Problems with Amazon.com MarketPlace - Help?
 

So, has anyone else been screwed over on Amazon.com Marketplace?

I won't go into excessive detail about what my situation is, but essentially:

- I purchased an item worth $100 USD (Criterion DVD set)
- The seller confirmed that payment was received, and that the items should arrive. But even though the e-mail header confirmed the item I had ordered, there was a short description in the body of the e-mail that DIDN'T match the item I ordered.
- When the package arrived, there were two separate DVDs inside (neithe of which is worth more than $6.00 USD)
- The items I received do match that description in the body of the e-mail, to an extent, but not exactly. (ie: it is not a box set. just two DVDs)

So, essentially, I was duped into paying $100 for two $6 DVDs.

Has anyone else been in such a situation before? I've already contacted the seller, asking for a full refund, and I've contacted amazon.com (neither have responded as of today; three business days after I told them what happened). Should I be contacting my credit card company at all, or am I supposed to wait it out and see what amazon.com tells me?

I'd give Amazon five business days, then challenge the charge.

I had a similar situation, although with only a DVD (only $15 total). Got sent a really bad bootleg (photocopied B&W cover, DVD-5 burn, handwritten title). Complained to seller, his response "what did you expect when you spend $15 for a $40 dvd"). Forwarded to Amazon with demand for reimbursement. Heard nothing for about 10 days, so I challenged the charged with Amex. I got an e-mail back from Amazon about 20 days after stating they understood my complaint and woudl have refunded me, but noticed that I had challenged the charge successfully. Wasn't really an issue for them.

But the thing is, Amazon doesn't pay their sellers immediately. They get checks 60 days after an item sells (for chargebacks). So the con didn't profit and all Amazon lost was commission, which they might have taken out anyway from the seller.

That's not quite true. Most Amazon Marketplace sellers have payments from buyers deposited into their Amazon accounts immediately. Then it usually takes 3-5 days to have it transferred to their bank accounts.

If a buyer successfully disputes a Marketplace transaction then Amazon will deduct the amount from the Amazon seller's account.

If the seller doesn't respond to you, I would give Amazon about a week to get back to you. Amazon has a "safe buying" guarantee that covers all purchases from the Amazon Marketplace.

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg...461320-9472033

This might be too late to do you any good but.... File an A-z claim with Amazon.com. If the item was described one way before you made the purchase and then the seller sent you an email that had a different description, it doesn't matter. You should receive what was originally described on the Amazon.com site. DO NOT file a charge back with your credit card company because Amazon.com may suspend your account with them and you really don't need to anyway, you have a clear case to have Amazon.com reimburse you for your order gone wrong.

I agree completely with this advice. I have purchased nearly 100 DVDs through Amazon Marketplace. In 4 cases, I did not receive the order. I found I was able to resolve things with the seller twice and the other two times Amazon fully refunded my purchase after I filed an A-to-Z claim. (Filing such a claim also puts Amazon on notice that they have a bad seller).

TWO CAUTIONS: (1) There is a limited time period within which you may file a claim. Be sure to check the rules.
(2) Amazon will take about 28 days to investigate the claim. Don't get impatient. They WILL reply after this.

I agree that you have a valid claim. The Amazon Marketplace offerings are linked to specific product descriptions. It does not matter what the seller put in an email. If the seller's product was offered under the Criterion DVD product description, then he/she is expected to supply the Criterion product.

Good luck.

I wouldn't care if amazon suspended my account, i have other ccs and other e-mails.

And then if you have an issue in the future and they do a related customer search and bring up your suspended accounts they will suspend that account. I won't go into the ways they have to find these related accounts but it goes further than credit cards and email addresses and that is just for the average customer service rep, I don't even know what the actual account specialist who would look into these matters has at their disposal but I know it is more than that.

I am not trying to tell you how to handle your purchases with Amazon.com, if you want to file a charge back you obviously have every right to do so, but what I am saying is, what is the point when Amazon will take care of it for you and it will be much easier and will help you avoid future issues if ordering from them. Also, when a customer is in the wrong, in other words their issue with their order was related to their error and not Amazon's or they wanted to return or replace an item that was outside of the stated time frame, past order history was something I looked at when I made the decision to go ahead and resolve the issue at further expense to Amazon and not the customer.

Except for the people I worked with at Amazon, the only pleasure I got from my job was when I was able to go above and beyond to help out a customer, which was encouraged by the company and not discouraged. I was at the point where I hated my job for various reasons but I can say of all the companies I have worked for in the capacity of customer service, Amazon.com was head and shoulders above the rest (most all very well known) as far as encouraging us to do everything that was within the realm of reasonable to resolve issues and keep the customers happy. I realize they don't always meet those expectations in every case but they were the best of anyplace I ever worked for. Like I told a customer on my last day there who said he loved Amazon and was always happy with the way we resolved any issues he had, If you send and email or call and don't like how someone offered to resolve your issue, wait a little bit and contact us again by phone. I realize it seems like Amazon doesn't want you to call them and that might even be true, but the average rep would rather try and resolve an issue over the phone rather than email, unless it is just a basic lost package issue or something. And due to it being a rather stressful job there is quite a bit of turnover, so there is always the chance that you might call and get someone new or maybe you got shuffled to an overseas call center, which I hate because they are basically robots who make decisions based on what a "wizard" spits out after entering order information. If you get a good experienced customer service rep and try not to verbally abuse them, chances are you problem is going to get fixed.

Number one thing I hated was when someone started bitching about the security information we were REQUIRED to verify at risk of our job. Number one thing I loved was when someone told me at the beginning of the call, I am just so frustrated with this order. I loved it because I knew then and there in most cases I was going to do whatever the hell I had to, to get their problem fixed and I was going to be hanging up with someone who was very happy they called and got me.