Sometimes, it just isn’t possible to amicably settle a dispute. In that case, you have several possible remedies. Just be aware that if the deal isn’t really a major one, all veterans will strongly urge you to forget it. This may not be fair... it may not be right... but it is definitely smart.
Here are your options...1) Formal Complaint -- Provide the facts in a calm manner. If it becomes a matter for law-enforcement agencies, the site may not notify you of the results. The buyer or seller can become a NARU (Not a Registered User). Unfortunately, unscrupulous people may simply re-register under a new name.
If it isn‘t a law-enforcement problem, you will be notified that customer service will contact you. This is a pretty overworked crowd and you may not hear from them for days.
The auction sites can’t compel someone to honor their agreement with you. Their only course of action is to suspend the guilty part from the auction site and hopefully from the auction business. Ultimately, auction sites are a community, and like any small town, word gets around. Your outstanding and fair dealings will become known, as will the actions of undesirable deviants.
2) Insurance -- In any event, if you have used wisdom in your dealings, you will have used an escrow service for any expensive items and thus eliminated your risk.
Some of the sites themselves offer insurance but this is usually for buyers, not sellers. If you are careless enough to ship merchandise for which you have not been paid, you are on your own.
eBay has contracted an specialized service called Square Trade (http://www.squaretrade.com/) to help resolve disputes between buyers and sellers. It is a free Web-based forum which allows users to attempt to resolve their differences on their own. You can file a complaint and Square Trade will then contact the other party.
Of course, if you are dealing with a genuine crook, this system is of no use because they won’t abide by the results. On the other hand, this method is effective between two honest people who have simply become outraged with each other.
