Looks like the guy who I bought the Hitachi 4GB microdrive from off of eBay decided to send the card to my old address (which paypal stubbornly insisted in putting in the e-mail) despite at least 3 warnings that this was not the correct address, and instruction on the correct address to mail it to at least 3 times. Trouble is, he’s not really sure which address he sent it to, and he doesn’t have a tracking number as he sent it USPS and didn’t bother with a tracking #.
The guy did not have a perfect feedback history, but there were only 6 negatives (32 positive), and he seems to sell items of the same value or more with little issue, so I don’t think he’s trying to rip me off. I just think he’s stupid.
I’ve been running into a lot of stupid recently. It hurts me deep inside. It pains me that even when I take great effort to ensure things go smoothly, those efforts are brushed aside either through incompetence or ignorance or sheer lack of attention. It also makes me angry when people won’t own up to the fact they have made a mistake and try anything to avoid taking responsibility for their actions. This fellow flippantly told me to check at my old address for the package. I now have to spend more effort trying to correct the mistake he won’t take any ownership of.
So now I either try and track the package down (which I can’t do since he did not get a tracking number), wait for the package to return to him and have him ship it again (trusting that he’ll get it right this time), or contest the paypal charge and let it go. Paypal thankfully has really expanded their buyer protection and it looks like I am covered in this case. I sent him an e-mail asking him to just refund my money and let me purchase from someone who has their act together. We’ll see how he responds.
It’s not clear in this case that even if I had requested that he get a tracking number that he would have. I would guess in the negative. He probably would have said okay and just shipped it anyway as he did with my address change e-mails.
Just to clarify. I really don’t mind when people screw up. It happens all the time, and I completely understand. What makes me angry is refusing to take responsibility for your screw ups and working to make them better. If this guy would have said “I’m really sorry, I spaced it out. When I get the card back, I’ll fedex overnight it to you and give you a tracking number. I’ll refund your money until I get the card back and you can paypal me when I give you the tracking number for your peace of mind” I would have been okay with it. A little annoyed perhaps, but respectful of his owning his mistake. Instead I get:
I shipped to wherever paypal address you needed it to go…please check your old adddress…
Completely dismissing the fact that I specifically had told him to not ship to my paypal address, and at the same time indicating that he doesn’t really care enough to look up what address he actually sent it to, or didn’t bother to keep any record at all. On top of that, he dumps the responsibility on me for finding it. This is the kind of thing that drives me insane.