OMG ... I think you and I are victims of the same buyer. I sold her a 10 pack of polaroid 600 film. She opened it on her vacation in Europe and sent me a nasty email accusing me of "purposely" ruining her vacation as the film was not as described. She was right. I HONESTLY did not know that there was an advertisement for a soda company on the film's borders. I had no camera for testing and all the film was sealed in plastic, in 10 pack by the manufacturer. The photos themselves were fine. Like an idiot, I refunded her in full immediately ($150.00) with the understanding that she return all unused film -- 9 boxes -- upon her return to the States. I was thinking that she could use the money to buy herself a decent digital camera to use on her trip. Nearly 4 weeks later, she emailed me and told me that she decided she liked the film and wanted to keep it. I replied, "Fine. However, you need to repay me for the film." She was totally insulted ... changed her story and said that she "trashed" all the film in Europe as she didn't have the luggage space for it because she spent all of the money I sent to her on souveniors and that she had no intention of repaying or returning anything. Then she added, "I still have a few boxes left and if you want them, you have to send me the money for shipping and then I will return them one at a time." At this point, I contacted eBay for advise. They encouraged me to continue to deal with the buyer in a businesslike manner and if she doesn't repay me on her own, that Paypal would reverse the transaction for me. They also pointed out that I never should have refunded her before she returned the film. Following eBay's advise, I replied to her in a very businesslike manner, "Suppose you purchased this film from Walmart. Do you think that they would refund you if you did not return their merchandise? You need to return your unused film within 7 days and you also must repay me for all of the film that you cannot return." After a few weeks, I received 4 unused boxes of film from the buyer's mother and 2 opened/damaged cartridges along with a letter stating: "you ruined my daughter's dream trip of a lifetime and if you try to charge her back for this "junk" we will leave you negative feedback". Luckily, her letter was a copy of an email that she sent to my yahoo account, so I was able to provide eBay with full headers, and the body of the email in hopes that they would take some kind of action. No such luck. They sent me a message telling me to speak with a rep. Every time I click on CHAT, the box pops up, but it does nothing but load. I tried calling, but spend 15-20 minutes on hold. I am a relatively new seller and I bend over backwards to keep buyers happy. I now realize that I was wrong to be so trusting of people. Additionally, I sold the same film to quite a few other buyers. No issues from anyone else. I've even had a couple of repeat buyers for the same film. OK ... someone please tell me ... isn't there something called "feedback extortion"? Also, what will happen if I do get negative feedback? How badly will that affect my auctions and store? She never left any feedback from the original transaction which occurred back in May. I'd sure appreciate any advise from anyone who has experienced a similar situation. Sarah
Orignal From: TO SELLER WORRIED ABOUT NEGATIVE FEEDBACK
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