Originally Posted by
PaulRivers
I'm guess what happens is that the persons account gets hacked. Someone was legitimately selling stuff and shipping it, their account gets hacked by a new person, the new person is a scammer.
My guess is that the seller can go longer before ebay shuts them down if they give a tracking # and maybe ebay can find out if the package doesn't weigh anything, so they throw in items that don't cost them anything. They have a tracking number, the package shipped at 0.5lbs, with 3-5 day shipping it takes ebay a week to figure out that they're now a scammer, whereas if they didn't ship at all or shipped empty packages it might only take 2-3 days.
I think you're right. I sold a freewheel on ebay a couple weeks ago. It is my one and only ebay sale. Paypal held my money until I provided a tracking number. The money was released 3 days later, as is their stated policy.
My stated policy for selling is no returns. My unstated policy is this: if you think I misrepresented the item, you get your money back. In the case of that particular freewheel, I'd probably have paid return shipping, too, if the buyer didn't like it.