You should NOT have the buyer return the item until FedEx has completed its evaluation of your claim. From FedEx's Terms & Conditions: "FedEx reserves the right to inspect a damaged shipment on the recipient's premises as well as the right to retrieve the damaged package for inspection at a FedEx facility." So be sure to tell the buyer to retain the original packaging, and tell him that FedEx might want to inspect everything. Also be very careful to file your FedEx claim correctly. If you do it wrong, they can exempt themselves from all liability. (Read the "Claims" section of their Terms & Conditions:
FedEx Express Terms and Conditions and FedEx Ground Tariff)
Buyers are supposed to file PayPal disputes/claims only if they are unable to obtain a satisfactory resolution from the seller. You should let your buyer know that if he initiates a PayPal dispute, it will then have to get escalated to a claim. Since you are cooperating with him, that is unlikely to occur. Even if it does get escalated, if PayPal resolves the claim in his favor, he will have to return the item to you and pay the shipping costs himself: "PayPal will generally require the buyer to ship an item that the buyer claims is Significantly Not as Described back to the seller (
at the buyer's expense), and PayPal will generally require a seller to accept the item back and refund the buyer the full purchase price plus original shipping costs."
If you declared a value for the package when you shipped it via FedEx, they are liable up to that amount. If it's not a big number, they'll probably pay it. In that case, you will be fully covered on your end, so you can reimburse the buyer and let him keep the item or ask him to send it back and agree to pay actual FedEx Ground shipping costs based on his receipt.
Given the above, and assuming that we're talking about a total that's big enough to make it worth your while to go thru filing a FedEx claim, I would tell the buyer the following:
- You're willing to give him a full refund. (This way, if he decides to go ahead with a PayPal dispute, you can show that you have already agreed to a refund.)
- Resolving the problem thru the FedEx claims process is a better solution for him than using the PayPal claims process.
- He needs to retain all the original shipping materials, since FedEx may ask to inspect everything. (Unlikely if it's a small amount of money, but it will probably scare him off if he's exaggerating the damage.) You also need him to send you digital photos right away that clearly show all damage incurred, since you need to submit these to FedEx.
- FedEx states that "Most cases will normally be resolved in 5 to 7 business days after we receive your claim form and supporting claim documentation."
- Since you have to depend on the buyer's cooperation in order to complete the FedEx claim process (and FedEx might reject the claim), you can offer two options: (1) If he wants a refund now, he can ship the item back to you, and you will issue a refund for the item and the cost of shipping it to him. However, since this will invalidate your FedEx claim, you're very sorry, but he would have to pay the return shipping. This is the exact same result he would get if he went thru the PayPal claims process and it was resolved in his favor. (2) If he is willing to wait until FedEx resolves your claim, you will give him a full refund and let him keep the item if FedEx finds in your favor. (Here I'm assuming your declared value for the package is equal to your selling price.) If FedEx rejects the claim or issues only a partial refund, you will still honor option (1) and let him return the item at his cost less the amount of the partial refund (up to the full cost of return shipping), or you will credit him the amount of FedEx's partial refund and he can keep the damaged item.
I think that approach would cover all the possible outcomes and give you all the protection you need. I don't see any benefit in offering an immediate partial refund, since all that does is cause you to lose money based on an unverified claim of damage. In any event, you described the item as not working, so I'm not even sure PayPal would resolve a claim in the buyer's favor if there's no visible damage to the item. Probably all that's happened is that some connection in the computer has come loose, so if you get it back you'll probably be able to fix it in 2 minutes.
BTW, you should always assume that anything you ship via FedEx will be dropped from a height of about 30" and get jostled a lot. If you're shipping something fragile (and it's valuable enough to warrant the effort/expense), the best solution is to double-box it with lots of padding between the outer and inner box. (For the padding, use foam or bubble wrap, NOT those larger air pouches, which deflate on impact!) Any computer with a built-in monitor will be very vulnerable to shipping damage, so those should always be double-boxed.
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Originally Posted by src3collector
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