Item Not As Described - Return Or Get A Price Reduction ?

[Chris L]

Recently bought some items in the US. 2 of them arrived "not as described" one,a styrene with a hairline crack

the other warped, marked as Mint-

 

Anyway on both occasions I contacted the seller and I gave them the option of either returning or reducing the

price. It's costs about $20.00 for a signed for from Belgium to the US.

 

So what do you do? Return or price reduction ?

 

The "Mint" one.............

Edited May 27, 2013 by Chris L

[Britmusicsoulfan]

Chris,

 

I would say it depends on whether you can live with keeping those records in those conditions.  If so, I would go for a reduction.  If not, I would get a refund from the seller and request to return them and file a claim with PayPal if they don't respond.  What were the conditions of the eBay sales, no refunds or ?

 

Cheers,

Tim

[Northern Soul Uk]

Depending on whether you are willing to keep the records in the state they are, I would go for part refund.

Also remember that you can leave them negative feedback too, and they can't, so if the seller doesn't meet you requests, threaten them with that., it works usually.

Edited May 27, 2013 by Northern Soul UK

[Guest]

I was in a similar situation recently so I will share what I learnt from it. I was the seller. Unfortunately, the LP was damaged during transit and therefore, turned up with a bend corner. When the buyer contacted me, I offered a full refund plus I would pay return shipping. Basically he would have everything covered, but that didn’t seem good enough for him. He gave me two ultimatums: either a partial refund of $50 or a full refund and he would return the record, but he was insinuating that I had to refund him in advance. The $50 partial refund was quite excessive, and I think he was just trying to take advantage of the situation and land himself a good deal. And the fact that he was taking it too far with the partial refund also made me unsure if I would actually get the record if I refunded him in advance. Therefore, I contacted eBay, and here is what I found out:

If the item turns up not as described, then the buyer is entitled to a full refund, but he is supposed to pay the return shipping. In your situation, that is not quite fair, but that is their policy. If you report him to eBay, then they will tell you to return it, and you will have to pay return shipping costs. That’s the best you can get if you go through them.

Therefore, the best solution is to get in touch with the seller. Explain the situation and ask him what kind of solutions he can offer you. You may be lucky that the seller even agrees to pay return shipping costs. You may also get a partial refund that makes the records worth keeping.

But be careful not to ask the seller for something that is outside eBay’s policies (like a partial refund or having return shipping costs covered) and then threatning him with negative feedback if he doesn’t comply to your demands. You can be reported for feedback extortion if you do that.

You are, however, allowed to leave negative feedback for the seller if his best solution is a full refund without return shipping covered. You just have to be careful not to make any threats because it can backfire if the seller is aware that this can be reported. Instead, I would tell the seller that I am not satisfied with the solution and then explain why. But I would refrain from sending threats. If the seller knows that you are not happy, then he also knows that he might end up with a negative.

Anyways, best thing would be to open a dialogue with the seller. Explain that you are not happy. If you are not happy with his solutions tell him and explain what you have in mind.

As for my own case, the buyer never returned when I told him to return the record, so it seems that he was tryig to take advantage of the situation to land himself a good deal. He was in fact threatning me with negative feedback if I didn't comply to his demands. ebay told me to save the message because negative feedback can be removed if you have been subject to feedback extortion. They also told me not to issue a refund until after I had received the record because it is the buyer's responsibility to make sure that the record arrives safely.

Edited May 27, 2013 by Preben

[dthedrug]

 HI ALL ...The record in photo described as mint, has a dish warp, this can happen to 1 in 20 records from the states & the same for hair line cracks, (many people probably don't no some of their collection has some kind of damage, if your purchases was a bargain, I would say KEEP them, as the Dish warp can be reversed as there has been no stretching or shrinking problems that you get with a ripple warp,

cracked records are common, I have many,

returns can be expensive and non profitable for both the buyer or seller, even if the seller has a returns policy if it does not cover postage costs, if you paid by credit card you will have cost covered, Pay-Pal do not cover you,!?

Contact the seller and explained the problem and go for a compensation deal, pick something from his list and you pay the postage,

If you don't want to do that or you have overpaid the going price and you want a refund if it has gone past the 14  days since the arrived, you may have more problems, as it is very hard to prove the seller was aware of the issue, and you could easy have dropped the 45 causing the crack, Best bet is you decide what to do,  DAVE K

[Cover-up]

 HI ALL ...The record in photo described as mint, has a dish warp

 

Don't think that's what I'd call a dish warp. That's just a common or garden warp, hard not to notice. A dishwarp is when the outside rim of the whole record sits higher (or lower) than the middle - hence, it's like a bowl - or dish and it wobbles about on the turntable. It's not a huge problem if the middle is sitting higher, cos the whole edge sits on the deck. But if the outer edge is higher, then it slips about because it's not actually sitting on the deck. Is that clear? Err, thought not...

[dthedrug]

Don't think that's what I'd call a dish warp. That's just a common or garden warp, hard not to notice. A dishwarp is when the outside rim of the whole record sits higher (or lower) than the middle - hence, it's like a bowl - or dish and it wobbles about on the turntable. It's not a huge problem if the middle is sitting higher, cos the whole edge sits on the deck. But if the outer edge is higher, then it slips about because it's not actually sitting on the deck. Is that clear? Err, thought not...

 HI What's you point mate? that type of warp, can be removed if that's what the owner want's if he can't get a refund, how does your comment benefit the buyer? if you want to talk about all things that are warped don't look at me  DAVE K

[Mick Reed]

Recently bought some items in the US. 2 of them arrived "not as described" one,a styrene with a hairline crack

the other warped, marked as Mint-

 

Anyway on both occasions I contacted the seller and I gave them the option of either returning or reducing the

price. It's costs about $20.00 for a signed for from Belgium to the US.

 

So what do you do? Return or price reduction ?

 

The "Mint" one.............

Velvet.JPG

Chris push hard at ebay explain to them what has happened and they will pay for you to send them back l had the same problem so hounded ebay and they paid for the postage it cost ebay £33.Mick

[Chris L]

A couple of things happened. I took photos and sent them to the seller, Ebay allows for this now. That way there's no argument did they or didn't they.

Both sellers said return for a full refund and I asked if they'd pay for return shipping and in both cases they agreed. When I informed them the costs

and asked them to choose between reducing the price by approx 1/2 (they were $50 records) or paying $20.00 for the return costs they both

preferred to partially refund - I have to say they were both very good about it, no lame excuses just apologies. The "warp guy" said he'd only just

started selling records and thought it was natural   and the "crack guy" understood that styrene is Kryptonite  

 

Just for your info the warped one was "Velvelettes - Lonely girl" on that double stripe label - cost $52.00 and the other was "Greg Perry - Heart" on Alfa $47.00 - both now for about £40.00, both play perfect.

 

The sign of a successful sale/purchase, happy seller, happy buyer...................

Edited May 28, 2013 by Chris L

[Pete S]

 HI What's you point mate? that type of warp, can be removed if that's what the owner want's if he can't get a refund, how does your comment benefit the buyer? if you want to talk about all things that are warped don't look at me  DAVE K

 

People say that, but I've never been able to remove any kind of warp without ironing it!  And 75% of those go wrong.

[Chris L]

People say that, but I've never been able to remove any kind of warp without ironing it!  And 75% of those go wrong.

 

Pete

Did this once with a Johnnie Mae Matthews - Lonely you'll be on ATCO..........................