Splitsville: Lose-Lose on eBay

I absolutely love eBay. I've had thousands of transactions on the platform over the last 15+ years, and for the most part it's been a pretty good experience. But sometimes things go wrong, and when they do it often feels like both parties come out losing. That was the case with this card, which on the surface is a beautiful 2015-16 Panini Totally Certified Materials Camo parallel of late NBA player and humanitarian Manute Bol. It's got a nice three-color relic piece and is serially-numbered # 07 / 25. It took a little while to arrive because it shipped out of Hong Kong, and I was pretty happy after I opened the package. Upon further inspection I found this:

The patch piece is so thick that the card bulges in the middle and it has actually begun to peel the layers of the card apart. The first thing I did was go back and review the auction listing to make sure I hadn't missed anything in the description or the pictures. There has been a time or two where I got a little too hasty with my bidding and went back to find that the faults were clearly listed in the item description or one of the photos. In those cases I just ate the loss. But this auction featured just one photo that didn't reveal the damage and the description said that the card was Near Mint to Mint in condition.

I spent enough on the card that I didn't really want to just drop things, so I took a picture of the damage and opened an Item Not as Described case on eBay. I always feel like kind of a douche when I open a case, but I also don't want to pay for something that isn't what was listed. I uploaded the picture and wrote a message describing the problem.

The seller refunded the money pretty quickly and eBay sent me a message saying that there was no need to send the item back. I was kind of relieved that I didn't have to ship it back as shipping it to Hong Kong was going to be a hassle, with customs paperwork to fill out and probably more cost than the card was worth. But I also felt bad because now I had a damaged card and my money back, and the seller was out the money I'd sent plus the money it took to ship the card. It was kind of his fault to begin with for not inspecting what he was selling but it still sucks for everyone involved.

I left positive feedback for the seller because he made things right. I'm not out to rip anyone off or blast someone who has done the best they can to make things right. A little while later I got kind of a passive-aggressive e-mail from the seller saying that the card had come out of the pack like that and that now that I had my money back maybe I could find another copy of the card, but that even if I found another three-color patch card from someone else it would probably have the same issue as the one I'd purchased from him. I understand that he is frustrated at the situation because he's now out the money and the card. In my mind we both lost on the deal. I didn't get the product I wanted and he lost money on the transaction.

I also sent a message out on Twitter directed at Panini with a picture of the damage and a complaint about their quality control. I am pretty sure that exactly 0 people saw that Tweet. It was worth a shot, I guess.

The card looks good from some angles, but in addition to the damage on the bottom edge it also now has negative feelings associated with the eBay experience I had. There are items in my collection that would otherwise be okay, but because of the way they came to me I have these bad feelings associated with them and I keep them tucked away so I don't get all fired up again. This will be one of those items. Whenever I stumble across it in the card boxes I will be reminded of the bad side of eBay, where everybody loses.

edit: I went back and sent the seller the amount that was charged as a shipping and handling fee. It felt like the right thing to do. It's only a few bucks.