Legal Question in Technology Law in Georgia
My fiance and i purchased a cell phone and decided to buy a new one a few weeks later. We sold the first cell phone through ebay. The woman we sold the phone to sent an email about a week later saying the phone was not activating and that we had to contact Verizon to remove the "EIN".. so that it can be activated by someone else.. no problem. After we were told it was good to go we responded through email saying it was activatable. She responded saying itstill was not activating and demanding her money back. We then again called verizon they assured us it was activatable. We asked her several times if she had called Verizon to activate it rather than trying to do it by herself through the phone, we have done this is the past and found it doesnt work so we do know... she responded again saying still doesnt work want my money back. We called Verizon one last time to try and get a report of some sort showing that the phone has never been activated, we are unable to get a report ourselves but that, i assume, the person asking about it would have to be the ones to call for it. We were notified by paypal a little while later saying that she had put in a request for a refund, even though we did specifically put no returns or exchange when selling the phone. We responded to paypal saying again that we could provide proof that the phone was never activated, never opened or even removed from the box, and the original receipt from when it was purchased. We were then notified that she had escalated the issue to a clam.. we were told to give a response we AGAIN told paypal and her we had all the proof... We were notified today that she won the clam and the money was given back to her... the one concern we are having and the reason we specifically put NO RETURNS OR EXCHANGES is because we have no idea what she may have done to the phone and we have now not only lost the $400 we used to purchase a new phone but $100 off the phones value from her taking the phone out of the box and the phone has had its original packaging taken off... we would like to know if there is anything we can do?
2 Answers from Attorneys
Your question obviously has nothing to do with computer or technology law - the category you chose - so some lawyers won't see your question. However, this is the chance you take on ebay and Craigslist. It is not worth the time and money to do anything beyond taking it up with ebay.
Your question has nothing to do with the area of law you posted in, so consumer attorneys here on LawGuru won't see your question. That means you'll receive very few answers.
Having said that, you might want to read the seller agreement with eBay and PayPal you sign before listing items on eBay. You consent to them resolving disputes, and the risk you agree to is that they will make resolutions you may disagree with. (I should note that the buyer is right in this case. Selling phones on eBay that do not have clean EINs is taboo, and you should have cleaned the EIN before listing the item. You'll lose that dispute on eBay every time). A no refund clause does not protect you on eBay when you list an item in a way they consider deceptive and selling a phone that does not already have a clean EIN unless you spell that out in your listing is deceptive. Treat this as a $100 lesson to follow the rules.
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