adywan said:thanks for the advise. The thing is that thanks to our postal system the seller was 100% covered with what he did. You can request a signature upon delivery without having to pay for the insurance. now because the post office have lost it Paypal (and any other company for that matter) and it wasn't insured the most they will offer is £30. the seller is covered along with paypal. you see , the thing with that Paypal clause you posted , is that this only covers when a buyer claims that he hasn't received an item but the seller is saying that he sent it and he has proof that the buyer has received it. I spoke to my brothers friend who is a solicitor this weekend and he has had a look over it and he has said that it is indeed the post office that are liable and paypal don't have to cover anything in this case. If he had paid for the insurance then i would get all the money back, but he didn't so i'm screwed.
Stuff like this really gets me angry. Paypal advertises itself as "the safe, easy way to pay" but it is anything but. They rip off both buyers and sellers on a regular basis.
It clearly states that the seller is only covered by Paypal if he gets a signature. By covering the seller when there is no signature, and he's merely requested one, they are in breach of their own rules. Whether the package going missing is the post office's fault or not is irrelevant. It's a seperate entity, and not insuring a package has ALWAYS been at consequence to the seller. NEVER the buyer (who has no say in it). You should have your full refund and he should have his measly £30 compensation. That is how things have always worked!
In my experience, if a seller cannot provide door to door tracking, the case is always found in favour of the buyer.
On ebay (I'm assuming you bought on ebay), you will have noticed on the right hand side there's a box that says "you are covered by paypal buyer protection up to £500". This, in your case, would be an outright lie.
I would strongly urge you to at least try with trading standards (I'd even be happy to do some chasing on your behalf). Just go to them with the following info. Along with the relevant paypal transaction ids etc:
The auction was covered by Paypal Buyer Protection.
The item did not arrive.
No tracking info provided. No signature indicating item arrived.
Paypal still found in favour of the seller.
You're out £200.
Seriously. Unless there have been some major changes in how paypal works recently, protecting the seller has always hinged upon them taking the proper precautions in sending an item. No signature, and the buyer wins the case. It is then up to the seller to recoup his losses from the post office. No insurance, then that's the seller's problem for not taking the proper precautions. That's how it's always been for me, and I've dealt with them MANY times.