

Losing out after winning the online auction. - olefoo
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/24/technology/24shortcuts.html

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smokey_the_bear
In case people are wondering what happens when you buy stolen stuff on EBay:

Three weeks ago I bought a macbook pro on EBay, from a seller with 60 sales
and a 100% positive feedback, who claimed she'd owned the macbook for a year.
The macbook arrived on, with photoshop still running, a dvd in the drive, and
a different name on the user account than the sellers. I called Apple, and
they confirmed it was stolen by the serial number. So I got in touch with the
laptop's owner via some googling, and found out it had been stolen just two
weeks ago.

I filed a dispute with PayPal, and the seller immediately offered me a $100
rebate, which I declined. Then PayPal resolved the case, saying that I should
send the laptop back to the seller, and my money would be refunded, with a 10
day time limit. This seemed crazy, and then for 8 days they ignored my emails,
and to my first two phone calls just said they'd update the dispute with the
information I'd provided on the phone, but never did. Then I reached someone
reasonable at PayPal, and they credited me back the full amount and told me to
send the laptop to its owner.

So it worked out, but it was a huge pain, and for a long time I thought I was
going to have to choose between doing the right thing and getting my money
back.

Also, the owner of the laptop contacted his police department the day I
emailed him with the name, address and phone number of the seller. It took a
week to get a phone call with the detective, who then refsued to contact
PayPal. Now he's been waiting a week to get an address from the detective that
I can send the laptop to.

