A customer wants to return a damaged product they bought from me. I didn’t see any damage prior to shipping it. I probably missed it. They showed me pictures though, so the damage is there. I told them they could return it but to cover shipping on their end. They’re refusing because they think I intentionally sold a damaged product, which is understandable. I wouldn’t have sold that product if I’d seen that damage, but anyways, I’m wondering if mercari will provide reimbursement for the shipping costs or if one of us (buyer or seller) must cover shipping? In the past I’ve had to cover shipping myself as a buyer, because a seller was dishonest about the actual measurements. I’m wondering if this solution could be applicable here… thanks!
7 comments
no they will not. take the L and have them send it by COD or whatever. if you can somehow produce proof of non-damage (photos or something) you *might* have a case with mercari but the time + effort spent on it will definitely not be worth the shipping charge.
Typically sellers (both brick and mortar and small businesses) pay for return shipment for damaged goods. It’s not the customers fault the item arrived damaged. That responsibility rest solely on the seller to make good on customer service.
It sucks you had to cover shipment in the past due to a dishonest seller. Generally not the norm for seller error and not a buyer error but generally speaking either refund the item and let the customer keep it or fork up the money for the return.
Mercari/ebay/whatever platform you use isn’t going to cover your expenses.
how much was it?
Once I sold something and JP damaged it, so buyer wanted the same. Full refund and return. But, the listing photos made it clear that it wasn’t damaged before sale. Mercari gave them a partial refund but didn’t deduct anything from me. I felt like I got off really lucky or something.
Anyway, point is if you can prove it may have been damaged in transit, there’s other options rather than refunding and paying for shipping.
How did you ship it?
If you shipped thru yuyumercari or rakurakumercari and it was damaged during shipping then mercari should refund both buyer and seller.
If its not worth the hassle just cancel
When I recently made a purchase on Mercari, the seller shipped the wrong item, so we had to restart the transaction. When I contacted Mercari management, I was told that the seller would have to pay the return shipping fee on “着払い.” If the seller makes a mistake, the seller will basically be responsible for paying the fees.
Once had an absolute nutter Mercari buyer claim the item arrived with a very long brown hair on it (not the colour nor length of my hair) and tried to force me to give them my address so they could COD it back to me for a refund. At first I thought it was just they didn’t like the item, had buyers remorse, and were making the shit up to get a refund with free shipping.
I politely refused, as it definitely wasn’t my hair. No idea where it came from, probably sometime during shipping? If it was even true…
But the buyer was craaaaazy, went right off the deep end when I apologized for the inconvenience caused but declined the return.
Started sending multiple messages with threats and then suddenly started up this story saying all this weird voodoo stuff like they felt the item was “cursed” (not exaggerating, that’s literally what they said), seeing the hair made them “physically sick”, they had to use tweezers to put the hair into a ziplock bag and would send it (the hair, AND the tweezers used!!) back with the item, and all kinds of other crazy weird shit.
Got progressively more and more aggressive when I continued to decline to give them my address for the COD. Sent a barrage of angry threats to “not ignore them” (when I hadn’t replied to yet another of their “I feel so disgusted and like I want to burn the item” type wacko messages for a few hours) etc etc. Real nut job.
I engaged Mercari dispute resolution saying hell would freeze over before I would give such a crazy person my address. Especially because the item had been dropped off at yamato very late at night and was already delivered by noon the next day, so there was a good possibility they actually lived quite nearby me. Mercari basically took one look at all the messages and understood giving out my address to this crazy person was no bueno and in the end they took the L for me – I got paid, the buyer got refunded and got the item for free. Hope they enjoyed sticking some voodoo pins in it before burning it 😆 🔥
When it was finally over, I blocked them immediately afterwards so they can never buy from me again! Was a heck of a lot of drama for a measly ¥2500 😂
Edit to add the bit I forgot re: your actual question lol. Do you have any photo proof it was not damaged at time of sending they way they claim it is now? If so, tell them to please take up their damage claim with yamato/JP, they can pound sand if the item was sent without damage 🤷♂️you’re not OBLIGED to refund them. If you have good photos Mercari dispute resolution will side with you. 👍