Paypal dispute question...

[billsfan2012]

Hi,

I recently opened a paypal dispute as a buyer. I asked numerous times for a full refund prior to the dispute, and the seller did not comply.

Finally, when the dispute was opened, the seller replied to me in an e-mail that he would issue a refund.

Naturally, the next day he had an excuse for not being able to refund:

"I have already requested paypal to refund your money, but it may take some time due to negative balance in my account which will be cleared very soon"

Further to this, I asked how that could be if the transaction just cleared a day before and his response to that: "It auto witdhdraws for indian users, but this time it has been reversed, due to currency exchange rates (paypal gives less rate than what is normal)"

Yes it sounds like a lie and these are the types of excuses that have been made ever since he got paid.

I think I will win the dispute, I reported this item as non-receipt and I have plenty of proof for non-receipt, the best proof of this being... HE EVEN RELISTED THE FREAKIN' SITE TODAY!!! Obviously, I did not get the item, if he relisted it, right? Not only did he re-list, but he changed all of the stats... It's as clear as day who the fraudulent person is in this situation, but here is my worry:

Is it possible that I could win the dispute, but I was too late because perhaps the buyer immediately took the money out of his paypal account and took it out of his bank account upon receipt of payment... and if that happens, there would be no money to return? Or... does paypal protect the buyer in this situation if they won the dispute?

Can someone please offer insight on this?

Thanks

 

[RMX]

If you win the dispute, PayPal will the the money from the seller's account even if it's not there. It will result his account having even more negative balance. If you win, you'll still get your money even his account is empty.

 

[CPAKing11]

How will OP get the money if there is no money is seller's paypal account? Would PayPal pay from their own pocket? I don't think so. Even I was on same situation once, at that time PayPal sent me an email stating that you have one the case but PayPal is not able to recover the money from seller's account and they will refund me the money as soon as they recover it from him.

Now if seller has withdrawn the money to his bank account and doesn't have any credit card attached to his account as secondary payment mode, then its very less likely that you will get your money back until unless seller uploads the funds to his PayPal which he won't if he is looking to scam you.

Secondly, you have reported to the PayPal that you both were involved in sale and purchase of a web site which is a digital product and PayPal 8/10 times would closed the dispute in favor of seller. (As PayPal says they can only take action if good shipped is traceable in physical)

Thanks

If you win the dispute, PayPal will the the money from the seller's account even if it's not there. It will result his account having even more negative balance. If you win, you'll still get your money even his account is empty.

 

[RMX]

Yes, PayPal will reverse the payment and leave the seller's account with negative balance - that's called buyer protection (https://cms.paypal.com/us/cgi-bin/?cmd=_render-content&content_ID=security/buyer_protection and http://pages.ebay.com/help/buy/paypal-buyer-protection.html). This has been proven many times. I have experienced this myself when I had $0.00 balance in PayPal and someone opened a dispute. The balance immediately went into negative and because I was away at that time, the dispute was escalated to a claim and was closed in buyer's favor. Came back from vacation and there you go - $360 negative balance. Had to cover it before I could normally use PayPal again.

You're right about the sale of a website, though, as PayPal does not offer this protection on sale of intangible goods, so the OP might not win the case. But if he does (this happened just recently with someone on BHW), he will get the money back no matter if there's a card/bank account attached to seller's PP account, or not.

 

[g33k0f9x]

Correct, I've seen countless disputes ranging from $5 to $5000, on both sides, paypal will leave him in the negative (if you win the dispute) and if he does not settle the balance he will be sent to collections.

 

[jamesvick]

If he has a bank account associated (obviously) then paypal reverses the transaction amount. If paypal can't then he can lose his account and maybe lose much more than what he gained.

May i know how much you lost?

 

[Taccc]

Unless Paypal has changed, they will always go into the sellers account wether the money is there or not and take the money out (possibly leaving the seller's account in the negative, and if not paid, it would be sent to collections) to give it back to the buyer, assuming you win the dispute.

 

[billsfan2012]

UPDATE: BUYER WINS

But not in the way I expected to win...

The seller finally submitted his refund after several demands. I was prepared to get an attorney involved, and I made him aware of this. Consulting with an attorney comes at no cost for me (family member) and in reality I was only asking for advice, but the seller literally begged for no involvement there, so... I don't know... it might have had something to do with his decision to issue the refund and move on. His mistakes and fraud were blatant... and he was well aware of that.

And yes, it was done through Paypal, not word of mouth. Paypal processed the refund and the transaction shows as "reversed" back to my credit in the full amount of $1000

HOWEVER, the funds are not officially in my account yet, PayPal has given me 3-5 business days... but I do worry about them being able to put the funds back in the account and how they will do that.

Or, perhaps I need not worry, because once something is officially marked as reversed, it is just a matter of waiting for it to process.