Paypal question

I purchased a lens from a member here on the forums and used Paypal to pay them about a week ago. I was Pm'd by the seller after they recieved payment that it was shipping out and a tracking # would be provided...I never received a tracking number or a response from them after several Pm's requesting it. I'm starting to get a little worried and was wondering if Paypal will re-emburse me if I don't recieve the item. I know that an e-bay transaction is covered because I was refunded money once for a item that was "Not as described" in the listing. I hope the item has been shipped and the member has just been to busy to respond, but it just seems a bit odd that he won't respond now that he has the cash. Has anyone here had to file a dispute with Paypal in a situation like this?

Yes, you can file a dispute, but it is hit or miss as to what the paypal ruling is. I would suggest taking the email addy of the paypal account and start googling it to see what pops.

Good luck, I hope you get your Canon 70-200 very soon.

I hope you posted something in the sell thread, just to show you were buying... I think to many people do PMs only deals and not post in the thread. Post at least show you were working with the seller and to maybe protect others if a deal goes bad.

if I was to buy, I would post in the thread, "I want it", send PM to work out the deal, Postt in the thread "sent Payment" and so on.

PayPal... You can try the dispute, but in most cases not much comes of it when it is just person to person cash trade... And back to posting in the thread, if you did show you were buying then maybe PayPal would like to see that thread link to see the deal, its a long shot but better then word against word.

Really I wish you luck and I hope it all works out to the best.

MrSteve wrote in post #8206983
I hope you posted something in the sell thread, just to show you were buying... I think to many people do PMs only deals and not post in the thread. Post at least show you were working with the seller and to maybe protect others if a deal goes bad.

if I was to buy, I would post in the thread, "I want it", send PM to work out the deal, Postt in the thread "sent Payment" and so on.

PayPal... You can try the dispute, but in most cases not much comes of it when it is just person to person cash trade... And back to posting in the thread, if you did show you were buying then maybe PayPal would like to see that thread link to see the deal, its a long shot but better then word against word.

Really I wish you luck and I hope it all works out to the best.

Yes, I posted "Payment sent" and I have the Pm from the seller stating when he would be shipping the lens and providing a tracking number. I also posted in the thread my concern for his lack of response after payment.

I think you did your part well... Hopefully it all works out.

Ok, I checked Paypal and I have to wait 7 days before I file a dispute...so I will hope for the best, but this doesn't look good. The members Paypal is registered in a company's name and not an individual, this company is apparently located in England according to their website ( which is suspiciously new and still under construction), and the Members profile here on POTN says he or she is located in CA. It smells like a scam and I should have caught that before I sent the money

They have a few more things listed for sale here on the forums and If I haven't heard anything in a couple days I will make other members aware of this potential scam.Like I said, I hope I'm wrong and they are just to busy to respond, but it seems fishy at this point.

This has prompted me to add a section to my already "famous" sticky on "buying online". I have added a section relating to buying from forum members since I have seen a few of these "did I get scammed from a member" posts in the past couple of months. If anyone else has more items to add to any of the 3 sections, please let me know.

What I outline there has saved me grief over the past several years of buying thousands of dollars of stuff online, and I really have only 1 or 2 bad stories in that time.

GUIDELINES FOR BUYING ONLINE

I see the thread (not my place to link it, but I have him o my ignore list for now, I don't want to deal/buy with him at point)... Kind of weird only the lens looks like it sold.

Have you looked at his profile? Just wondering because of what you posted above, it states he is a "Auto Salesman", dose that make any sense to the "England" company?

Maybe, just maybe a Mod or Admin here will do a IP check for you. They will be able to tell you what country his IP is coming from and if he is in the States tell you if it is in Ca., not sure what that will do for you, but... Can't be good (I would think) if the PayPal is out of country and he says he is in the US.

If you haven't, I would look at every post he has made and see if you can add anything up, if for anything it will give you something to do while you are waiting for time lock to be lifted over at PayPal.

From what I have read so far Paypal is pretty good about protecting the buyer if they don't receive the item from the seller. Outside of E-Bay they are not very concerned if the item is not as described or damaged, but they do seem to expect something shipped to the buyer and would require the seller to show proof that they shipped. The real bad thing is that I purchased this lens for a good friend of mine with his money...he's without a lens and now it's looking like a bad situation brewing.

MrSteve wrote in post #8207259
I see the thread (not my place to link it, but I have him o my ignore list for now, I don't want to deal/buy with him at point)... Kind of weird only the lens looks like it sold.

Have you looked at his profile? Just wondering because of what you posted above, it states he is a "Auto Salesman", dose that make any sense to the "England" company?

Maybe, just maybe a Mod or Admin here will do a IP check for you. They will be able to tell you what country his IP is coming from and if he is in the States tell you if it is in Ca., not sure what that will do for you, but... Can't be good (I would think) if the PayPal is out of country and he says he is in the US.

If you haven't, I would look at every post he has made and see if you can add anything up, if for anything it will give you something to do while you are waiting for time lock to be lifted over at PayPal.

He's only been a member for a couple months and has 50+ posts. I'll check it out...

You should be made aware that POTN won't get involved in market place disputes here. Deals here are entered into at your own risk.

We will not divulge email addresses or IP addresses of any parties to members.

Sorry, but you need to deal with this through Paypal, your bank, and/or the law enforcement agencies. There's usually some kind of personal detail within the paypal transaction that can help you to track people down to some extent.

Pete wrote in post #8207293
You should be made aware that POTN won't get involved in market place disputes here. Deals here are entered into at your own risk.

We will not divulge email addresses or IP addresses of any parties to members.

Sorry, but you need to deal with this through Paypal, your bank, and/or the law enforcement agencies. There's usually some kind of personal detail within the paypal transaction that can help you to track people down to some extent.

To that end, I added #5 to my new section helping others to remember aspects of this.

The usual thing we recommend in cases like this is to wait. Most of the time there is a valid reason for non-communication from the seller.

What is you reason for posting this here?

I was asking any other members here if they had dealt with Paypal in filing a dispute outside of an E-Bay transaction as I have not. I'm guessing that if I have to do this because of a transaction that took place on this site that there is someone here who has gone through the process and could give me some advice. Since there are 50+threads concerning Paypal in this section then I just assumed it would be ok. If this is the wrong section to do this then I apologize, and move if you must.