Buyer falsely claims item is fake to force a return
Buyers sometimes falsely claim items are not genuine to force a return out of buyer's remorse, leaving sellers struggling to get platforms to acknowledge they acted in good faith. Conversely, buyers dealing with bad transactions face terrifying situations like being provided fraudulent customs forms and low valuation labels for expensive custom items, risking heavy fines and prosecution for customs fraud if they return the product.
What people tried
Every workaround mentioned in the threads below. We haven’t tested any of them — and nobody here is claiming they worked.
- 1retesting the item to prove authenticity
- 2Bypassing Etsy to do a credit card chargeback
- 3Keeping the item without shipping it back if Etsy already issued a refund
- 4Gather supporting documentation from the manufacturer and prepare for a potential chargeback
- 5Accept the return, deduct shipping costs and a restock fee, and block the customer
- 6Accept the return and refund to avoid a chargeback, then block the customer
In their words
Unedited, grouped by where they were said, most upvoted first within each place, each linked to the thread it came from.
“Bought a custom ring, ring arrives way late and it's objectively terrible. Seller refuses to honor their refund policy, Etsy steps in and rules in my favor. They provide a return shipping label to another country with the dollar amount as $100 and tariff code for imitation jewelry. It was listed for $3600, I paid $2,173. If I ship this back to them, I get fined and possibly prosecuted for customs fraud. WTF is happening?”source ↗
“A first time customer is requesting a return on an item because they’re claiming I sold them a fake item (which cannot be true since I received it directly from the incumbent company).”source ↗
Where this came up
People with this problem also raised
- 2How to know if an energy auditor is wrong
- 5Seller gave me a fake tracking number with a thank you card
- 15How to protect yourself against false accusations from students and parents
- 6How do I dispute a bunch of incorrect charges at once?
- 2Family opened credit cards in my name when I was a minor
- 18How to stop fraudulent chargebacks on online stores