TIA for your insight. I don't sell much on ebay, just stuff from my personal collection and I'm not sure what to do about this.

I had a buyer with 0 feedback bid on and win a Fendi bag from me. She paid in a reasonable amount of time. I emailed her to verify shipping address- no response. I emailed again- no response. I tried calling the number on Paypal and it was invalid. Not just disconnected, it went to some random company who had never heard of her. So I googled her name and company and all kinds of crazy came up! She and her company have been under several investigations for all different kinds of fraud.

So, I have a buyer who paid by credit card, who will not communicate, and who is obviously a shady character. I emailed her one last time, stating that I would cancel the transaction if she did not verify her address with me. No response. I submitted a cancel request through ebay, and within the hour she denied it. She then sent me an email saying she didn't know how it works but I can send the bag to the same address paypal had. Then not 5 minutes later she emailed again and gave me a different address, saying she bought it for her "biz partner."

Every part of me is screaming "SCAM!" but I'm not sure what recourse I have. I can refund her money and just not ship the bag, which would mean a hit on ebay fees and probably negative feedback. But I'd rather not pay the fees if I don't have to! I'm afraid she'll get the bag, submit a SNAD chargeback, and I'll be out the money and the bag.

Am I being overly suspicious? What would you other ebay sellers do?

Do NOT send to any address other than their paypal address EVER. I would trust your gut on this one and not send the item, and I would contact paypal and ebay to let them know that you are not comfortable completing the transaction as the buyer has requested you send to a different address than is on file. Hopefully all of your emails have been through ebay, and you can point those out in your calls.

Originally Posted by tutushopper

Do NOT send to any address other than their paypal address EVER. I would trust your gut on this one and not send the item, and I would contact paypal and ebay to let them know that you are not comfortable completing the transaction as the buyer has requested you send to a different address than is on file. Hopefully all of your emails have been through ebay, and you can point those out in your calls.

Agree here.. and probably would refund... whatever the "hit" might be

it will be a smaller "hit" than dealing with things you are uncomfortable

with.. IYKWIM...

Originally Posted by tutushopper

Do NOT send to any address other than their paypal address EVER. I would trust your gut on this one and not send the item, and I would contact paypal and ebay to let them know that you are not comfortable completing the transaction as the buyer has requested you send to a different address than is on file. Hopefully all of your emails have been through ebay, and you can point those out in your calls.

Yes, definitely call PayPal AND eBay. Make sure both companies have a record of your concerns b/c I had a situation once where I called eBay only and a buyer filed a false claim through PayPal and the advice I'd gotten from eBay resulted in me losing this case b/c their policy is different than certain PayPal policies. I'm not sure about this exact situation as mine was a little different but I would make sure you contact both companies.

I would refund her..... Something seems shady about this buyer.
Also send to confirm pp address so you will be protected.

I cannot understand why anyone would want to complete a transaction when they have "all bells ringing" that they are about to be scammed. People here post again and again that they completed a transaction against their gut instincts.

If you mail out to an unconfirmed address you are asking for trouble. Even if they confirmed later, or you lose fees, I would take the little hit, not the big one.

I see red flags everywhere! I would not go through with this transaction.

agree with the above.. red flags are flying very high on this one

Better safe than sorry--don't send the bag!