Looking for help, advice, alert the masses, etc. on possible scam ebay sale/seller 2 2

[acesilver]

I'm looking for any assistance, advice, help, you name it for a problem that I've run into over a recent attempted purchase of a unique CGC 9.8 GOTR #1 Sig. Series The book, The auction

 

I won this auction and made my payment the same day.  The next day I received an email on the item.  At first I thought it was just a confirmation that the item had been sent out by the seller.  Instead it turned out to be cancellation of my purchase from the seller along with a corresponding refund!  I emailed the seller right after to find out what was going on.  Here was the reply I received:

Quote

 

I was in the process of shipping off the comic when I accidentally dropped it on my kitchen floor. I will need to ship the item to CGC for a new case. Sorry for the inconvenience!

 

I told the seller to just send it to me and I could decide if I would need to reholder the book.  I noted he could give me a small refund off the purchase price if they chose.  I followed that message up with a question of why they cancelled the purchase in the first place.  I felt the seller should have contacted me about the problem to discuss it and possible solutions.  None of those would have been me choosing not to buy the book.

I received a reply back hours later saying they did not see my response and that they had already sent the book to CGC in that time!  Here is the picture I received of the "damage" Damage? 

I was, and continue to be, highly skeptical of both the circumstances of the damage as well as the sending off of the book for, I assume, reholder that quickly.  But I let the seller know that I still wanted the book and expected them to notify me when the book was back and to honor the price I paid for it.  I asked if they would do that and heard nothing back.

It is getting to be about the time a reholder submission may be completed.  I tried again recently to reach the seller for an update and whether they were going to fulfill the, imo, wrongly cancelled order.  Nothing.  So I contacted ebay to see if they could reach the seller and use their involvement to get the seller to follow through with the deal.  I heard back from the ebay representative this afternoon and they had been in contact with the seller.  What they shared from that contact seems very contradictory.  The seller was dealing with family issues and they were in the process of closing their ebay account.  Yet they would supposedly let me be the first to know if they listed the item again.  I'll note here that according to gpa this book sold for $1500 back in 2014.  You can see that if the seller is the buyer from that time they would have been taking a decent loss on the book.

Needless to say I'm very frustrated by all of what has taken place.  I don't know if I'm dealing with a scam artist or not.  On one hand I have not lost any money so that is a positive.  On the other I thought I would be the owner of a truly special book based on all of the sigs from a great show at a tremendous value.  Now I'm not and I'm skeptical that I ever will be.  So that is a BIG negative.

So I'm putting my story out to the board community for their insights and suggestions.  This may also serve as both a warning to others about this seller and a request that if anyone happens to see this book pop up for sale anywhere to let me know and be forewarned yourself.

FWIW here is the seller info I received from my paypal refund: 

Anthony Rey
anthonyrey83@gmail.com

 

Thanks in advance for any help you can give me here.

[SquareChaos]

I would personally let it go and move on. This guy is not a high volume seller, he has nothing listed at the time of this writing, and he has only 2 feedback in the previous twelve months (both positive). You may be correct - he may have decided that he'd just hang on to the book before he ships it out at that price... is that fair to you? Probably not, but you can't make him give you the book, and neither can eBay. If he was going to agree to ship it to you he would have already done so one of the many times you asked him to do so.

[DarkPhantom13]

Once the transaction has been cancelled that is pretty much it. The only thing you can really do is leave negative feedback for the guy but thats pretty much it. Even if he ends up relisting the book on ebay he has no obligation to honor the original price that you won the item for or to even contact you that he will be relisting it. Really crappy that the guy decided to go back on the deal but like the poster above said, it's better to just let it go and move on. 

[skypinkblu]

I'm not sure you can even leave negative feedback as long as they refund. I bought some dishes last year, paid for them (after asking the seller about shipping) and out of the blue he canceled the sale and refunded. He never told me why, it was weird. I thought it might be the shipping, but he was the one who picked the shipping price.

I called eBay, but they said they could not force a sale and something about the transaction being over.

I forgot about it until now.

[Tnexus]

You can leave negative feedback. I've had stuff like this happen, and it was possible. With only two feedback, it'll basically kill that account's credibility at least.

[Raze]

i personally never leave negative feedback i just don't leave any but thats far a few in between! ive only had  2 bad experiences on eBay and both times were resolved amicably.

sure you didn't get a cool book but you didn't lose any money so its a wash. don't let it hang over you remember we are talking comic books this should be a fun hobby!

[WolverineX]

I would just ignore it.  You got a refund.  Move on

[chrisco37]

19 hours ago, Wolverinex said:

I would just ignore it.  You got a refund.  Move on

This.  

[Avi]

 

19 hours ago, Wolverinex said:

I would just ignore it.  You got a refund.  Move on

Double This!