What To Do As A Buyer In Case Of Item Not Received?

Hello all.

I have been buying stamps on ebay for about a month now, and so far have not had any problems.

About a month ago, I ordered a small lot of used world stamps from Canada, for just over a buck, free postage.

The item never showed up, so I contacted the seller, who told me to give it another week, just in case. A week later, the item has still not arrived.

The seller is obviously a legitimate vendor, as he has 1000's of reviews, 99.9% positive, more than can be said for most companies and products out there.

The Spanish post office in my town/area is obviously to blame, as all my normal penpal mail has arrived safe, but all this years Christmas cards that contained money never showed up either, and they represent 3 different deliveries from 3 different countries.

I am now wondering, what the right thing to do on ebay is. Obviously in my eyes the seller is not responsible for any wrong doing, yet on my summary page, it is telling me that I need to open a case before the week is up, and that I still need to leave a review.

What is the right thing to do here?

I feel it would be a bit of a nasty move if I left the guy a bad review saying it never arrived, no need to damage his future business over a lost buck.

Any advice appreciated. Thanks!

It is the responsibility of the seller to make sure they get there. I ship all of mine in a plain white envelope internationally. They fly through because they look like business mail. Never had one lost but is I do I will reimburse the buyer. It is a part of doing business and having trust in our fellow collectors.

Opening a case will not reflect badly on the seller and in most instances they try to encourage a resolution between the parties.
The seller should be aware that your feedback will relate to how well they handled the whole transaction including speed of refunding you though.
In the UK the process of refunds the last time this happened to me was that a case needs to be opened with the mail provider and once they refund you then the buyer is re-imbursed.
As this can take as long as 28 days, if the amount is small I refund immediately.

I recently had two instances of non receival.
I emailed each vendor, and advised I was going to leave negative feedback.
Both refunded my purchase price.
I did not leave negative feedback.

One package arrived yesterday (purchased/sent 12th December)
(purchased from UK vendor but posted from Romania)
I shall repay the vendor full price, and I have left positive feedback
but advised postage was slow from Romania.

If you ship in plain white envelopes do your stamps go through letter sorting machines? Do you put any stiffener in the envelope? What is your value threshold to ship higher value stamps in a photo mailer instead of an envelope?

Yeah I'm waiting for something also. It's only a week late but it is from Romania so as I just read I assume I'm to be patient for a while longer? To make matters worse I promised it to a good friend...