I thought of stalling on closing the dispute to hold his account hostage for a few days...but that would simply put me in the same position as Ian. Fortunately PayPal’s dispute safeguards worked without having to escalate it to a claim.
I would have just refunded your $22 and let you have the tools for free instead of letting my account sit there in the negative for no reason other than spite.
Dispute resolution is why I’m nervous about doing the PP/Gift option unless the seller has a long and good track record. Gifts are excluded from PP resolution – at least to my understanding.
I had a long and good track record prior to my health issues... but that didn't stop a bunch of members from getting together and working themselves into a frenzy thinking I was scamming them.
Sometimes I think folks actually feed on the drama.
edit: This is a general statement. I'm not trying to individually criticize anyone for being worried about their purchase. Just look at the view count of this thread vs. other threads its size. Some people eat this stuff up like a good television show.
The fact of the matter is, track record doesn't mean a DAMN. I had a perfect track record, and then the instant I screwed up, that was all forgotten in an instant.
When I was younger and in better shape, I ran a small repair business. I had HUNDREDS of satisfied customers over a period of years. I had a single transaction go foul and all of a sudden I was labelled as a scammer and a liar. I even ate the cost of the transaction, yet the stigma still followed me. People that had done business with me for years prior, and that I considered friends, all of a sudden wouldn't even answer phone calls.
Even worse, I ended up finding out that the guy that I "screwed" (even though I was the only one that lost anything) was a complete dirtbag himself, and took about 10 seperate people for nearly $40k in bankruptcy when he went under.
I'm not happy - I'm not angry. I'm just glad this little saga is over for me and I hope that others find an amicable resolution in their deals with Ian.
Everyone already has found resolution... you were the last person with an open dispute.
I am still very sorry about this, but the fact of the matter is that I'm just not meant for selling online any more, that's why I've decided to call it quits. Even at my best, when I'm shipping promptly, I'm not cut out for it.
I've been buying and selling online pretty much since the beginning. One thing I can say, is that over the years since ebay and paypal started villifying the seller, and coddling the buyer, people have gotten more and more militant about smaller and smaller dollar amounts.
Additionally, people have become much more trigger happy with filing disputes and claims. It used to be that filing a dispute was an absolute last resort, only to be used in the most extreme cases. Now, people will file a dispute because the seller was ONE day late on shipping, or because there was a tiny rip in the packaging.
I've found that the more popular online selling becomes, the more scammers are popping up. Buyers get more and more paranoid, and more difficult to deal with each year. If you stack that up with entering a market that grows more and more slanted towards buyer's rights, things are just pretty much a big pile of **** for anyone that does any major amount of selling, whether they have issues like I have or not.
