I was the second highest bidder on an auction. Within a day or so I receive a Second Chance offer.
I go to my ebay to see if it's legitimate and it is. So I click the bin =accept button, happy, and pay them.

The next day I notice they have ended an auction early, for the same item. They cancelled all bids and ended it early "because the item is no longer available."
That was kind of strange. Nothing wrong with having more than one of an item for sale, but... they have so many auctions running, so what a coincidence they ended this particular one only. I couldn't help wondering if it had anything to do with their transaction with me.

And what do you know, a couple of days later (=today) they send a formal message saying they can not sell me the item after all because they discovered it's "in less than great condition".
They are giving me the choice of either a refund or store credit with them.

I can't believe they are turning non selling seller on me!
So now what do I do?
They said nothing to indicate what is supposedly wrong with the item. I think it's kind of rude of them. Basically they are just giving me the choice of the two options they think are acceptable, without even letting me know what's going on.
I was thrilled to get the second chance offer and would still like to have the item (a christmas ornament). If it has flaws or damage I would prefer having it anyway but preferably with a partial refund obviously.
How do I tell them this politely?

I can not prove it of course but this is what I suspect happened:
The seller both listed the item *and* offered it to me via ebays second chance offer system, thinking they had more than ornament left.
I accept and pay, then the seller realize their mistake (they only have one ornament left) and ends the auction.
One of the bidders whos bids were cancelled gets really annoyed and questions the seller, demands to get a chance to buy the item.
Seller gives me this "will not sell after all because it's not perfect" in hope of me accepting a refund so they can sell to the other person.

If this is the case it's really unprofessional of them. But it's not like I can ask/tell them about it because obviously it will not help me get the item.
So how do I handle this?
.

I guess the question is, what was the item that you had the 2nd chance offer on? I am wondering if maybe they decided to sell it outside of e-bay.

Either way, I would just get the refund and be done with it. Probably easiest for you and your sanity rather than fighting with them to sell the original item to you.

Sorry you have to deal with this!

Since you believe they are not behaving legitimately I would probably cut my losses and accept the refund. If you want you can open a case about it. Then at least they will get investigated and perhaps a strike will be put on their Ebay account. If you think they might be telling the truth you can try to work something out but it sounds like they are either wanting more money for the item than the 2nd chance offer allowed, or they want to pull it and sell it again closer to christmas.

Sarahlacewing wrote:

Since you believe they are not behaving legitimately I would probably cut my losses and accept the refund. If you want you can open a case about it. Then at least they will get investigated and perhaps a strike will be put on their Ebay account. If you think they might be telling the truth you can try to work something out but it sounds like they are either wanting more money for the item than the 2nd chance offer allowed, or they want to pull it and sell it again closer to christmas.

I guess that might be what's going on.

The ornament (glass garland) is a semi hard to find collectors item, not really rare but does not show up often either - there are none on ebay now.

They seem to have gone up in price lately. The last one I saw ended on $150, that is almost twice what I paid in the second chance offer. So I guess the seller got a better offer.

You are both right, I will probably have to accept the refund eventually but still..

How annoying and upsetting It really does sound like the seller wanted more for the item and so either 1.) sold it to someone else who offered them more money, or 2.) decided to try and fob you off with a lame excuse and then resell it later for a higher price
You can either just accept the refund , message the seller back and say that you would still like to buy the item even though it is "in less than great condition" , and then see what they say.. or you can open a case and let ebay investigate. The seller probably wont be too happy about the third option.. but still if they did decide to not to sell it to you because they wanted more money in the end, then it might make them think twice before doing that kind of thing again in future.

Wanting more money? How can you draw this conclusion? She's probably telling the truth about the item not being in great condition thing.

Either that, or your idea on her thinking she had more than one and then being mistaken might be it as well. Just cancel and move on.