I have sold my old iPhone 3GS on eBay. The buyer received it yesterday, but however I received a call from him saying the iphone box was there but no iPhone was in it.. I already contacted UPS and there investigating it. Now I have the IMEI number and Serial Number for that phone. I just contacted ATT and they said there is no way to track it even with that, is that true? There's not even a way to see if it's activated??
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Anyway to track iPhone with serial number? *Urgent*
- Thread starter Vin365
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It can't be tracked but AT&T could probably tell you if its activated but that might be confidential since it is not yours anymore. Or the buyer is trying to screw you.
This really sucks. But it looks like you're pretty much out of luck.
Reasons being:
1.) eBay/PayPal have an overwhelming bias to always support the buyer.
2.) You don't have any video evidence of putting the iPhone in the box, closing it shut, and handing it over to an agent of a courier that you could use to prove you actually mailed it.
3.) The buyer can always claim that you put in something else (a brick, etc) to make the box weight show that it had an iPhone in it.
As far as I know, there is no way to really beat this kind of fraud, unless you have a video showing all this.
What is the buyer's feedback like? Can you show us the link to the auction?
Reasons being:
1.) eBay/PayPal have an overwhelming bias to always support the buyer.
2.) You don't have any video evidence of putting the iPhone in the box, closing it shut, and handing it over to an agent of a courier that you could use to prove you actually mailed it.
3.) The buyer can always claim that you put in something else (a brick, etc) to make the box weight show that it had an iPhone in it.
As far as I know, there is no way to really beat this kind of fraud, unless you have a video showing all this.
What is the buyer's feedback like? Can you show us the link to the auction?
It still pisses me off that the buyer will get the iPhone and gets to keep his money while the seller has to go through all the pain of filing a claim and waiting for it to process, etc, etc.
Thank you. It's very stressful. Thank god I got it insured, it's going to make me think twice about selling on eBay.Even though the buyer has over 67 pos. feedback(100%) every single item that he has bought is an iPhone it's fishy..
Could be a store or reseller. Who knows maybe a UPS employee tampered with the box. And if everyone of the other iPhone purchases were positive why would he try and trick you.
With eBay's buyer-centric policies, a seller can't leave a buyer negative feedback anymore. It's really stupid if you ask me since I've had to deal with extremely rude late or non-payers and I can't do a single thing about it but report them so they can get a slap on the wrist.
This is why I make a boxing video of everything I sell on ebay, complete with the shipping label and postage.
I sold an iPhone on eBay. What I did was create a free mobile me account, and tied it to the phone I shipped to the buyer. The buyer claimed he didnt get the phone, I then remotely wiped the phone and locked it down. He then emails me asking why they phone is now locked down, to which I say, thought you didnt have the phone....so I won out. I suggest do this. The mobileme account you create expires anyway, and you'll only have access to it to cancel the cc's and such
Clever idea but what's the outcome? You still didn't win if you don't get paid.
Ohh I got paid, he complained he never recieved the phone, but he shot me an email saying "hey, now the phone you sent me is locked" once I added that quote of his to his paypal claim against me, they basically awarded in favor of me within a day, I even faxed them a copy of his email with headers proving he obviously has the phone if he knows i locked it....so I got my money for my 3G with this route...
can they restore the phone before you lock it down? or even if they restore it can you still lock it down??
Even if you do lock it down, they can still do a factory restore of the phone and they'll have a brand new phone ready to use.
If you have insurance it won't really matter. When I was doing ebay I required insurance on all iPhones.
Buyers cannot be negged now I believe.
Often scammers only use accounts with good ratings.
Buyers cannot be negged now I believe.
Often scammers only use accounts with good ratings.
Unless it's a continuous shot up until you hand it to the teller, that is an epic waste of time and proves nothing other than you putting it into a box. You can still turn around and ship whatever you want.
Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_0_1 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/532.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/4.0.5 Mobile/8A306 Safari/6531.22.7)
Great outcome and evidence that paypal doesn't always side with the buyer. You obviously had a stupid buyer who was dumb enough to send you that email rather than restore the iPhone out of its locked state.
iphone1105 said:
Great outcome and evidence that paypal doesn't always side with the buyer. You obviously had a stupid buyer who was dumb enough to send you that email rather than restore the iPhone out of its locked state.
Every time I see a story like this it makes me happy I was able to sell to a friend. I don't mind I made less money. That amount is better than getting scammed and getting nothing!
Another safe way to ship an iphone for an ebay sale is through your local mailbox store (or UPS Store). Have the store pack, insure, and ship the phone. Request that the store employee INSPECT and DOCUMENT the contents on the receipt/shipping form. This provides an independent third party verification.
I have to write this to support the original poster
The exact same thing happened to me.
I sold the phone, the guy wanted me to ship it to Russia. I said no. He then said he wanted me to ship it to a california address on his paypal account even though his ebay profile said he was in minnesota
I ship it, insure it, give him the tracking info. 2 days later he signs for it. I have proof he signed for it. I hear nothing from him for the next 10 days. PayPal has a hold on the money, so I ask him for feedback so they will release the money. He then immediately files a complaint with ebay saying the box was empty.
It's been several weeks now, I've filed a claim with the shipping company, and am waiting for feedback. EBay said the resolution was for the buyer to return the phone to me and for me to refund his money but I have reiterated to them that this solution doesn't work because he has no phone to send me (supposedly)
The exact same thing happened to me.
I sold the phone, the guy wanted me to ship it to Russia. I said no. He then said he wanted me to ship it to a california address on his paypal account even though his ebay profile said he was in minnesota
I ship it, insure it, give him the tracking info. 2 days later he signs for it. I have proof he signed for it. I hear nothing from him for the next 10 days. PayPal has a hold on the money, so I ask him for feedback so they will release the money. He then immediately files a complaint with ebay saying the box was empty.
It's been several weeks now, I've filed a claim with the shipping company, and am waiting for feedback. EBay said the resolution was for the buyer to return the phone to me and for me to refund his money but I have reiterated to them that this solution doesn't work because he has no phone to send me (supposedly)
Just sold 3GS on eBay too
I was afraid this was going to happen to me also when I recently sold mine on eBay. I put a passcode on the phone and requested him call me once he received it for the passcode. I got a call luckily and asked him to call me back after he had left me positive feedback about receiving the phone, paypal released the funds right after that and I gave him the passcode.
But with all the risks and scams now days, I'd probably stick to CL on my next iPhone sale.
I was afraid this was going to happen to me also when I recently sold mine on eBay. I put a passcode on the phone and requested him call me once he received it for the passcode. I got a call luckily and asked him to call me back after he had left me positive feedback about receiving the phone, paypal released the funds right after that and I gave him the passcode.
But with all the risks and scams now days, I'd probably stick to CL on my next iPhone sale.