Hi everyone! Just wanted some insights on what I should do…I purchased a used Celine tshirt on Mercari recently, and I’m worried it might be fake. It was my first time purchasing a designer item on the site, and I know this kind of stuff inevitably happens, but my birthday is coming up and I wanted to buy something nice for myself.
The seller included a photo of a receipt from Celine so I felt pretty good that I was buying a legit used item. However, once purchased, the seller said that she can no longer find the receipt and frantically apologized, and asked if it was okay. I misplace things all the time too so I thought oh well, it happens. (I know, it should’ve been a red flag.) The photo of the receipt seemed real enough for me to believe that she once did have it on hand. The shirt arrived as promised, looked and felt authentic, so I rated the seller and completed the transaction.
My husband wasn’t convinced though, so he did an image search of the picture of the receipt. And to my surprise, the exact same photo came up on a site that apparently sells fake designer items. Furthermore, all of the photos and the description (i.e. retails for ~yen, worn once) were all pulled from this site. I was definitely naive, but had no idea these sites made available photos of the receipt just so people can resell them as if they were real.
I contacted the seller but of course she denies ever selling a fake, and I’m waiting for Mercari to get back to me.
Is there somewhere I can take this shirt to confirm that it’s fake? Are my chances of getting my money back pretty low?
5 comments
Maybe a Celine shop in Japan will authenticate it? If it’s not genuine, many designer shops won’t tell you directly that “it’s fake” but may tell you something more ambiguous like “this is not something we sell”.
I bought a Prada wallet online, convinced myself that it was fake, brought it to the Prada Ginza store and they told me that it was genuine to my relief.
Having the exact same receipt picture, etc., on a different site is definitely a bad sign however. Unfortunately there’s not much to do but pursue with Mercari, or via your credit card if you happened to have paid that way.
Also tell your husband per reddit rules he must buy you a new one for your birthday.
Chances are slim. I unfortunately bought a fake wallet on mercari years ago. I didn’t realize it was fake until months later and more time handling authentic ones.
In the future, look out for sellers that are unverified; ones that are only selling two or three items (in particular weirdly over priced furniture or random over priced used clothing, but a “barely used” Chanel bag); anything that says “Bought at duty free in Hong Kong last year” (this was a huge flag in 2021 at the peak of covid lockdowns and little international, plus most duty free shops being closed); “Only used/worn once!” with a ridiculously inexpensive price (ex: Chanel flap, bought at duty free in HK airport last year with an asking price of 18,700 yen because it was used once and they are “so sad” to see it go.
Pics of boxes and receipts mean nothing. You can buy authentic boxes and shopping bags off mercari.
If you thought it was fake when you got it, that was the time to tell the seller and offer to send it back to them. Since it is fake and they know it, and they don’t want to get banned for selling fakes, they may simply cancel the order from their side.
To keep from getting had, do an image check. Get familiar with the stories and prices scammera use. Most of the fakes have a particular photo style. When you buy something, decide whether you could be okay with it potentially being fake.
As for authentication, I don’t think most luxury stores will authenticate items bought off mercari or at Daikokuya. The best way to authenticate it in the store is to take it in for repair. They won’t repair knock-offs.
Edit:
If it’s the Celine shirt in white with black lettering with the tags attached, I’d assume most are fake. Don’t assume lack of tags or receipt mean it’s fake. Don’t assume pics of them mean they are real, either.
If the shirt was like 3,000 yen and not the 40,000+ I see on mercari, I’d just take the loss.
If you can get screenshots from the original listing and pair them with the ones from the counterfeit seller pages and send those to mercari it may help. But mercari does nothing about fakes. I’ve reported countless sellers and they all just change their names or put up items temporarily (ie late at night) and then pull them by the next morning.
I hope you haven’t rated the seller yet. If you haven’t, don’t rate them. Since you have already contacted the seller and they presumably refuse to refund you, all you can do is wait for Mercari Customer Support.
Next time, please don’t “spoil” yourself with a second hand item.
Mercari is pretty good about responding to fakes. I report fake designer stuff all the time. What you’re supposed to do once you get the item is contact Mercari, which you did. All you can do now is wait for their response. They should get back to you in a day or less — when did you contact them?
Celine won’t authenticate a shirt. If you have the proof that the photo is from a knockoff site, that should be good enough. Mercari took down a listing of a Jacquemus bag I reported when I said the photo was taken from a knockoff site and included the link.
Lesson learned I guess? If you’re not super familiar with a brand and the item is easy to copy, I would be weary of anything on Mercari that doesn’t come with proof of purchase.
There are a lot of scammers creating fake websites and steal photos from MERCARI.
https://www.japanonlineshopping.com/scammer
Not sure if this helps you one understand why there are pictures everywhere for the same item