Help! Don't know what to do!!!

[casey82]

I recently was browsing ebay to buy a new phone, then this guy said that if someone made him an offer, he'd end the auction early. so i made him an offer for the cell phone, and he agreed. I sent him the money via money order and then he claimed that he sent the phone via usps. but i never got the phone. I think he's scamming me, and i want to either get the phone or get my money back ($260 USD) what can i do to alleviate this problem? whenever i email him, he just says its up to the shipping company and the deal was to include shipping insurance, but i don't think he got that. i have email evidence of our conversation and deal, and evidence of money order purchase, but since the purchase was outside of ebay, i have no ebay evidence and unable to get any ebay benefits. what can i do? please help!

 

[Michael Wechsler]

To begin, did you ask for and receive the tracking information? If it was sent via insurance then it should have a number.

For more information about ebay scams, here is a good thread and information from e-bay themselves:

http://www.thelaw.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=1821&highlight=ebay

Originally posted by casey82
I recently was browsing ebay to buy a new phone, then this guy said that if someone made him an offer, he'd end the auction early. so i made him an offer for the cell phone, and he agreed. I sent him the money via money order and then he claimed that he sent the phone via usps. but i never got the phone. I think he's scamming me, and i want to either get the phone or get my money back ($260 USD) what can i do to alleviate this problem? whenever i email him, he just says its up to the shipping company and the deal was to include shipping insurance, but i don't think he got that. i have email evidence of our conversation and deal, and evidence of money order purchase, but since the purchase was outside of ebay, i have no ebay evidence and unable to get any ebay benefits. what can i do? please help!

 

[casey82]

he said he shipped it and he said there was no tracking number...
whenever i email him, he replies by saying that he will check with the post office, but never gets back to me... i think he's trying to brush me off and just stall until i give up...

 

[NYClex]

that's a tough one. You could try to sue him in small claims court, but you probably pay more for travel costs than you would ever recover.

I guess you learned an expensive lesson here: never go outside of ebay and never ever pay auction items with money orders.