller, so risking his account might not be a big issue: hotukdeals.com/com…857
Also the OP states somewhere that the tracking number supplied to ebay was wrong, and the Iphone was apparently sent first class with no additional insurance.