ebay seller question, is it ever ok to cancel a paid item?

First off, please don't let one or even a few bad apples ruin selling things on a platform like eBay for you. Yes, there are some real shmucks out there who will give you a giant headache from time to time. But, the vast majority of buyers are just honest folks looking to buy something. I've been buying and selling on eBay for over a decade and only had a handful of really bad experiences.

Situations like yours really suck because this buyer clearly had every intention of doing some shady crap right from the start. In no way would any buyer ever be entitled to a partial refund because they think they overpaid. That's just asinine right there. Unfortunately, this is probably the biggest problem with being a lower level eBay seller (they'll bend over backwards to help out power sellers, but don't seem to care a whole lot for small, part-time sellers). Any seller absolutely should be allowed to leave negative feedback for a buyer when it's warranted and eBay removing that option is one of the worst things they're ever done.

Sadly, putting a disclaimer in your listings wouldn't really help at all. Yes, it might be a good idea because some unscrupulous buyers might be frightened off by it, but ultimately, whenever you sell something on eBay, you agree to eBay's rules regardless of what you put in your listing. For instance, you can say all payments are due in 24 hours and anything not paid within 24 hours will be cancelled and relisted if you like, but the reality is that eBay allows 2 days before you can even open a non-payment case against a buyer and then allows the buyer an additional 4 days before you can close that case. So, it doesn't really matter what you right in your listing, you're still going to be beholden to eBay's policies and regulations.

eBay does usually side with the buyer in disputed, but not ALWAYS. And even if you do lose a case initially, it is possible to get that overturned. I had a sale one time where that came into play. I was doing custom painted and decorated vintage game consoles for a while. I'd buy ugly looking or broken consoles and controllers, fix them up and give them a nice custom paint job (kept me going for a while until stock consoles got too expensive to obtain). Most of the time, a new part or two and some know-how would get a supposedly broken system working like new again. This one time, I just couldn't get a system working again. Not wanting to just waste the parts, I decided to customize it anyway and sell if as a show-piece. I literally wrote both in the listing title "DOES NOT WORK PROPERLY" and in three different places within the body of the listing page "SYSTEM DOES NOT WORK PROPERLY - console will power one, but won't play games. Sold as a display piece only." Sure enough, I sold it and literally minutes after the delivery confirmation showed it as delivered, the buyer opens a Not As Described case claiming that the game system didn't work. Sure enough, because eBay uses a largely automated disputed process, the case was closed against me and the funds were removed from my paypal account, a refund automatically issued to the buyer, and the buyer left me negative feedback (my first and only non-positive feedback). I was pissed, so I called eBay customer service. They read off the script as they usually do until I spoke with a manager and politely requested that a human being actually read the description of the item in question. As soon as they actually did that, the manager promptly apologized, returned the funds to my paypal account, and removed the unwarranted negative feedback from my account. They buyer also had their account suspended for abusing the dispute process. So, yeah, you might initially lose a dispute, but if it's not a justified reason, just put up a stink about it (in a polite manner - yelling and screaming and blaming eBay customer service won't get you anywhere) and it can be changed.

Point is that sure, you're gonna run into some crappy buyers looking to scam you on eBay (or any sale platform). But, the positives will almost always outweigh the negatives. Just look at the numbers for your own history. At least 200 sales and only 2 or 3 issues. That's like 1% of the time you have a problem, meaning that 99% of the time it works out splendidly. That's pretty danged good odds.

In the future, you might try a tactic that I've found pretty useful in weeding out a few more crap buyers. List things at a Buy It Now price with the Best Offer option. Set you Buy It Now price higher than your normally would and do NOT set an automatic acceptance level for your Best Offer. Almost any buyer interested in what you're selling will try to get it cheaper if they can, so they'll send an offer. Not having an automatically accepted price point will allow you, as a seller, to sort of pre-screen the buyer by looking into their location, feedback history, and other such factors. Then you can better respond to them by counter-offering or declining (and they blocking the buyer if you got skeevy vibes from them). I'm pretty sure I've avoided at least a few headaches that way.

Yeah, but then it's a wash anyway after what I paid in shipping and a return label ebay would have charged me. And then I run the risk of it being returned screwed up or him not even sending the same item back. And there's really no way of proving anything.

You do have a comeback if they return it to you damaged though
I just cant stand people like that, so out of principle, I'd rather take the hit on the return, I have done so in the past and they just dont bother returning it 9 times out of 10

I would say for 1/50 transactions, you encounter a buyer who is the online equivalent of the lowlife virgin who repacks figures and returns them to the store and/or steals the accessories.

look always at there feedback,

i tend to stick to the facebook groups im in when selling stuff then ebay

What sucks about eBay is that there is no real recourse for a seller. I've had people BIN then tell me they didn't want the item, buy items then try to hold me up for a discount after they receive the item, the old classic of buying/winning the item then ghosting.

I've tried to state my case to eBay, but they don't care as long as they get their cut. You can't even leave negative feedback for buyers to warn others.

When eBay works, it's a cool platform. But when things go south....it's a trainwreck.

PROTIP: I almost ALWAYS ship Priority because your parcel is insured (up to $50) if the item you sell is more than $50...kick in the extra couple of bucks and pay for insurance.