$1,000 loss on e-bay/paypal, please help

[leonardboot]

What is the name of your state? NY

On Thursday, 11/24, we purchased an XBOX 360 in an ebay auction and paid $1060 using our PayPal account. The seller (from Texas) promised to ship the item the following Monday and supply a tracking number. Instead, on Monday we received an email, after we requested the tracking number from him, which stated: "Hello, My name is Doug and I am the father of the guy that sold you the item. I am sorry to make you wait for such a long time on a response. I have had a horrible two days my son just past away in a car accident and I had no idea about the shipping or the items being sold. I think that the money that was collected was put in his paypal account or something like that. I am not sure, but I am trying to find out. I am sorry about the delay on everything, but I hope you understand. I will send you your money back if and when I can figure out his password and screenname. Please do not be mad. If you are still upset feel free to leave negative feedback, but I just haven't gotten the time to figure this all out. It is kind of hard for me to do this. I will conclude this situation as quick as possible and I am sorry again. If you need to contact me please email me at..."
The following day we made a complaint to E-Bay/PayPal and went through the dispute process and a decision was made in favor of the buyer, us, and we were refunded all of $175.00 (E-bay Buyer Protection). PayPal states that there were insufficient funds in the seller's account to refund our money, and now we are out almost $900 and the case is closed although they keep saying they will still try to recoup the money from the seller. There was no PayPal Buyer Protection. We are aware of several others who were scammed by this seller as well and are trying to get their money back.
Do we have any recourse here? Please advise. Thanks.
M. Green

 

[EvilWizard]

We had a similiar situation. I don't think the case is closed in the way you think it is. Read the descriptions of the different statuses and then post back. I think you are just in a hold pattern while they are trying to recoup the rest of the money.

 

[JETX]

Do we have any recourse here?

If your PayPal payment was made by credit card, you have the right to dispute the charge with your card issuer.

Also, you might contact the local police where this 'seller' lives to verify his claims of sons death.... and when you find out that is bogus, you might ask them if they will take an out-of-town criminal complaint. Some departments will... if you send them a written complaint with ALL information... and a signed notarized affidavit.

Also, if the US mail was used at all in this scam... you can file a postal fraud complaint with the US Postal Inspection service.
https://www.usps.com/postalinspectors/fraud/MailFraudComplaint.htm

Finally, if it gets to that... you can file a small claims suit against the 'seller'.

 

[janedoe23]

OP you will only get the rest of the money back if the seller puts more money in his Paypal account, which at this point is VERY unlikely. The only options are filing a chargeback if a cc was used or small claims. You can also send a letter to the address and request a money order for your remaining refund.

 

[leonardboot]

Payment was made with money already in my PayPal account.

 

[janedoe23]

Payment was made with money already in my PayPal account.

Then your only other option is to sue in small claims. Sometimes sending a certified letter stating your intentions will get the seller motivated to give a refund but in your case it appears that the seller is dead or said to be which I seriously doubt.

 

[RedemptionMan]

Once you dispute the item with Paypal they freeze the sellers account for that amount until a resolution is reached. Paypal will not release the money so a lot of other people must have filed disputes if they are saying that there is not enough funds...... Did you look at the feedback for the seller on ebay? Was it a new user? Were there several negatives? that could give you some clues as to you getting the item or not.....