Has anyone else had problems with an Arena member?

I just filed in a PayPal dispute, because I wanted to do it before the dispute time closes. I have had trouble with a purchase from a member here at the Arena.

After I paid a bit over a month ago, she immediately let me know that she has lost the ponies. She has replied to my messages all right, and promised to pay me back in case she didn't find the ponies, but didn't pay. Then she finally gave me a day and promised that she'd pay on Friday, which was yesterday. I received no payment or a message.

So today I filed in a PayPal dispute. Is it too soon? I have been scammed before, so I want to be a bit extra careful, but if you guys have any advice on what I should do, I'd gladly listen. The member in question has a lot of positive feedbacks and a new one that mentions her being a bit slow, but otherwise all right.

Thanks for any input.

I think you did the right thing. Hope it works out!

I think you did the right thing. They claim they are going to pay you back anyway so the case will just ensure they do it. I would hate to think a member here would try to wait out the PayPal case time restriction but I'm sure it does happen. You have given them every chance to make it right. But now you need to protect yourself.

A little update! The person paid right away after I filed the dispute, so all is in order in that regard. Now I need some further advice. Would you leave a negative feedback here at the Arena if you were me?

The person doesn't seem like a scammer, after all I got my money back and I suppose the ponies are actually lost. But it took some time, plus I would have preferred to get the ponies to getting back my money... Also, if I was to trade with someone, I would like to be warned about trouble like this. What would you do? Bad feedback or no feedback? I guess there's also always the risk of receiving a "revenge feedback".

Thanks for the input so far, and I'd like to hear your thoughts on the feedback issue too.

I wouldnt worry about "revenge feedback" if such a thing happened, the mods would take care of it for you.

As for leaving negative feedback - thats a tough one - if I had gone through your experience but the seller had fantastic feedback, was an established member of the community and I thought maybe on this one occasion had simply been having a bad or mad moment, I would be reluctant to leave bad feedback as I would perhaps think my experience had been a one off. However, if the seller did not have feedback or when I read her/his feedback found a similar pattern, I think I would need to be honest but I would perhaps also make sure to mention if their communication was good and the fact they did refund when prompted to. That way you are being as truthful as possible and saying that although the transaction did not go smoothly - you were not out of pocket in any way.

sorry to hear you had problems dealing with someone here.
I think you did the right thing opening the case. I'm glad that things are resolved now too
TBH I know its difficult, but its important to leave honest feedback, so that anyone thinking of buying from this member in future is aware of any potential problems Everyone makes mistakes sometimes and the seller might be genuine, but all too often people dont leave the appropriate feedback for people they have had issues with, and it can lead to more people having the same issues with the same person, before the info comes out. By leaving appropriate feedback you are helping to protect our community. It doesnt need to be negative as you did get your money back in the end and the seller did communicate with you, but it just needs to be honest, stating what happened

I've been in a situation where I was very emotional about a problem and I was worried about what to write. Everyone told me to be honest (people should know about problems) but not to be unkind. So something like "My order was lost. Seller had good communication about the problem but there was a long delay in getting everything sorted out."

I think Sarah's wording is perfect for fedback. And please do leave appropriate feedback, it's important to our community

Accurate feedback is important! I would leave accurate feedback, just be nice about it. Maybe a 2 or 3 star rating would be appropriate?

I like what Saralacewing said.

Thank you for the input, everyone! There is some new information that I found out yesterday!

I went to a MLP meeting and spoke with a collector friend of mine. She told me that she was expecting a package from the same person. We started talking about it, and it turns out that the seller had sold the same product to the both of us. She just waited until I had paid before she told me she had "lost" the ponies! To the other person she said that the first deal was cancelled by the buyer (=me).

More detailed description of what happened:

The seller was selling a lot and I asked to buy a part of it. I understood that she wanted to sell the whole lot, but thought I would ask and she could decline if she wanted. Well, she said she could sell the ponies I wanted separately. After that I paid the price we agreed upon and she promised to send the ponies the next day.

After our deal, my friend had asked to buy the whole lot. The seller said that some of the ponies are sold (the ones I was buying) but the rest are available. My friend didn't want the lot then and kindly said she's not interested. But right away, the seller got back to my friend, saying that the first deal had fallen through and the lot was available again!

My friend also went ahead and paid for her purchase. After the seller had both of our money, she told me that she had lost the ponies and even claimed that maybe her daughter has something to do with the ponies being lost.

After this, as I described in my earlier message, the seller had the nerve to keep my money for a month before returning it to me. She told me she hadn't got much money, so that's why she wanted to refund my purchase only later. Understandable, but I'm not a bank that gives loans, so I would have wanted my money back faster. Especially since this was completely on purpose on the seller's part!

I am shocked by the nerve of this person! If she had just had the guts to tell me she had gotten an offer of the whole lot and refunded my money right away, this would be fixed with an apology, but in this situation I will have to leave a negative feedback for her fishy actions.

To my friend, the seller has said that she has sent the lot. It has been a month since my friend's payment too, and she still hasn't received the ponies. There's a little bit less than two weeks of time until the last possible PayPal dispute, so she decided to wait and see if the package arrives after all. It might be that the seller sent the package and has been honest to my friend, even though she has lied to me and kept my money until I filed the dispute. I'll be sure to let you know if my friend doesn't receive her purchase either.

Thank you for reading such a long rant/description. I don't wish to post the seller's nickname yet, because I'll first send her a PM and ask for an explanation/confession before leaving that negative feedback.

Hm, thats not very professional of them!

Sounds like we need to add a new name to the Bad Trader's List. :/

oh my goodness I do think that asking your seller for an explaination first was the right thing to do, but based on what your friend said, this person does deserve a negative feedback TBH. That isnt good selling practice at all

i am the arena member. i made a mistake and she did get her money back. she is making it out to be a bigger problem than it is. i wanted to get rid of the whole lot and she had already paid for just the petites and i decided, dumbly to give the whole lot to another member and then just return xaras money.

i had just put money into the account sometime after midnight on friday. she filed a paypal claim sometime before that. she did get her money and the dispute is closed. yes i made a mistake. i have apologized to both members. i really didnt mean for it to become a huge deal. im a dummy. i didnt mean any harm. i deserve the negative feedback. we all make mistakes, i did a dumb thing.

As I said in the PM, a month is a long time to keep a sum of money you fooled me into paying, fully knowing you were going to sell the ponies to another. I'm glad we got the mess resolved and I got my money in the end, but I still think that the lie and the delay in returning my money make this quite problematic.

However, I'm glad that you recognize that this was a mistake and I hope that my friend won't have problems in receiving the lot. I'll think about the feedback issue, as you've always answered to PM's and did come through with this in the end. Probably you don't deserve a 0-star feedback, I'll think of it a bit and see how it goes with my friend's deal who ended up buying the ponies.