Caution When Buying Large / Heavy Items and paying with PayPal

This is not directly relevant, but I used PayPal when buying an upgrade kit from Europe.  When it arrived, it was missing RCA posts, so I bought some expensive ones locally.  PayPal sided with me and deducted the cost.  The vendor was not at all happy.

More recently I bought a turntable from Europe.  The payment options were direct bank transfer, or paying 3.5% extra to use PayPal.  In the end, it became too hard to set up the PayPal transaction, so I bore the risk. It all worked out very well, but it could have gone pear-shaped.

Even more recently, I bought an Equalizer and cartridge from an Australian distributor who has no retail interfaces - neither credit card nor PayPal.  Again, I had to take a risk and do bank transfers before the goods were shipped.

All adds to the excitement ...

@richardbrand that would not be the type of excitement I would be willing to have..

@yags1 

There is a risk / reward ratio at play here! 

When the reward is a discount close to 50%, the risk is worth it unless there is about a 50% chance of the seller going belly-up sometime before completing the transaction.  To assess that, I look at how long they have been in business, and do a Google maps drive past of their bricks and mortar premises.

So I am a cautious risk-taker ... but still get nervous!

On a side note question… When someone ships to you,

do you  need signature required or that does not really matter ?

I have had much experience with this, the two options are to refuse the item and leave it with the courier, taking photo's. If PayPal get gnarly then contact your credit card company. I pay for items with a suitable 180 day purchase protection card and with PayPal never use my current account.Either way if not suitable contact your credit card company who are there to protect your interests.