I suspect many of us feel that we have been ripped-off by someone through excessive postal charges. In most cases the fault lies with the buyer not checking with the seller prior to bidding. However, I have been caught through no fault of my own.
I recently bid on an item which was advertised with only one method of postage, that being first class recorded delivery at 8. There was no offer of an alternative means; it was a question of having to accept this charge as part of the sale. I was aware of this before bidding and placed my bid which eventually won. I paid for the item by PayPal and a few days later the parcel arrived. It consisted of a second hand jiffy bag with stamps valued at about 1.50. I immediately queried this with the seller expecting him to concede that he had made a mistake and offer a refund, his response was that the total amount I had paid still made the item the cheapest available on eBay. Clearly this was not an oversight on his part, he had deliberately mislead me into believing that I was paying for recorded delivery when he never had any intention of using this method.
This is a very straightforward case of obtaining money by deception, a criminal offence under the Theft Act. If the seller had advertised his postage as 8, sellers standard rate he would not have committed any offence; equally if he had not specified a method of posting or offerred an alternative means of postagehe would not commit an offence but under these circumstances the only method offerred was first class recorded delivery at 8. By then posting the item by normal delivery there can only betwo possibilities; either it was a mistake by the seller or it was a deliberate deception by him in order to obtain money from me. Please be aware that if you offer such a service, accept payment for it and then fail to deliver on it you commit a criminal offence. A simple analagy would be if you walked into a pub and ordered a pint of beer, paid your money to the barman and he then gave you half a pint of lemonade, a straightforward deception.
My first recommendation to anybody in this situation is to e-mail the seller before sending payment to confirm with them that they do intend to send the item by recorded delivery.
My second recommendation is that if you do get caught like this do not bother to contact eBay because from my experience you are wasting your time. I made my complaint to them and ended up communicating with seven different people none of whom seemed to be able to grasp what I was talking about. As has been written in previous guides it appears that as long as they get their listing fees and final valuation fees they are quite happy and don't want the boat rocked. I pointed out to them that I had worked in the criminal justice system for thirty two years and was able to say for certain this seller was using their system to commit criminal offences but I never got any satisfactory response. The last communication I had suggested that I leave negative feedback for the seller which rather misses the point and secondly, as most of us know will only result in unwarranted negative feedback being left for us in return.
Last time I checked the same seller was still in business and everything he is selling is advertised as first class recorded delivery only.
UPDATE 7/8/06 - I waited until the 90th day to leave feedback in order to avoid the 'retaliatory strike'. I was unable to do so becausethe seller, 'henrymjewellery' is no longer registered. I wonder what name he is using now????
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