Super Bummed-Out, Coin Never Arrived

I know the feeling.. I had a similar incident a few months ago with 2 sweet BU silver Jefferson War Nickels. Tracking confirmed delivery. But I never received it. Turns out my regular mail lady was on vacation that week and a replacement was filling in. I was disappointed and suspected foul play. I contacted the seller and told him I understood that it wasn't his fault, and that I wasn't looking for a refund, I just wanted his help in finding out what happened. He basically washed his hands of it due to delivery confirmation.

I filed a lost package claim with the USPS. And I filed a conflict resolution claim with ebay, explained my case and added that I simply wanted the seller to file a claim with the post office from his end.

After several follow up calls to the USPS I received a call from a postal supervisor. He said that After interviewing the mail man they concluded that the package was mis delivered.. However in a city as densely populated as mine, there was no way to even guess where it might have ended up. But he offered advice on how ebay buyer protection would cover the loss.

In a few days I received a "courtesy refund" from ebay buyer protection.

Unfortunately theres little to no chance the PO will say its missing when tracking says delivered and theres really nothing that the cops can or will do about it. Theres no telling where the package ever ended up since it was scanned in delivered, which sometimes they do before they actually drop it off being lazy. Unless you have a security camera outside your door or mailbox no telling who could have taken it if it even ended up there.

If you contact ebay and the item doesn't cost to much they may just refund it to keep you happy. Its worth a shot at least. Theres little to no chance that the seller will refund your money and eat the loss. I'm not saying youre lying but thats what theyll think when he sees the tracking says delivered.

The only real way to make sure this doesn't happen is to have things sent with signature confirmation. That way if it gets misdelivered or someone else picks it up you can show thats not your signature that signed for it and then actually have proof for the post office and ebay ect

Unfortunately as already noted by so many, when something is stated as delivered and it really is missing, your chances grow less and less each day. Hopefully you may see that coin someday but highly unlikely.
Think of this. The post office has stated it was delivered. Now even if they find it, not much chance they'll admit they lied. AND if the postal delivery person actually BORROWED that coin, that peson surely will not admit that too. If a neighbor took it out of your mail box, not much chance they'll come running up to you and say "Here, I store this from you". Same with a landloard, friend, relative, etc.
All this is just one of those many, many such stories from ebay. And imagine how many are not even reported since the item may be to cheap for some to worry about. And that is why I never use ebay.
Now here is someting interesting. A long, long time ago, I used to send rolls of film to a place for developing. Before the digital age of course. One I sent never came back. It was a roll of one of my neighbors kids at a party they wanted me to photograph. The kids were all teens or less at the time. One day many years later, in the mail I got a package from the film developing place. Yes, it was of that party. All the kids were now grown up, some married, moved away, etc. Still the mail goes on and on and on.
Not long ago on TV they showed a story about the postal service on PBS. And an interesting thing was the dead letter/package location at the main office. It contained many thousands of unidentified STUFF.

If I remember correctly didnt ebay just decide to eat the cost themselves and not penalize the seller for it?

Its not their jurisdiction. Postal crimes are handled by postal inspectors but theres really nothing they can do besides open a case unless theres cameras on his mailbox or outside his door for some reason

I would contact the seller immediately, and also open a claim on ebay for not receiving the item. If it arrives you can always cancel the ebay claim.

You should do this as soon as you suspect something isn't right with a sale.

Good Luck!

keep us updated!

And how does ebay determine if the seller has complied with that responsibility? By looking for the delivery confirmation. No delivery confirmation then the seller is still responsible. But once the post office delivery confirmation reports that the item was delivered the seller is off the hook. As far as ebay is concerned the item was delivered to the buyer. Even if it wasn't and was delivered somewhere else.