Problem with "sealed" boxes

[Guest]

[kbmum]

His auctions say sealed boxes.  He is most definitley playing games with the difference between sealed and factory sealed, and worded his auctions accordingly.

[canny19]

The seller said that he would by the PW cards that are missing.
I think he knows how much they are!!!

I think that was very craft for them not telling them.
Although the descripion didnt say that they were sealed, on the connections ones, thats not the point!

Chris

[grecopa]

I don't know much about PW cards, but is he going to buy you cards worth the same or more than what you paid for the boxes?  I still don't like that option.  It sounds fishy.

[Anna]

I also wrote this seller about my boxes this morning.  Here's what I wrote:

Hi Ken,

I’m writing to you in regards to the auctions that I won from you.  I have already left you positive feedback on the 4 items I won, but I wanted to let you know that I was very disappointed with the hobby boxes that I won from you.

Out of the 4 boxes I won, all Inkworks, 3 of them were resealed boxes, not factory-sealed.

The two Charms Connections boxes (#6201428834) that came with binders did in fact contain pieceworks cards, but the packs were repackaged in such a way that only two base sets were able to be made, normally the collation is better.  The boxes also only had only 2 foil chase cards apiece, where normally there are 4-5 each.

The Scooby Doo M&M box (#6202406821) did not have any Sparkly chase cards or an auto in the packs, only base cards and stickers.  The Catwoman box (6202398871) did have the factory-sealed wrapper, but there wasn’t a pieceworks card in the box, so I contacted Inkworks about the missing pieceworks card and they are sending me a replacement.

Since your auctions stated that these items were purchased by you in a liquidation sale, I wanted you to be aware that the boxes you are selling have been picked over and resealed.  Had I had know these boxes were resealed and not factory-sealed; I would not have bid on your auctions at all.

The box I’m really upset with is the Scooby Doo box, because $36.69 is a lot of money to spend for some base cards and stickers.  Is there a way you can somehow partially compensate me for this box, since now I have to buy these inserts that should have been in the box?

Sincerely,
Anna

I will let you all know his reponse when I receive it.

[Nienna]

Good Luck to all of you over these auctions. :'(
I've been appalled over what this seller has done and I'm sure Cindy is right over how carefully he's worded the auction listings!
Please keep us informed when you hear anything fresh.

[Anna]

I received a response back from the seller and this was his reply:

Some of the boxes had print on the wrap & some did not. I rechecked the
pictures on the scooby doo box you spoke of & it was plain to see that it
did not have the printing on it so it was not factory sealed. If I need to
compensate you for something just let me know what it is & how much.

Thanks

So now my question is this, what is a fair compensation for this box?

The box did contain two complete base sets and 2 full sets of stickers, but no autograph or sketch card.  I believe the sketch cards are very rare and that most likely I would have only pulled an autograph had the box been factory sealed.

[grecopa]

Who knows?  Would you feel right asking for the moon - a Sketch and an auto?  And which sketch and auto would you base your compensation price on anyway?  Maybe he could refund you the money minus the price of the 2 base sets and stickers?  What a huge can of worms. 

[Scifi Cards]

Unfortunately, I'm not sure that this box was much worse than many factory sealed boxes.  I've opened 3 boxes of Scooby Doo M&M and have yet to pull an auto or a sketch.  I checked Jeff Allender's site and the autos were 1:62 packs and sketches were 1:85, meaning I've just had plain bad luck.

http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/allender/scoobymm.htm

But, to be fair, since it was not factory sealed you were robbed of your fair odds.  Not to mention the 5 Sparkly cards you should have gotten...

No guess as to what would be fair compensation on this.  That is a very tricky call.

Ed

[beckham1]

Wow, I also won a box from this seller, but haven't paid yet as I am trying to get a confirmation on if I can get insurance.  By the way John thanks for outbidding me on about 3 LOTR boxes   Well I will be curious to hear if your boxes have the logo seal on the wrapping.  Just judging by previous auctions I have seen that were resealed it seems that most of the time the seller is aware of what they are doing, I guess you should give the seller the benefit of the doubt, but I've been burned before.

Here is the auction I won  http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=6204883981, I guess I need to send the seller an email and make sure it has the inkworks logo on the wrapping or maybe i can pay sellers fees and get out of it.

[Tea_and_Fruit]

Recieve a response


If you want I can try to buy you a few pieceworks cards to make up
for it. Let me know & if so just send me your address again and sorry for
the trouble

I decided that i want a refund and no PWs. So what would be fair? I paid 150$ with shipping to germany for 3 Charmed Boxes and only get 5 Foil Cards + 3 Boxtopper Cards.

Can someone here help ne with the mail again 

[Sharon]

For what it is worth I have just re-read this whole thread and am convinced this seller knew exactly what they were doing.  In the reply to Tea and Fruit they distinguish between sealed and factory sealed boxes.  How many non-card people would know the difference?  IMO this seller was just trying their luck and hoping uninformed people bought these boxes.

I would have a go at a complaint note for you but I tend to rant a bit    Maybe something like:

Thank you for your reply.  I have considered your offer of PW cards but would rather have some form of monetary compensation.  I originally paid you $150 for these boxes and would be grateful if you could let me know how much you are willing to refund.  Please bear in mind that out of the three boxes I only received 3 box toppers, 5 foil cards and no other chase cards.  The odds for this set are.................*

* Maybe you could put a link to the manufacturers website here.

I look forward to your early response


I am afraid I am a little bit sharper than rns91294 and to be honest her wording will probably get you a better result.  But good luck - this seller needs to learn that they can't rip people off, especially Yak Shackers 

[Scifi Cards]

Wow, I also won a box from this seller, but haven't paid yet as I am trying to get a confirmation on if I can get insurance.  By the way John thanks for outbidding me on about 3 LOTR boxes   Well I will be curious to hear if your boxes have the logo seal on the wrapping.  Just judging by previous auctions I have seen that were resealed it seems that most of the time the seller is aware of what they are doing, I guess you should give the seller the benefit of the doubt, but I've been burned before.

Here is the auction I won  http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=6204883981, I guess I need to send the seller an email and make sure it has the inkworks logo on the wrapping or maybe i can pay sellers fees and get out of it.

I don't know if it's any consolation, but the Alias box in the picture IS a factory sealed box.  The Inkworks logo is visible on that one.  Still not sure I'd trust this guy, but that one looks legit.

Insurance will probably double the shipping cost on that one for an international shipment.  Unfortunately, the US Postal service is VERY lacking in options for insuring international packages.

Ed

[LikORish-Spider]

Wow, I also won a box from this seller, but haven't paid yet as I am trying to get a confirmation on if I can get insurance.  By the way John thanks for outbidding me on about 3 LOTR boxes   Well I will be curious to hear if your boxes have the logo seal on the wrapping.  Just judging by previous auctions I have seen that were resealed it seems that most of the time the seller is aware of what they are doing, I guess you should give the seller the benefit of the doubt, but I've been burned before.

Here is the auction I won  http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=6204883981, I guess I need to send the seller an email and make sure it has the inkworks logo on the wrapping or maybe i can pay sellers fees and get out of it.

I got a response saying that the ROTK box is factory sealed. He conviently did not mention the others...hummm. And you can see the Topps logo on the PIX if you look closely, which I did. But the other two are dark colored boxes and the blue topps logo doesn't show up in the pix on the dark background. I'll keep everyone posted.

[Anna]

I received a response back from the seller and this was his reply:

Some of the boxes had print on the wrap & some did not. I rechecked the
pictures on the scooby doo box you spoke of & it was plain to see that it
did not have the printing on it so it was not factory sealed. If I need to
compensate you for something just let me know what it is & how much.

Thanks

So now my question is this, what is a fair compensation for this box?

The box did contain two complete base sets and 2 full sets of stickers, but no autograph or sketch card.  I believe the sketch cards are very rare and that most likely I would have only pulled an autograph had the box been factory sealed.

Per John's advice, I looked up some current eBay auctions to help me determine a fair compensation.  This is what I wrote back to the seller:

When I saw your auctions, I was under the impression that the boxes were factory-sealed because you did not state in your auctions that they weren’t.  In general, it is assumed that the box is factory-sealed unless otherwise specified in the auction.  Since this set is older, I was unaware that Inkworks had placed their logo on the shrink wrapping.  I usually buy Artbox hobby boxes, and they just recently started putting their logo on their wrapper a few months ago, so I thought the Inkworks wrappers were the same, a new addition.

I’ve looked on eBay and found an auction that has base sets and sticker sets.  The asking price is $5.95, so since I managed to put together 2 sets of each, that total would be about $12.00.

http://cgi.ebay.com/SCOOBY-DOO-MYSTERIES-MONSTERS-Card-Set-Stickers-PROMO_W0QQitemZ6207472328

The box also didn’t contain any Sparkly chase cards and I found a set that has an asking price of $9.95, but I’m aware that you normally wouldn’t complete an entire set from one box.

http://cgi.ebay.com/SCOOBY-DOO-MYSTERIES-and-MONSTERS-SPARKLY-Chase-Set_W0QQitemZ6208396937

I paid you $36.69 for the box but there wasn’t an autograph inside.  The lowest price autograph I could find is for $27.58

http://cgi.ebay.com/Scooby-Doo-Mysteries-Monsters-Susan-Blu-A3-Auto-Card_W0QQitemZ6173018332

So after looking at these auctions, for compensation I would like to request a refund for the amount of $20.00 from you.  If this is agreeable to you, please refund my PayPal for this amount.

Sincerely,
Anna

I will let you all know if I get a refund.

[Nienna]

Good luck on getting your refund Anna - I thought you were more than fair with the compensation you requested form him!
There are definitely Topps logos on all the boxes in the listing posted by Beckham, even the FOTRU box - I can see just the one on the Cave Troll's left shoulder!!
Same goes for the Alias box, but the others ... hard to say.

I tend to agree with Sharon that this seller knew exactly what they were doing and how to word the auctions to catch out the unwary!
Lousy git is about the cleanest thing I care to say about him ...

Please keep us posted won't you?

[beckham1]

Jules you beat me to the punch.  I totally agree if you look at most of the auction pics you can see logo's on the boxes.  So that leads me to believe one of two things:
1) The seller knew what they were doing and posted pics of boxes that only had logos
2) The seller was not aware of the issue and it is just luck of the draw with the box you get (and the seller did have more than one box of many of the boxes listed ie. there were 3 alias season 3 boxes listed)

Ed I am in the US so insurance shouldn't be more than $1.30 for $50 of coverage if I hear back on that I am going to email the seller about the seal.

Also I will be interested to see if a seller I just bought three boxes from who charged $10 shipping priority mail from Alaska (seems a little high) per box.  He said he would refund me some shipping after he sent the package.  So I was charged $30 for shipping 3 boxes.  I am a little concerned about this one, and will be a big rip off on shipping if I don't get like $17-$20 back from the seller.

[Bryanjs14]

Not sure if it is the same in Alaska, but I know for a fact that the USPS makes a $7.70 flat rate priority box that can fit up to 6 Harry Potter POAU boxes, so it should fit 3 non sport boxes pretty easily. I use them all the time. You should mention that to him and request $20 or so back.

[rns91294]

I would have a go at a complaint note for you but I tend to rant a bit    Maybe something like:

Thank you for your reply.  I have considered your offer of PW cards but would rather have some form of monetary compensation.  I originally paid you $150 for these boxes and would be grateful if you could let me know how much you are willing to refund.  Please bear in mind that out of the three boxes I only received 3 box toppers, 5 foil cards and no other chase cards.  The odds for this set are.................*

* Maybe you could put a link to the manufacturers website here.

I look forward to your early response

I am afraid I am a little bit sharper than rns91294 and to be honest her wording will probably get you a better result.  But good luck - this seller needs to learn that they can't rip people off, especially Yak Shackers 

Ah, thanks!!!

Just got back online so sorry if I behind here. 

I actually like what Sharon wrote. it is too the point.  If you didn't send it yet, you might want to ad:

I really like the thrill of opening my own boxes and being surprised of what cards I pull.  If I wanted to just get the PW cards, I would have just bid on them on my own. Is there any way you could compensate me for these auctions, minus the cost of the base sets that i was able to compile?

Thanks!

Again, keep us posted.

Shame how many people bought from this seller.

?

The two Charms Connections boxes (#6201428834) that came with binders did in fact contain pieceworks cards, but the packs were repackaged in such a way that only two base sets were able to be made, normally the collation is better. The boxes also only had only 2 foil chase cards apiece, where normally there are 4-5 each.

Anna

Anna- I just opened a sealed Inkworks box and only got 2 base sets.  I am about 8 cards shy of a third set.  Is this not normal

[Tea_and_Fruit]

2 Base Sets per Box are ok. I think that is normal for a Inkworks product

I ask the seller for a refund instead of the Pieceworks.   

[Nienna]

Dave - Just make sure your Alaskan seller isn't off hunting moose when he sends your boxes and leaves them for a 'friend' to do it for him!!
He used that one on me nearly two years ago when I dealt with him - best excuse for making a muck-up on sending stuff I think I've ever heard!!

Oh, and while I think about it - push him hard for your postal refund too.
He was supposed to send me a FOTR base set as compensation for making such a mess and I never received it and got fed-up emailing him ..... so he didn't get any kind of feedback from me.
Needless to say, I haven't bothered dealing with him again, which is a shame as he had some really nice LOTR costume cards for sale when many didn't have them.
*pft* his loss ... I bought them elsewhere!