Seller claims he cannot ship without a "form"

[pimpom_in1]

I bought an item from a seller with nearly 3000 feedbacks and a 99.5% positive score. He says that he uses PowerShip but cannot ship because FedEx refuses to pick up the shipment without a "form".

My state does not require a tax waybill or any other form for personal items. Over the past 3 months alone, I bought about 40 items online, most of them from eBay. Most of those were shipped by PowerShip, out of which about half were by FedEx. They were all delivered without fuss and no one else said anything about requiring a form.

I explained all this to the seller but he's still not co-operating. I would have suspected fraud except for the fact that he has a good feedback score. Although he has not yet mentioned a refund, I know I can eventually get a refund if he keeps refusing to ship, but I would still have wasted a lot of time and effort.

What do you think I should do?

[delhiwholesaler]

I am also a Powerseller, now i opted out of powership.

Seller is right. Fedex asks for invoice will every packet + form for certain places.

No one else require all this.

Not a seller mistake, who doesnt want to get profit out of selling.

[pimpom_in1]

Previously, my state's Taxation Department did require a waybill for any incoming shipment, but that has been discontinued for a long time. Evidently, FedEx and other couriers know this because they never asked for a form for all my other purchases.

Another thing that doesn't sound quite right -

I made the purchase at about 2:00 AM. At 10:00 AM the seller sent me the message about not being able to ship. His message simply said "Sorry sir we can't ship as your location requires form". That's all. Nothing else.

When I explained everything and asked if he uses PowerShip, he replied -

"yes we are using that only and have refused pickup without form". Again nothing else.

He didn't even ask me to provide the form. Now he has stopped responding. Something's fishy here.

You ask "who doesnt want to get profit out of selling." The answer is obvious, but not all sellers have the same sense of obligation to their customers.

[sanchitgoyal90]

Which state are you from?

The issue is that even the courier companies dont have clarity regarding state forms. The issue is not much with air cargo but state forms are an hassle with surface shipments.

Below are the fedex regulatory guidelines-

http://www.fedex.com/in/domestic/services/regulatoryguidelines.html

You would notice that some of the north eastern states are not mentioned.

I do not use powership but use fedex for courier shipments.

Recently I had a case where I had to ship a product to Manipur. I specifically emailed fedex and asked about any state form. They said no form is required. After the product was shipped and after 20 days they said that they require the form or the product would be returned. Ultimately the product was returned. Thankfully the buyer was cooperative enough to understand the fault of courier company.

[pimpom_in1]

I'm from Mizoram. The Mizo community is a close-knit one and I personally know the Tax minister, the commissioner, etc plus several inspectors and clerks. They all confirm that no form is required for any personal item. Form 33, as specified in the link you gave, is only for commercial shipments.

Apart from all that, as I said from the beginning, I have received dozens of shipments this year alone without a form. These were carried by various couriers including FedEx. Many of those were from this seller's location - Delhi.

I'm now strongly inclined to believe that the seller is playing some game. Since the time I bought my item, he has received 4 negative feedbacks against only 5 positives (I have not yet givem him any feedback myself). His overall score is still very good. Maybe he took over someone else's business. Whatever the reason, he is rapidly destroying his reputation.

You can see his recent feedbacks here -

http://feedback.ebay.in/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewFeedback2&userid=dealzown&ftab=AllFeedback

[sanchitgoyal90]

I looked the recent feedback and most of the negative feedback seem to be from persons to whom courier were not shipped and the seller has mentioned they were not shipped because of form requirements.

Most of these products are volumetric and would be sent by surface mode which as I mentioned already is problematic. There might not be any form requirement for Mizoram but courier companies do not know about it. Lets take example of 2 courier companies-

1.) Bluedart-

http://www.bluedart.com/regulatory.html#n18

Bluedart website mention form 34 is required for non commercial shipments. Therefore they wont take any SURFACE shipment without form 34.

2.) Fedex-

The regulatory guidelines doesnt mention mizoram at all for b2c shipments! I have written them an email regarding the form requirement for mizoram and other states for which it hasnt been mentioned but have not got any reply.

Remember the problem is only with surface shipments.

[bracevor]

I cannot tell if the seller is doing this intentionally or if he really has a problem but logisitics continues to be a challenge in India. 

As a seller, I offer free shipping out of goodwill at my own cost and to boost customer satisifaction. I ship my items immediately on the same business day or next day. I use Bluedart or professional or DTDC depending on location. However, I am at the mercy of these companies once the item is shipped. I dligently track the items but sometimes they just take longer to reach. To be fair to them, they have their own challenges and the logistics industry does not operate uniformly because of the vast geographical differences. 

To put things in perspective, yes, there are challenges and some sellers and buyers are trying to take advantage of them to commit fraud. But it is still very nice to see the rest of the buyers and sellers trying to make ecommerce work and provide value by selling items at affordable prices. More power to all of us! 🙂