Sold my Eris, Problems with activation

[mgg4591]

Hello everyone, I am new to this forum and currently own an HTC Incredible. I am having an issue with my former Droid Eris that i sold. Im terribly sorry if i posted this in the wrong section. So heres the story... So i am on a Verizon account with my mom. She added me on as another line after having her account and contract for over a year, the phone i chose was the Droid Eris. After having my phone for a few months i was issued a phone on Verizon last week from my job on their plan, which is where i got my HTC Incredible.

So my mom and i went to a Verizon store to see how much it would cost to cancel my line when they told us that her phone was out of contract since May 2010, and she could upgrade or close her account for no fee. Being i was added on later, my number still had two years left on the contract. So she cancelled her line and took over mine and kept her phone, but they changed her number.

So being i had no use for my Eris, and my mom isn't into touch screens, i sold it on eBay. The buyer sent me a message after receiving the phone saying that he tried to activate it but Verizon is saying that the phone has been reported stolen. I called up and the rep i spoke to said that the phone is not on the lost or stolen list. What do i do here? The buyer said he is trying to activate the phone on verizonwireless.com. I even got the MEID from the phone and the Verizon rep matched it to the phone they are looking at in their system, which is not on the lost or stolen list.

 

[lilbballer27]

Tell the buyer to go in a store and have a rep activate it for him. Or he can do the *228 option.

 

[rick311]

sounds like he's tryng to scam you. if he cant get it activated, tell him to send it back and you'll refund him once you get it.

 

[mgg4591]

thats what it seems like. I told him to try activating the phone through the on screen prompts when you power up the phone, when it asks you to enter the number that you want to activate the phone on. He said that he activated all his phones on the Verizon website and never had any issues. He could at least try it from the phone.

 

[lessit]

I hate to be the crabby old guy, but........... Have your buyer take it to a Verizon store and have them activate it. If he/she can't get to a store give Verizon a call. For whatever reason, if the buyer can't/won't go the Verizon route, have him/her return the phone and you issue a refund. Simple!

 

[Brainfart]

I had the same problem selling a phone on eBay. The buyer couldn't activate the phone because Verizon said the phone was never activated by the original buyer lol. To make a long story short I called Verizon to make sure the phone was ok to activate and they said to either have them go into the store or get the buyers phone number and then call Verizon back (Tech Support) and have them 3 way with me and the buyer and they would activate the phone. He said some times the online method glitches when the phone was just recently activated on another account then trying to activate it on another.

Just Call Verizon and make absolutely 100 % sure that the phone can be activated and then follow what I did and all should go well. If the buyer refuses to go by your suggestion of a 3 way call or going into the store then he/she is trying to scam you.

In the end all worked out with my transaction and the phone activated just fine & the buyer was very happy. Hope this helps.

 

[Hiroshika]

Some guy did this to me awhile back with my razr! I sold it on ebay, the guy said it was reported stolen and that he turned it into the police and that the police told him to demand a refund otherwise i would be in jail (that sounded ridiculous). Needless to say when i asked him to have the police contact me he stopped bothering me.

Basically, you have proof the phone isnt stolen. Hes just an idiot and doesnt understand how to put the number in properly, or hes trying to scam you. Just ignore him.

 

[lessit]

Hes just an idiot and doesnt understand how to put the number in properly, or hes trying to scam you. Just ignore him.

Bad advice. In all likelihood it's kind of a naive mistake in activating the phone. Direct him to Verizon. If it doesn't work out, refund his money.

 

[bjanow]

Bad advice. In all likelihood it's kind of a naive mistake in activating the phone. Direct him to Verizon. If it doesn't work out, refund his money.

Agree, but we understand how Ebay works. You simply don't do that. But I would get that phone back, root it, and *228 option 1. Play around, OC, tons of new ROMs out there. Unless, of course, you need the $100 or so. Not worth getting aggravated about it in the slightest.

 

[mgg4591]

The problem is he opened up a dispute against me, and until this is fixed, PayPal took out the money from my account and has it on hold. I sent him a message last night about dialing *228 from the phone or going to the store. he has yet to reply back, so well see what his excuse is when he does.

Here is his last reply. This is the message i responded to telling him to try *228.

"I am using the activate my phone link on verizonwireless.com.
Every other phone that I've purchased activates fine like that. The
phone still isn't activated on your account is it??"

And obviously the phone isn't still activated on my account.

EDIT: oh, and here is the first message he sent me:

"I just got the phone but when I tried to activate it with Verizon,
they told me it couldn't be activated because the phone had
been reported stolen!! WHAT'S THE DEAL HERE?! WHY did you
send me a stolen phone?? Are you going to clear this up or do I
need to get Ebay involved??"

 

[Hiroshika]

The problem is he opened up a dispute against me, and until this is fixed, PayPal took out the money from my account and has it on hold. I sent him a message last night about dialing *228 from the phone or going to the store. he has yet to reply back, so well see what his excuse is when he does.

Here is his last reply. This is the message i responded to telling him to try *228.

"I am using the activate my phone link on verizonwireless.com.
Every other phone that I've purchased activates fine like that. The
phone still isn't activated on your account is it??"

And obviously the phone isn't still activated on my account.

EDIT: oh, and here is the first message he sent me:

"I just got the phone but when I tried to activate it with Verizon,
they told me it couldn't be activated because the phone had
been reported stolen!! WHAT'S THE DEAL HERE?! WHY did you
send me a stolen phone?? Are you going to clear this up or do I
need to get Ebay involved??"

That sounds EXACTLY like the guy who tried to scam me...

Plus the fact that he went from "Its telling me its STOLEN" to "Its not still activated on your account" Means that somethings up. When you try to activate a phone thats stolen, they will explicitly tell you that. And if its already activated, they will also tell you that.

But maybe try calling verizon, getting a rep on the line, then 3 waying him into it? Have the rep activate it for him. Theres no sense in refunding the money, he bought it, and theres nothing wrong with the phone.

So three possibilities.
1. Hes having legit problems activating it.
2. Hes trying to scam you.
3. He got the eris and realized he didnt want it and now hes trying to play you to be able to "return" it and get his money back.

 

[Puddlejumpernva]

I tried to activate a replacement phone the other day online and it didn't work. It didn't tell me anything specific, just that I needed to call customer service. Could it be that the buyer is not turning off his old phone during the process? That may mess things up.

For me, the *228 activation didn't work either, until I called Verizon and told them the ESN/MEID. It went through fine after that.

I got stuck with a replacement phone a year or so ago. Bought it from a guy on Craigslist. We went to a Verizon store to verify the ESN. All checked out at the time, as it was not reported as lost or stolen. When I went to activate it (the battery was dead, so I had to take it home), it wouldn't work. Turned out it was already assigned to an active account, which had been opened fraudulently. It was making calls even. Spoke to the victim, got it cleared up, but never was able to use that phone. Sold it for parts.

 

[mgg4591]

So i sent him this message this morning:

"So whats going on with the phone, did you get it
activated? If your still having issues online you
need to go to a Verizon store and have a rep
activate it in person. If you still have a
problem, give me your phone number and i can do a
3-way call with Verizon and get it activated."

He replied with simply:

"I never could get it activated. I want a refund."


EDIT: Just saw this message in paypal:

"I still can't activate the phone. I either need a partial refund to keep the phone as a PDA or a full refund along with return shipping costs to send it back. Which would you rather do?"

So what do you guys think?
He has 425 100% positive feedback, so i don't think hes trying to scam me. What i do think is he doesn't like phone for some reason. I'm probably gonna escalate the claim with paypal. Because in the listing it says no refunds, and he doesn't seem to be making an effort to get it to work.

 

[bjanow]

Tell him to send you back the phone and email you the shipping costs. When you get the phone back, and it's not been activated for sure, refund him the shipping. Although, since you did say no refund I'm not sure how that will play out with Paypal. I just think it's best to move on.

 

[Brainfart]

In your auction did you guarantee a clean ESN and no problems with activation? If so your best bet is either have him 3 way call with you and Verizon or have him go into the Store and fix this. Like i said in my last post some times activations glitch up when using the online options. If he is not attempting to work with you then make sure eBay and PayPal knows this that he is not cooperating with you to try to resolve his supposed activation issues. The main thing is for him to do is work with you on this matter, if he refuses than he is trying to return the phone because he changed his mind.

Also did you call Verizon and verify that the phone is OK to activate to an eBay buyer?

 

[kick19782]

Hey Make sure he has a data plan. If he is not trying to scam you, he may just not be able to activate the phone because it is not compatible with his plan. If he was having problems acivating the phone it might have caused him to panic and assume the phone was stolen or still activated. If he dosen't have a $29.99 data plan I don't think the phone will activate. I recently bought a used eris and I had to change my plan BEFORE the phone would activate online. The idea about a 3 way call seems like a good idea. Good Luck!

 

[Hiroshika]

Hey Make sure he has a data plan. If he is not trying to scam you, he may just not be able to activate the phone because it is not compatible with his plan. If he was having problems acivating the phone it might have caused him to panic and assume the phone was stolen or still activated. If he dosen't have a $29.99 data plan I don't think the phone will activate. I recently bought a used eris and I had to change my plan BEFORE the phone would activate online. The idea about a 3 way call seems like a good idea. Good Luck!

When you try to activate the phone online it brings you to a screen asking you what options you'd want (or have to in the data plans case) to add to your plan.

Hes definitely trying to just return the phone. So make sure you go through the 3 way call with verizon before giving him even a partial refund.

 

[mgg4591]

I escalated the claim and now PayPal is going to decide who gets the funds. I called them up and the agent i spoke to said that it does seem odd that he is asking for a partial refund. They also said i should have it made if i can get a paper from Verizon saying that the phone can be activated. THAT i don't think i will be able to get.