In Reference to Ebay problems:
I have purchased a lot of items off of ebay including both my barracudas, my dodge duely and a nice 4x4 "compact tractor." i have filed one lawsuit against a seller and threatened two others with litigation. obviously, the first course of action is to let ebay open a case. i had one of these recently and i got all my money back plus the shipping costs. my most recent case was "closed in my favor" almost immediately because i had taken pictures of the items i received and uploaded them to ebay along with the original pics the seller had posted in the ad. it was clear that the seller had not sent me what he had advertised. i have been an attorney for over 25 years now and a simple rule i learned my first year of law school applies to most things in life: "if you can't prove it, it DIDN'T happen." so FYI to my fellow mopar fans - take pictures and write everything down that you can just in case you may need to recreate/prove what happened at a later date. as to chilidart's case - even though the buyer is in CA and the seller is in PA i would tell the buyer to go to his local Magistrate/District Justice/Small Claims Court and file a suit. here in PA it only costs $37.50 to file a small claims suit and most people once they receive a suit via certified mail will think again about settling the dispute. and even if the person does not respond, go forward with the claim and obtain a judgment from your local court. it is a general rule in all states that if a judgment is not appealed within the time period prescribed by that state, the judgment becomes final. once this happens, all the plaintiff has to do is send the final judgment to the court where the defendant lives and proceed to "collect" the award of the court. the staff at your local court will explain how this can be done.
i always try to work things out with the occasional deadbeat seller that i encounter, however, sometimes you just have to pursue the "ball bat in the face" approach - legally that is.