I hadn't run into an issue on ebay yet and I thought I wonder have the usual 6 month protection from Paypal, so I gave this seller a month to ship my item. I opened a request for my item to be shipped, only to realize that ebay only will step in up to 30 days after purchase, and it has been 38 days. Is there a way I can get my money back through Paypal since the seller isn't responding?
The last time that I had an issue with a seller it was outside the 30 day window because of me giving them the benefit of the doubt after they told me repeatedly that they would send it "soon".
If you had the chance to file with them then you likely would not have had to deal with PayPal. The main perk there is that the return shipping and all that would be tracked by eBay, but it would not apply in your posed case. They would not have done much in the way of discipline, anyway, if they have not had repeat instances of scam-y behavior. It would have been worth to file within the window for the notch eBay would have given to their account, but it's not super integral since the issue is that the package was not sent.
In the end I still had to file with PayPal since that was the method of payment. There is a 180 day window with PayPal to file, so the appeal process for an awry transaction is super flawed. Even if you filed with eBay, PayPal may still not be on your side, even if you are in the right. They gave me my money back, though.
This is just some further stuff with my eBay experience- it's of slight relevance if you run into similar issues as the case may progress.Spoiler
If this kind of stuff happens I recommend getting on the buyer's case ASAP, and retain screenshots of all messages, and keep a log of all attempts to contact. Always ask for tracking, always make sure that you know what postage that you paid for, and keep track of the time that lapses.
For instance, I am currently in an issue with USPS because of a package that went to TEXAS from Wisconsin when it was supposed to come to Michigan (and all they had to do was hop over the lake, so I don't know how that happened), and it's been there for over a week when I paid for it to be shipped Priority 2-Day Flat Rate. However, it took the seller 5 days to bother to respond that the package was sent. While the situation is out of their hands because they sent the box, if I wouldn't have had that information then I would have filed the claim with eBay instead of getting ahold of USPS about why my box is not here yet.
There are still a lot of open holes there, too. (To my knowledge) you can't file a claim with USPS unless you had insurance, and when you buy postage via eBay you have to manually tick the box and choose USPS Insurance from the drop-down. They didn't provide the tracking when they marked my purchased listing as "Shipped", either, so I have no clue if they really DID buy the appropriate postage for what I paid and what was needed. I have no idea if I am protected there because of their lackluster performance as a seller.
Now it's in USPS' court since I filed an inquiry on where my box is. That takes 3-5 business days on the high end so it's still a waiting game. I will leave negative feedback if they didn't purchase the postage that I paid for or if the box was not insured, and that's if it gets here. At best they will get a neutral from me. They are a total "meh" because they were not very helpful until I threatened to file a claim.
All I can do is recommend that you document and log everything when it comes to your seller. When you run into these issues, having appropriate documentation is necessary so you can protect your own interests.