When does ownership change hands?

[shadroch]

Doesn't the post office say the seller must make the claim if there is an issue in transit? If the seller is responsible for seeing the Book is delivered, I'd say ownership transfers at delivery.

With that said, reneging on a done deal is a punk move, legal or not.

[CBT]

Let's say person A puts a book for for sale with a BIN of $250. Person B sees the book shortly after it is listed and buys it immediately, and pays immediately. Person A fears $250 was too low a price for the book, so, after doing some digging, discovers the book was probably worth more than that, so he cancels the sale and refunds the buyers money, making up an excuse that the book was missing the centerfold when it wasn't. So, who is the legal owner of that book? If a seller cancels a transaction after payment has already been made for his asking price, is it still his book?

 

 

regardless of the legal aspect, if you dont have it in your hands, you dont "own" it. Even if you could sue to get something, that only matters when the value of that something is greater than the legal costs to do so.

 

I suppose if you could get your legal costs reimbursed as part of the lawsuit, then its doable, but you'd have to know your case was a sure thing and for $250 its still not worth your time....

[Dr Chaos]

regardless of the legal aspect, if you dont have it in your hands, you dont "own" it. Even if you could sue to get something, that only matters when the value of that something is greater than the legal costs to do so.

 

I suppose if you could get your legal costs reimbursed as part of the lawsuit, then its doable, but you'd have to know your case was a sure thing and for $250 its still not worth your time....

 

This

 

Also, there is a difference between a seller realizing he can get $350 for a book listed at $275 and a typo where a $1,200 book is listed at $12.00. In the first case the seller comes off pretty bad in the second case I think it is the buyer who would be the unreasonable party if they expect to get that price after a cancellation.

[Thawk]

Possession is 9/10ths of the law so there's that.

 

I was about to say the same thing. +1

[AKA Rick]

Ultimately he or she who holds the book is the owner, and if payment was refunded albeit unscrupulously through sellers remorse (much like if a buyer commits to buying and backs out of paying), in the real world regardless of implied contracts and agreements even through auction houses, nobody is going to force a seller to sell (if they don't accept the payment) nor force a buyer to pay (if they refuse to release funds).

 

It's a question of morality and business ethics as far as the transaction.

 

I think a seller is being pennywise pound foolish to retract a sale for any differential (if they sold a $1 bin book that's worth hunderds or even thousands, it's still not ethical) and it's their error and cost of doing business. That's why in part when sellers complain about the low sales prices of their penny auctions, I'd then say "then start your starting bid to where you won't complain and be happy."

 

 

[zuulioso]

Let's say person A puts a book for for sale with a BIN of $250. Person B sees the book shortly after it is listed and buys it immediately, and pays immediately. Person A fears $250 was too low a price for the book, so, after doing some digging, discovers the book was probably worth more than that, so he cancels the sale and refunds the buyers money, making up an excuse that the book was missing the centerfold when it wasn't. So, who is the legal owner of that book? If a seller cancels a transaction after payment has already been made for his asking price, is it still his book?

 

 

Isn't that entire line speculation? I am not saying he didn't do it, but how can you prove he did?

[cousin itt]

It's a hypothetical. As I say elsewhere in the thread, I can't "prove" it. I suspect it, but I can't prove it.

[Davenport]

If a seller cancels a transaction after payment has already been made for his asking price, is it still his book?

Pretty much a universal law that if a seller hands back your money and cancels the transaction you're not getting a book, or lunch, or laid, or a cruise around the world or whatever it was you hoped you were buying. No más!

[Dr Chaos]

 

It's a question of morality and business ethics as far as the transaction.

 

I think a seller is being pennywise pound foolish to retract a sale for any differential (if they sold a $1 bin book that's worth hunderds or even thousands, it's still not ethical) and it's their error and cost of doing business.

 

 

In the case of the $1,000 books accidentally listed as $1.00 buy it now:

 

Is it less ethical for the seller to cancel the order or for the buyer to open a case after the cancellation?

 

If we expect people to learn what they were taught in kindergarten and play nice in the sandbox I think the reasonable thing in such cases is for the seller to get a mulligan instead of insisting that the buyer essentially get something for nothing.

[Wally's Comics]

"That was a steal!"

 

 

[cousin itt]

I agree but that's not the case here. The seller specifically stated that the reason for the cancellation was that the centerfold was missing. He didn't say anything about a typo. (And, in any event, we're not talking about a 1000:1 difference here. Maybe a 1.5:1 or 2:1 difference.)

 

[Buzzetta]

I have cancelled sales and refunded money when I though the buyer was attempting a scam.

 

Classic examples:

Buyer pays, asks for item to be sent to a different address

Buyer pays with an eBay account never used twice before, from a country where tracking is not available.

Buyer pays and then wants to renegotiate the price, (This one is laughable. They hit BIN for $150 then want to know if they can have it for $100 or something like that.)

[wombat]

I have cancelled sales and refunded money when I though the buyer was attempting a scam.

 

Classic examples:

Buyer pays, asks for item to be sent to a different address

Buyer pays with an eBay account never used twice before, from a country where tracking is not available.

Buyer pays and then wants to renegotiate the price, (This one is laughable. They hit BIN for $150 then want to know if they can have it for $100 or something like that.)

 

Buyer claims all your books based on a PM you didn't agree to.

[Buzzetta]

I have cancelled sales and refunded money when I though the buyer was attempting a scam.

 

Classic examples:

Buyer pays, asks for item to be sent to a different address

Buyer pays with an eBay account never used twice before, from a country where tracking is not available.

Buyer pays and then wants to renegotiate the price, (This one is laughable. They hit BIN for $150 then want to know if they can have it for $100 or something like that.)

 

Buyer claims all your books based on a PM you didn't agree to.

 

Yeah, that was a move on his part. I wasn't too shocked that another boardie had a problem with that buyer.

[fmaz]

Just so you all know "possession is 9/10 of the law" isn't based on any binding legal principle at all. But it does reflect common sense, which is why people site it so often.

 

To take the example sited here - a transaction is completed and then the seller claims the item was missing/damaged? The idea that the buyer had ownership at the moment of payment would be the last thing you'd want in many cases.

 

Let's say you, as buyer, purchase a book and then before shipment the seller's house burns down and the book is destroyed? Or the seller's dog eats the book? Or the seller simply loses it? In those cases, would you want to consider the book to have been "yours" or the seller's ?

 

Typically ownership will transfer, with a physical object, with the passing of the object from one party to the other. With a larger object (a boat, a house, land, etc) this will occur solely via signed documents.

 

What is available to the buyer in these situations in terms of relief is to make claims based on how the cancelled transactions negatively impacted them financially. So in the case where the buyer was to be getting a good price for an item they needed to complete a larger transaction on their end, for example (let's say here they were including this comic with a few others in trade for another desired book)... They would claim damages for the difference between the original purchase price and what it would/did cost them to secure a replacement item at a higher cost.

 

So basically? 99% of the time it wouldn't be worth the trouble of doing more than receiving a refund and moving on.

 

Hope that makes sense.

[keever]

Just to slice it even thinner than the detailed explanation by fmaz, consider who "owns" the book if it has a mishap while in the hands of a party who has been engaged to deliver possession from seller to buyer, e.g. fedex or the postal service. Commercial law developed FAO and FOB terms for shipping, concepts of bailment for storage by third parties, and other arrangements to help define when title passes and who bears the risk of loss.

 

As far as when can a seller change his or her mind after agreeing to sell (kav's offer and acceptance), the law allows various categories of excuses that would fill a book, but let me say that a "mistake" usually has to be mutual rather than unilateral. Those very long pages of fine print that you "accept" to sign up for auction sites or to use a delivery service are contracts that define on whose behalf the third party auctioneer or courier is acting and what rules apply to transactions they assist in completing, and may end up answering the ultimate legal question about ownership. The practical answer remains: it's usually not worth trying to enforce legal rights when the dispute involves a comic book worth of few hundred or few thousand dollars. Hence the nine tenths of the law, might is right, forms of resolution tend to prevail.