Looking for advice, bought item from China, defective, want my money back

[DCBaudin]

So hello I hope this is okay to post here. I'm kind of up a creek without a paddle or a clue.

I bought an electronic product from a Chinese seller via their website because they had a good reputation amongst a group of people and lots of good reviews. It was $800.

And to top it off I paid with a Paypal echeck.

So I received the item and it turns out it's defective and misadvertised on top of it all. The company has a shipping address in California I know from reading reviews and talking to some people who have made returns (some via Amazon, others were reviewer freebies).

However when I won my Paypal claim they provided an address in China. Shipping will cost a bit over $300. I'm trying to ask the company to provide their American return address but I don't have much faith they will. They've already ignored messages from Paypal for a day.

My bank says they could do something to reverse the initial payment but that PayPal might come back and dispute it. (Not sure it's actually a reversal, they didn't use that terminology. But I know nothing.)

So if they don't pony up the American return do I do the bank reversal? What are the chances Paypal hits me back on that? Do I send it back and hit the reversal if they don't refund me and just eat the $300? Do I have any other options?
What if they claim it was damaged in delivery? UPS said their insurance will only cover if it's damaged or lost Stateside.

I appreciate any advice that could be given. I'm a low earner who was just trying to further his own craft. Losing this money on an unusable product is a devastatingly bad hit for me.

[Modee]

I'm going on the assumption that you won the PayPal claim but that you must return the item with online verifiable tracking to reclaim your funds from PayPal.

You are correct, the terms of your PayPal account require you to make any such claims through your PayPal account ONLY which it appears you have already done. Even if you had paid with a credit card via PayPal, if you were to take a dispute with your credit card bank rather than with PayPal or in addition to complaining to PayPal, that would jeopardize your PayPal account.

Similarly, if you convince your bank to dispute the ACH withdrawal from your account, which really - you may be stretching there because the ACH was legitimate (an authorized withdrawal of funds from your bank account), you may also jeopardize your PayPal account.

Bottom line, you have to decide - is it worth jeopardizing your PayPal account over $300. If yes, then you should try to convince your bank to do to the reversal. Otherwise, just return the item and view it as an expensive lesson in why there is little or no recourse when purchasing items from overseas with other than a direct credit card payment.

There are ways to ship the item all the way to China insured. Go to a local freight forwarder and you may find a way to ship it for less than UPS. Oddly, you might even find it less expensive to ship it via USPS. It all depends on the box size or weight.

On international shipments where the item isn't intrinsically valuable (i.e. not something that someone would want to steal and resell), as long as there is SOME amount of insurance on the item it will rarely end up lost. In other words, if you pay for $100. of insurance that should do it.

Good luck.

[DCBaudin]

Thanks very much. Really great to hear a knowledgeable response on the situation.
They didn't tell me it was an ACH reversal by name, but I figured that's what it was. I thought it was kind of strange. And don't really want to do anything illicit.

But would a freight forwarder still have tracking to keep it under buyer protection?

[Modee]

Freight Forwarders have different shipping methods and yes, if you need tracking, it can be done with that. Just make sure it will be online trackable. Don't forget to try USPS too.

To help the rest of us out please do post follow ups and let us know what you did and what happened.

[DCBaudin]

Will do. Was told by PayPal that USPS can't track into China. But I'm going to try calling a local (well, 40 minutes away) shipping place tomorrow that does DHL, USPS, UPS, Fedex, and Freight Forward.

I'm also waiting tonight to see if the company will either help pay for shipping or give me the American return address I know they have as one buyer/returner from Amazon and one reviewer have confirmed to me that they returned to a place in California but received the device from the company (Huion).

Some reviewers have also noted they said they would reimburse shipping and didn't till called out in public on it. Which I guess I can stick that in my back pocket in a last ditch.

Edit: And now I've obtained the return address given to reviewers for some ammo. Hopefully ammo I won't need.

[DCBaudin]

Well now they've finally sent me a new address: In Ontario, California. They also want to take -$50 from my refund and have not sent this new address to PayPal despite having received two e-mails from PayPal.

Edit: Okay. It seems they want around $40 from the initial price to return it and will refund that $40 if the item is found to be defective. And I have gotten them to agree to send the details and new mailing address to PayPal and told them I would inform PayPal that I have agreed to this. So ultimately I'm out $112. But I can live with that just for this whole ordeal to be over.

[Modee]

You were best off in this instance handling the matter through PayPal and glad to see that it appears to be working out.

[DCBaudin]

Well we still have one more stage to see. I'm still worried that they may not relay the information to PayPal. Communication has been slow, but they did send me an after hours e-mail so I'm cautiously hopeful.

"Kindly tell you that since we are off duty now, we are not able to send message to paypal for the moment. Please kindly understand that we will send them message as soon as we are on duty tomorrow. Sorry for keeping you wait for this matter. Hope you understand. "