Why should a buyer cover the costs of return shipping (presumably to the Far East) when incorrect items are delivered?
Summary: bwfennek shared an issue experienced on eBay involving the receipt of the wrong item, with the seller unresponsive. bwfennek detailed difficulties with returning the item due to incomplete address information provided by eBay, allegedly in China, and questioned why they should bear return costs for the seller's error. They shared a similar past experience with the same seller where a refund was processed without the need for a return. Other participants, like bootyooty and grohbacher, offered insights and suggestions, highlighting the role of the seller based in China and emphasizing the expectations for a refund-related return process. nina@ebay, identified as an eBay staff, intervened to ensure the seller is given a deadline to provide a return label, but the seller remained non-responsive. bwfennek expressed frustration with the eBay support process and the lack of resolution.
Hello everyone,
I’m looking for your experiences and opinions on a topic, because I have a few questions I don’t understand, since I can’t make sense of the logic.
If someone from ebay is reading along and asks which case?:
Case No. 5386995598
Return No. 5328941191
An item was offered on ebay, documented with photos of the goods.
After the purchase and delivery, when I unpacked the parcel, I found that I had received the wrong goods, which I had not ordered.
I contacted the seller, who stayed silent.
Note: This is not a wrong purchase, no mistaken decision in selecting the item, and not my exercise of the right of withdrawal, but rather a complaint about goods delivered incorrectly.
After the required waiting period, I involved ebay.
The current status is as follows.
-Note: I do not have a return label.
As the return address, ebay provided me with the following on the same webpage.
-Stupid question or does anyone else see it the same way?: Who can spot the two errors here?
Here it is to be assumed the seller is based in the Far East, according to a Google search presumably in China, but only presumably China.
Something like that cannot be shipped with DHL.
Even if it could, then “Return to sender”.
For me, that means double shipping costs and the seller keeps my money item / shipping costs.
What options are left for me?
None except shipping at my own expense .... or I stay silent without providing a shipping number and do not get my money back or receive a replacement item either.
Contacting ebay is not possible online in this case / process.
Is that the end of it already?
No, in the event of non-deliverability, there will be additional costs of around 15.00 for me for the return shipment of the goods I complained about back to me as the sender.
Now to my questions:
Why do I have to pay the return shipping costs for a complaint identified immediately, even though the mistake here is clearly with the seller?
Even if I could ship it, I pay and bear the return shipping costs because of a seller error of 25.49 euros?
Why does the seller provide a shipping address on ebay that presumably cannot even be delivered to?
Are we being measured by different standards here?
-Same seller, same delivery with the above-mentioned goods in a shipping box, and here too the wrong goods were delivered.
-The seller was contacted, again there was silence, ebay was involved, the result: a credit without return shipping
-Case: Case No. 5386995643 / Return No. 5328941165
Regards
Klaus
bwfennek
OP1 week agoHello,
the whole matter is closed or it has been resolved too.
Today, 29.09.2026, at 08:20 an email was sent my way.
The result was the same as in the parallel case with combined shipping, which had already been closed long ago:
Refund of the purchase price, additional import fees, and shipping costs.
That’s it, the waiting is over.
Many thanks to eBay at this point for its efforts.
Best regards
Klaus
nina@ebay
·2 weeks ago@bwfennek Good evening. 🙂 I was happy to take a look at this for you. I’ve now asked your seller to enable free return shipping within 5 days. After the deadline has passed, your case will be reviewed again automatically.
@oskar_der_wikinger Thanks a lot for the tag. 💖
Best regards,
Nina
bwfennek
OP2 weeks agoHello Nina, hello Oscar,
many thanks for both of your efforts and for your attention to my concern.
I had already received an email about the 5 days, thank you again.
Regards from Freiburg on the Elbe
Klaus
bwfennek
OP1 week agoGood morning nina@ebay,
thank you again for both of your efforts.
Yesterday the deadline for the 5 days had already passed.
The seller has not sent me either a message or a prepaid return label so far.
How does the journey continue now?
Regards
Klaus
lidor3073
·1 week ago@bwfennek
Unfortunately, there's no support here anymore.
You're being referred to the "great" customer service - see legal notice.
Unfortunately, no one here can tell you anymore where things are headed.
I'm very sorry for you. But you're by no means the only one this is happening to now.
bwfennek
OP1 week agoGood morning,
it's kind of funny:
1 order, one shipment, one shipping box, 2 differently and wrongly shipped items.
Reported and complained to the seller via eBay.
Item 1 - right away, without any response from the seller, I received a credit note thanks to eBay.
Item 2 from the same delivery and the same purchase, the story you can read here - I'm supposed to send the goods back, but where to with an incorrect address, and at my own expense; that's worlds apart, which I can no longer understand and don't want to.
After my post here, the seller was given a 5-day deadline to get in touch in some way.
Nothing has happened so far.
bwfennek
OP1 week agoGood morning nina@ebay,
many thanks again for your effort, both of you.
Yesterday the deadline for the 5 days had already passed.
The seller has not sent me either a message or a prepaid return label so far.
How does the process continue now?
Regards
Klaus
perfect-sally
·1 week ago@bwfennek you actually need to read what’s written to you here.
There’s no Nina or any other staff here anymore, and from now on you’ll have to deal with customer service. Unfortunately, we can’t help any further with this here.
bwfennek
OP1 week agoGood morning,
which customer service?
I only have the option at checkout:
Keep quiet, wait it out....and not get my money back
Wait for the seller to act
...or simply voluntarily click the mouse to "close the case", I’m not allowed to choose anything else.
perfect-sally
·1 week agoLike with any company, there is a legal notice where you can find contact options.
bwfennek
OP1 week agoHello,
many thanks for the tip about the legal notice.
I had already tried all of that.
The result = negative
I replied to emails with the case number in the subject, also = negative
Wherever it was possible, I attached screenshots:
Offer photo - showing loose small parts, as ordered
-For comparison:
Received photo - showing small cubes, which were not as ordered but were delivered incorrectly
Either there was no response at all, or a staff member got in touch with the name "KI", which the Americans apparently call "AI".
All contact options that were possible were exhausted.
eBay's last reply a week ago was:
-The return period has been suspended.
-The seller was supposed to get back to me by yesterday, but he did not.
-According to eBay, the seller is obliged to provide either of two options: a pre-paid return label or he pays me the return shipping costs in advance, along with a postal address where he can be reached
Up to now, for reasons of decency, I haven't been this direct, but with a smile I am thinking of the following:
Keeping quiet and waiting it out - sitting on the money received
Silence is golden - likewise sitting on the money received
Regards
From Klaus
oskar_der_wikinger
·2 weeks agoHello @nina@ebay could you please take a look at which things the original poster still needs to provide to move forward?
bwfennek
OP2 weeks agoHello Oskar, hello Nina,
many thanks for your both / both of your efforts and the attention to my concern.
I had already received an email about the 5 days, many thanks once again.
Regards from Freiburg on the Elbe
Klaus
grohbacher
·2 weeks agoHello, @bwfennek
as already written, without the item number (not order number, etc.) and without the purchase and delivery date, all we can do is guess in the dark.
What is clear, though, is that if in the (within the deadline = 30 days) eBay return you had given as the reason for return "item not as described" or something similar, the seller is obligated to make the return possible at their expense; namely by providing a (trackable) shipping label or prepaying the shipping costs. If that doesn't happen, you can accordingly involve eBay in the case. What reason for return did you give?
If the item location in the listing was given as a place in Germany or in another European country, you only need to send it back there.
Regards
Manfred
bwfennek
OP2 weeks agoHello Grohbacher,
Thanks very much for your message.
The sender on the DHL label in Germany is listed as "DGF Unzustellbar" with postal code and city.
You could maybe ask Google; then I don't need to go into too much detail here.
Just now I received a specific message from eBay about this matter.
I only just got around to reading it now, though.
eBay has initiated the steps so that a free return shipment is possible on the grounds of "item not as described".
Regards from Freiburg an der Elbe
Klaus
voli-maus
·2 weeks agoDid you complain about the item, @bwfennek ?
When was the purchase?
bwfennek
OP2 weeks agoHello voli-maus,
Thank you very much for your message., that's right, something went wrong there.
eBay had already contacted me too because of my post here.
Now the seller is being given the option for the return shipping to go back to him free of charge for me and at his expense.
Regards from Freiburg
Klaus
bootyooty
·2 weeks agoHi @bwfennek
as community members, we can't do anything with case numbers or order numbers; we'd need the item numbers for that.
Only eBay employees can look things up using order numbers.
Whether a seller is based in China can usually be found out pretty easily, can't it? The item location may be a German city, but when you open the feedback profile or, if available, the legal notice, you can see before buying where the seller is based, can't you? 🤔
bwfennek
OP2 weeks agoHello,
Many thanks for the feedback.
I can only go by the information that was provided to me.
Here, the seller clearly has the obligation to provide.
If this is incorrect, with the destination country missing, then that only allows one assumption, which I do not want to write about here.
Legal notice etc., this is not something the buyer has to actively obtain through research.
DHL told me plainly, even online, after I had only tested it as a trial once: Nope, that’s not a valid address.
Unfortunately, the destination address was removed from my entry.
It sounds more like my grandson had smashed the keyboard.
In the specified return address, nothing can be read out in either German or English, not even Chinese characters.
On shipping labels from the Far East to Germany, it usually looks different.
In this case, the sender starts with "DGF Unzustellbar"
Google will tell you what that means.
Regards Klaus
bootyooty
·2 weeks agoSince you’re not naming any article numbers, I can’t be of any further help and don’t need to bother Google either
bwfennek
OP2 weeks agoThat is right, it's an eBay internal matter, so the details I provided without an ITM no. should be completely sufficient to ensure data protection is maintained.
I already have the post because of this posting.