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  1. #1
    ford2
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    I'm a seller Ebay for over 5 yrs, I just sold a used phone last week, and the lady that bought it from me took it to her local sprint store 6 states away to have it turned on, and they said her phone was stolen & confiscated it. I own a very small pawnshop and have sold well over 50 phones on Ebay and this is a first. I run every item I buy through my local police dept. when I buy it. One red flag for me is, the lady I that is giving me this story has only been on Ebay for 2 weeks, with 0 feedbacks, I have a 400+ perfect feedback rating. What should I do. The lady wants a full refund, and I wouldn't even get my phone back? Thanks


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  2. #2
    Brad729
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    Re: Stolen phone confiscated.

    Well, did you keep a copy of the phone's ESN? With it, you can call Sprint and explain the story to them. They should be able to confirm or deny whether the phone is stolen merchandise. If you didn't take note of the ESN there's no way to be sure. If you want to prevent this from happening in the future, you should always call CDMA providers with the ESN number to verify that it's clear for activation (not lost or stolen), or if the provider is GSM they can tell you by the IMEI number.

    Honestly, I don't think it's a very good idea to accept cell phones as a pawn item. You're only setting yourself up for this to happen again. People might not file a police report on a stolen phone, but they are definitely going to report it to their service provider so it gets blacklisted and blocked from future activations. I hope this answer helps...



  3. #3
    RooDlux
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    Re: Stolen phone confiscated.

    When ever I have sold my old cell phones, the place did an esn check on it before hand. Once I asked him what he was doing, he just said he was calling Sprint to find out if the phone is able to be reactivated. The place I sold the phone to was a store that only did that kind of stuff. It wasn't a general pawn shop, but more like a cell phone only pawn shop. You could also get hooked up with new phones and service there to.

    From now on, I would always call the provider of the phone and check with them, then maybe check with the police dept.

    I'm not sure what you should do, maybe if you do have the esn number still you can call the provider and find out if the phone was really activated. If not, maybe find out if it is able to be reactivated. I everything is good, then I would not give her anything. I'm sure there are things you can protect yourself on ebay from people like that if she is lying. I don't want to judge because I am a buyer with 0 buys or 0 sells and I'm not out there to just scam people. I could carry on all day with this but I'm sure you get the idea. Sorry to hear about your misfortune, but I'm sure things will work their way out of the best.
    It's Not A Tumor!!



  4. #4
    camstuf
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    Re: Stolen phone confiscated.

    She should provide you with a receipt from whom ever took the phone from her.
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  5. #5
    Dirty-Harry
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    Re: Stolen phone confiscated.

    Quote Originally Posted by ford2
    I'm a seller Ebay for over 5 yrs, I just sold a used phone last week, and the lady that bought it from me took it to her local sprint store 6 states away to have it turned on, and they said her phone was stolen & confiscated it. I own a very small pawnshop and have sold well over 50 phones on Ebay and this is a first. I run every item I buy through my local police dept. when I buy it. One red flag for me is, the lady I that is giving me this story has only been on Ebay for 2 weeks, with 0 feedbacks, I have a 400+ perfect feedback rating. What should I do. The lady wants a full refund, and I wouldn't even get my phone back? Thanks
    I've been an ebayer since 1999, she's trying to pull a fast one on you. I've never heard of sprint confiscating a phone.

    How did she pay for the item? If it was Paypal you might be in luck. You might want to double check with the police on that phone. I don't trust new ebayers with no feedback. Heck, I won't let them bid unless the have at least one positive and zero negative.
    Last edited by Dirty-Harry; 09-28-2006 at 09:56 PM.
    Brad729 likes this.



  6. #6
    camstuf
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    Re: Stolen phone confiscated.

    I'd like to see the Ebay auction link of the item in question.
    Because if it was sold as is...oh well
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  7. #7
    mbressman
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    Re: Stolen phone confiscated.

    Why not get her to give you the name of the store she went to and then call them directly to find out if she's lying or not...if they have no record of it, you can call her on it...tell her you'll file a police report against her (or something similar) for attempting to defraud you...



  8. #8
    barnacules
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    Re: Stolen phone confiscated.

    Quote Originally Posted by ford2 View Post
    I'm a seller Ebay for over 5 yrs, I just sold a used phone last week, and the lady that bought it from me took it to her local sprint store 6 states away to have it turned on, and they said her phone was stolen & confiscated it. I own a very small pawnshop and have sold well over 50 phones on Ebay and this is a first. I run every item I buy through my local police dept. when I buy it. One red flag for me is, the lady I that is giving me this story has only been on Ebay for 2 weeks, with 0 feedbacks, I have a 400+ perfect feedback rating. What should I do. The lady wants a full refund, and I wouldn't even get my phone back? Thanks
    Same kind of thing happened to me and it turned out being Sprints fault, they screw up all the time and mark phones as stolen and have no good system in place for customers that have phones confiscated to resolve the issue. Sprint wont even try to contact the original phone owner, its rediculous. Read my story in my signature for details on my experience.
    LGL likes this.



  9. #9
    LGL
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    Re: Stolen phone confiscated.

    The phone you sold on Ebay was probably reported as lost or stolen. Sprint keeps track of those reports and will not activate.

    I had my brand new Sprint LG Rumor 2 stolen a few months ago, and I reported it stolen to Sprint that very day. I hoped that the thief would not be able to activate it, or sell it, or pass it along to a pawn shop, etc.

    It's frustrating, however, to see phones listed on Ebay with a "bad ESN" and yet they are listing it as being able to flash/switch to another carrier. Those carriers should be held accountable for flashing/accepting a bad ESN. It's just not right.

    I'm not saying that's what you did ... but sellers of phones on Ebay should recognize that if a phone has a bad ESN, there's a reason why it's BAD. As a seller, you should check it out first.



  10. #10
    barnacules
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    Re: Stolen phone confiscated.

    Quote Originally Posted by LGL View Post
    The phone you sold on Ebay was probably reported as lost or stolen. Sprint keeps track of those reports and will not activate.

    I had my brand new Sprint LG Rumor 2 stolen a few months ago, and I reported it stolen to Sprint that very day. I hoped that the thief would not be able to activate it, or sell it, or pass it along to a pawn shop, etc.

    It's frustrating, however, to see phones listed on Ebay with a "bad ESN" and yet they are listing it as being able to flash/switch to another carrier. Those carriers should be held accountable for flashing/accepting a bad ESN. It's just not right.

    I'm not saying that's what you did ... but sellers of phones on Ebay should recognize that if a phone has a bad ESN, there's a reason why it's BAD. As a seller, you should check it out first.
    This was simply a Sprint PCS errors. I gave them an ESN to label as stolen and they instead got lazy and just picked the wrong phone from my profile and listed it as stolen so the whole time the phone I reported was being used without any issues and the phone I later sold months later got taken away from the person who purchased it and I had to fight to get it put back. Because of there incompetence the person that had my stolen phone was able to activate it and they never let me know and the person that purchased my phone legitimately later on was unable to activate it until I made a ton of phone called and utlimately threatened with a lawsuite.



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