advice needed about a deal gone bad.

[max 330 mega]

ok, i recently bought an awesome neo geo AES lot on ebay, and it seems the deal was too good to be true.

link to auction: http://cgi.ebay.com/NEO-GEO-AES-boxe...QQcmdZViewItem

After waiting 5 business days i decided to email the seller and ask for the tracking number of my package. i received no response, so yesterday I emailed the seller again about the current status of my package and received this email:

"Well sorry I didn't reply to you sooner. I haven't got any emails since I have been out of town on business. This is the deal though. The stuff that was sold on Ebay was sold for my friend (I sold 4 things for him, at over $1,200), I took the money out of my Paypal and sent it to him so he could pay for the shipping of the items sold. I had to go out of town, so I assumed that he had sent it off. I have tried to contact him by phone but I never get any response from him at all. I'm getting worried cause he left me with this to deal with and he has screwed me from the looks of it. You can report me to Ebay if need be and i'll understand. The most I can do now is refund you and the others their money out of my own pocket, which sucks bad. I'm going to kick his ass for doing this to me and sticking me with having to pay back everyone. I thought he was someone I could trust, since i've known him for some time now, but I guess you can never trust anyone. You can look at my feedback from the past and see that I have nothing negative against me, and i'm a trusted member on Ebay. He knew that and decided to screw me. I'm very sorry this has happened, and i'm gonna try to get either your money or the item sold to you from him. I was just trying to help him out and I don't want to get stuck with this. I will be out of town a couple of more days and when I get home I can talk more about this with you."

i need some advice on what to do about the situation.. Should I play it nice, and not report the seller and hope I receive my items or money back, or would it be more benificial to report the seller and risk pissing him off, which in turn may make him less inclined to help me out? Will I be more likely to see a return of my money if i report him and let ebay handle it?
does it seem like the seller is scamming me, or do you think he really is being honest? i cant really find any evidence to make me feel one way or the other.
When i reply to the seller's email, what do you think would be the best way to deal with the situation?

thanks for any help you can offer, i guess even with 100% positive feedback sellers you can still never be totally safe.

[MichaeltheGreat]

You know, the longer you're in ebay, the more stories you're going to hear. What I've done in the past is I've looked up the other buyers he's had recently, and emailed them to see what kind of story he's sent them. Sometimes you find out that you've all been had and that nobody wants to neg him because he seems like a nice guy, has a nice story (sometimes different to everyone!), and has good feedback.

[Vectorman0]

If you paid with paypal, I would file a complaint with them ASAP. If you do get refund even it if is on the way, you can always send the money again. If it isn't sent out, then hopefully paypal will get you your money.

If you paid another way, I would just pray since eBay really doesn't do anything to try and stop fraud or rectify such situations.

Good luck, keep us updated.

[Sylentwulf]

Report him immediately, it's probably still too late though. You lose NOTHING by reporting him. If he refunds you, the report through paypal is closed and everyone is happy. If he doesn't, well, at least you reported him.

[jajaja]

Ye, if you payed with Paypal fill out a complaint. I would wait atleast 30 days before i do this tho. You never know if it will show up soon. You have 45 days to fill a complaint.

[Darth Sensei]

Sounds like yet another load of crap.

[Vectorman0]

Ye, if you payed with Paypal fill out a complaint. I would wait atleast 30 days before i do this tho. You never know if it will show up soon. You have 45 days to fill a complaint.

I would normally wait this long too, probably, but I think because the seller had admitted that he probably wont get his items, he should file as soon as he can.

[kevin_psx]

Contact all 4 buyers.

Hire a lawyer to represent all of you. Recover your combined $1200 of lost money in small claims court from this Scam artist.

Take him to Judge Judy so she can bounce him around the world.

[gepeto]

This is a hard call but for someone to put 1200 worth of stuff and not have the items on hand sounds fishy.

Now there is trouble contacting so called friend and he send money and trust the friend to ship. This makes no sense. I could see a game but 1200.

I think someone saw auction and made him a higher backdoor offer. The picture looks near mint. Tell him to refund the money like yesterday. If he really was sorry he would have already refunded the money.

That happened to. I one a large game lot paid. The seller said there was a problem with his supplier and the money had been refunded.

[max 330 mega]

well guys, amazingly the seller was telling the truth.... or atleast he rethought stealing my money i suppose. after filing the complaint, and exchanging a few more emails with the guy, the $320 was returned to my account. he actually was a really nice guy, and if he really was telling the truth, he had to repay me with money from his own pocket .. :/
but what can i say, how often does someone actually manage to get there money back in a situation like this? hardly never. so i guess what im saying is..... a winner is meeeee!!!!!!

[Kitsune Sniper]

well guys, amazingly the seller was telling the truth.... or atleast he rethought stealing my money i suppose. after filing the complaint, and exchanging a few more emails with the guy, the $320 was returned to my account. he actually was a really nice guy, and if he really was telling the truth, he had to repay me with money from his own pocket .. :/
but what can i say, how often does someone actually manage to get there money back in a situation like this? hardly never. so i guess what im saying is..... a winner is meeeee!!!!!!

This is a Neo-Geo thread. The more appropiate response should be:
VICTOLY!

[Griking]

I'm glad to hear that you got your money back.

BTW, I'm not sure where the $1200 figure came from but he's only sold $850 worth of merchantise recently.