You go to your local movie theater hoping to see the latest new release. You buy a ticket and popcorn and sit down only to be greeted by a blank screen. “The show will start in a moment,” says the usher when you ask, but ten minutes later, nothing. Twenty minutes later, darkness. Ready to go to a competing theater, you ask for a refund. “I can't give you a refund,” says the usher, “because the manager's taken your cash to go and buy a copy of the film you wanted to see. He should be back in a couple of hours.” When you respond with incredulity, the usher replies, “Hey, we didn't have the film in the building. What else were we supposed to do? Hang tight, enjoy our comfortable seats, have some more popcorn while you wait. Don't be so unreasonable.”
Sound crazy?
Unfortunately, this is not an uncommon story on eBay—it's one played out over and over again between unprepared sellers, drop shippers, and/or hapless buyers who find themselves in a shopping twilight zone in which they have no cash and no item for an extended period of time.
The Drop Ship Nightmare
Most buyers are unhappy to discover that they are dealing with a drop shipper. There's nothing wrong with drop shipping per se, but if it's so obvious that your buyer notices the fact, it likely means that something has gone wrong in the transaction—and that your buyer has already made you out to be an unethical seller, whether the hiccup is your fault or the fault of your fulfillment partner.Most often, these hiccups take the form of fulfillment delays, sometimes a matter of days, now and then a matter of weeks during which the buyer is growing ever-more antsy—and with good reason. After all, whether the delay is your fault or your fulfillment partner's fault, it's clear that the one person whose fault it isn't is the buyer, who could have easily bought from someone else and may regret having bought from you if the situation isn't quickly resolved.
To make matters worse, some sellers have the habit of adopting the “not my fault” position whenever anything goes wrong in the drop shipping department. There's nothing that a buyer likes less than hearing something like: “It's not my fault—my supplier is supposed to have sent it to you already, but he's out of stock!”
Let's be clear. So far as the buyer and the law are concerned, it is your fault, since your contract is with the buyer. They gave you money, you're responsible for getting them the goods. Period.
Cash Floats and Sour Notes
The only thing more irritating to an eBay shopper than a drop shipping transaction that's gone wrong is hearing the following:“I'm sorry I haven't shipped your item yet. I ordered the item in question once you paid but it hasn't arrived yet. I have the box ready and will ship it to you as soon as I have it in stock, probably this week, definitely before the end of next week.”
This scenario is totally beyond the pale from a customer service standpoint. You sold an item that you don't have, apparently without an existing contract for or assurance of its fulfillment and delivery. Not only do you, the seller, not have the item in hand—you also don't have a proper fulfillment relationship with a supplier, nor the cash in hand should your buyer ask for a refund.
To really seal the deal, some sellers automatically print a shipping label for an item the moment they receive payment, even if they then turn around and use that payment to order the item in question and have it delivered to them en route to the buyer. The theory is that the tracking number will reassure everyone that the transaction and shipment are proceeding normally, even if slowly.
In truth, this is a sure way to annoy buyer, eBay, and PayPal alike, since the item will show as “shipped” in tracking information but will never arrive. The other involved parties may in the meantime spend frustrated weeks trying to determine just who has the package, whether it's on its way, and whether a chargeback or buyer protection refund is in order.
