Teenager Pays Hundreds Of Dollars For A Picture Of An Xbox One

from the worth-a-thousand-words? dept

In prep for writing this short piece, I was surprised to learn that apparently eBay sellers sending pictures of items, rather than the items themselves, to buyers was something that existed. It's obviously a shady sense of humor that thinks bilking buyers out of their money this way is funny. I guess there are lots of ways it can happen, between ambiguously worded sell posts and incomplete reading by buyers. I imagine the latter is often fueled by a newly released item that is in high demand.

Such would seem to be the case with an English teenager who found out he'd paid hundreds of dollars for a picture of a new Xbox One, rather than for the console itself.

Peter Clatworthy thought he had bought one of the consoles on the auction site, but actually received a picture of one. The Post highlighted his story today, with Mr Clatworthy having now received a refund with the help of eBay.

Well, good on eBay for doing the refund, but this wasn't just a simple matter of a jackass seller sending the picture when he or she had promised the console. The actual seller listing did indeed promise a picture, not a console.

Despite the listing stating it was a photo of an XBox One Day One edition console, Mr Clatworthy said he’d expected to receive the console as it was listed in the video games and consoles category on eBay.

He instead received the photo in the post on Monday, with it having ‘thank you for your purchase’ written on the back.

I imagine somebody did the listing as a joke and then found out someone had purchased it after obviously not reading the listing carefully. That doesn't absolve the seller from completing the purchase process, obviously, but it does serve as a warning for all of us during this holiday shopping season. Read what you're buying, people.

Filed Under: auctions, peter clatworthy, photograph, scams, xbox one
Companies: ebay