How to handle this situation....

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BoiseTech

Limp Gawd
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Sold a video card to a person, I won't use their name.

Card was purchased from an individual here, card worked when pulled from my sons gaming rig, mailed to this user who stated it starting having issues, but he re-pasted it and it seemed fine.

The card was being used to mine with (I'm okay with that, not my card anymore)

But now the card isnt functioning. The card was in his hands for about 6 days.

What do I do? I mean, he paid me via paypal, could he request his money back, would I be screwed? Do I offer him a full refund, the card worked when I sent it to him, and for several days?

I sold him a GTX 1080 for $400, but bundled a 3900xt with it for $400, total purchase price was $800.

Any thoughts?
 
This is my worst nightmare here.

I'd accept a return and turn it over. Is it a card with an easy to flash BIOS?
 
He was mining with it for 6 days and THEN it went down? Yeah, I wouldn't touch that card. Who knows what he did.

If his concern is it's a shit card and you pulled the wool over his eyes, I disagree. A card with problems will rear it's ugly head pretty fast. Who knows what he did when repasting.
 
A used board typically doesn't come with any expressed or implied warranty. It died on his watch. He might have applied too much paste and it was something conductive like artic silver. Or he tried to flash the BIOS incorrectly and bricked it... his loss. If he comes across as genuine and not belligerent and really seems to not have done anything unreasonable to the board - just bad luck and it seems it really did just up and die on him, then I'd probably offer him a partial refund if he returns it to you so you can inspect it and make a determination as to its state. (I.E. Inspect for damage - make sure he didn't spluge paste all over the sides of the GPU, etc.) If it checks out, and it really is your card he sent back and it is indeed dead, then I'd probably offer him a refund on just the card - but he pays for shipping back to you though. But hey, that's just me. You do you! :D

Edit: Typos!
 
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Supercharged_Z06 said:
A used board typically doesn't come with any expressed or implied warranty. It died on his watch. He might have applied too much paste and it was something conductive like artic silver. OR he treid to flash the BIOS incorrectly and bricked it... His loss. If he seems genuine and not belligerent and really seems to not have done anything unreasonable to the board - just bad luck and it really did just up and die on him, then I'd probably offer him a partial refund if he returns it to you so you can inspect it and make a determination as to its state. (I.E. Inspect for damage - make sure he didn't spluge paste all over the sides of the GPU, etc.) If it checks out, and it really is your card he sent back and it is dead, then I'd probasbly offer him a refund on just the card - but he pays for shipping back to you though. But hey, that's just me. You do you! :D
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couldnt get more fair than this
 
PayPal has a 90 days or 180 days return policy (don’t remember which), so if he pays with PayPal, you don’t really have a choice other than a full refund. Hence you should sell to people with good Heatware feedback to prevent situation like this.
 
As a buyer, I personally know the risk. Hell had a 2080ti I got about 6 months ago that died within 2 days of getting it, but i handled the rest of the warranty etc after asking the buyer if I could get the receipt info. It took a month, but I eventually did end up having a working 2080ti. That stuff happens. If the card was DOA, I think it's fair to talk to the seller for a refund. But as soon as you do anything to take it apart, I personally believe you cross that threshold of asking to return it full refund.
 
If he re pasted it before there were major issues than he modified the product and you can more than defend that to Paypal.

If there were voiced concerns, and the re paste was a decision made to resolve whatever his issues were...you are probably better off doing the return to whatever terms you can get better than a total loss. If it posts, I'd ask for gpuz or whatever screenshots and do the return. You may be able to resolve and resell again...🤷
 
trick_m0nkey said:
This is why used cards that still have a transferable warranty command a higher price than cards out of warranty.

Plus he said he was mining with it? Tough shit. Only he knows what he did with it. Not on you OP.
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Thats funny cause evga cards are the cheapest now and have a transferable warranty.
 
I love all the advice, bottom line is, it's within 90 days, so worst case I'm out of luck.

I also, I've never fixed a card, and I'm not sure about the warranty, since I bought it 2nd hand.

We're still working it out on messenger.

He's being really nice, and I'm trying to work through it, we haven't talked about refund yet.
 
No warranties expressed or implied on used gear especially if it's second hand to you, unless DOA. Document your proof of function and you're covered. They fuck it up on install or mine with it and cook it off? All their problem.

New in Box card? Yeah you ought to help work it out and help with warranty return and what not or at a minimum provide a receipt so they can try.
 
Warranty void if re-pasted and re-padded. My guess would be that the pads were too thick or too thin, or mounting pressure was uneven when he screwed down the heatsink, and some component ended up overheating.
 
repasting and repading a card is standard maintenance. its what, 5 years old now? its due for that stuff to be done i didnt buy this so im not the one with a broken card here.

on the otherhand its 5 years old.. its out of warranty anyway. stop the warranty void fud. those little BS stickers manufacturers put on cards about voiding warranty arent legal and arent enforceable atleast not in the US for damnsure.
on the other hand ITS A FIVE YEAR OLD CARD. its totally possible it could have just up and died. it worked when he got it and he was happy. you win some you lose some with second (or third) hand stuff.
 
I sold a guy a Vega card maybe a year ago. Within a week he had cracked the die installing a waterblock. He told me about it, but never came after me for a refund or anything because he broke it. That's what this guy should do. You take the chance when you disassemble a working card. Just document where he said that he took it apart after he received it. Should go a long way if there's a PP dispute.

Then again, I also sold a card a few years ago to a guy who clearly broke it when he was installing it in his computer by knocking off a capacitor. Even though it worked perfectly when I had it, and he clearly broke it, I had to eat the cost of that one.
 
nealx01 said:
repasting and repading a card is standard maintenance. its what, 5 years old now? its due for that stuff to be done i didnt buy this so im not the one with a broken card here.

on the otherhand its 5 years old.. its out of warranty anyway. stop the warranty void fud. those little BS stickers manufacturers put on cards about voiding warranty arent legal and arent enforceable atleast not in the US for damnsure.
on the other hand ITS A FIVE YEAR OLD CARD. its totally possible it could have just up and died. it worked when he got it and he was happy. you win some you lose some with second (or third) hand stuff.
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They are not enforceable sure but they know most people will not fight it let alone take it to court. I don't believe removing a cooler and repasting is preventive maintenance. You really shouldn't be doing it unless it starts having over heating issues. Everyone always claims they use the cheap stuff but in reality it stuff that is meant to last for the usable life of the card. You are taking a risk every time you take it apart. Some cards are pretty easy but some are seriously a pita to take apart.
 
nealx01 said:
repasting and repading a card is standard maintenance. its what, 5 years old now? its due for that stuff to be done i didnt buy this so im not the one with a broken card here.

on the otherhand its 5 years old.. its out of warranty anyway. stop the warranty void fud. those little BS stickers manufacturers put on cards about voiding warranty arent legal and arent enforceable atleast not in the US for damnsure.
on the other hand ITS A FIVE YEAR OLD CARD. its totally possible it could have just up and died. it worked when he got it and he was happy. you win some you lose some with second (or third) hand stuff.
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It may be standard maintenance, but if you take it apart to do it and then it doesn't work when you put it back together, you can't blame the seller.
 
Personally I only sell stuff that I know works 100%, so if this scenario happened to me, I'd tell the buyer he needs to figure it out on his own.
 
kirbyrj said:
It may be standard maintenance, but if you take it apart to do it and then it doesn't work when you put it back together, you can't blame the seller.
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and you know what else.....my last 3 cards in use i never even bothered to pull them apart. They worked as they were desighned so I cleaned them to factory cleaned every so often without taking them completly apart. I see no reason to risk bricking a 400 dollar+ card when it already working fine
 
I'm just confused how a re-paste and pads "fixed it". He must have thought it was overheating or something? I don't know if it was working fine when you sold it and he wasn't satisfied he should have returned it then. You can't expect a seller to give a refund when you do mods to the card after the sale and it doesn't work out.
 
Furious_Styles said:
I'm just confused how a re-paste and pads "fixed it". He must have thought it was overheating or something? I don't know if it was working fine when you sold it and he wasn't satisfied he should have returned it then. You can't expect a seller to give a refund when you do mods to the card after the sale and it doesn't work out.
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There's not enough info. Mining can be very complicated, it's possible he had something set up wrong in software and then blamed the hardware. That happened to me when I sold a bunch of old USB miners on ebay forever ago. They worked perfectly before I sent them. Buyer claims none work. Wouldn't give any specifics and opened a claim with ebay. Ebay sided with me thankfully. I even offered to help the guy set them up and he just ignored me... Some people just want to do things they don't understand and refuse to put in the effort required.
 
LFaWolf said:
PayPal has a 90 days or 180 days return policy (don’t remember which), so if he pays with PayPal, you don’t really have a choice other than a full refund. Hence you should sell to people with good Heatware feedback to prevent situation like this.
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My experience with heatware has been that it is very poor indicator of the quality of the buyer or seller. I've had great experiences with people without heat and terrible experiences from people with a ton of heat.

Supercharged_Z06 said:
A used board typically doesn't come with any expressed or implied warranty. It died on his watch. He might have applied too much paste and it was something conductive like artic silver. Or he tried to flash the BIOS incorrectly and bricked it... his loss. If he comes across as genuine and not belligerent and really seems to not have done anything unreasonable to the board - just bad luck and it seems it really did just up and die on him, then I'd probably offer him a partial refund if he returns it to you so you can inspect it and make a determination as to its state. (I.E. Inspect for damage - make sure he didn't spluge paste all over the sides of the GPU, etc.) If it checks out, and it really is your card he sent back and it is indeed dead, then I'd probably offer him a refund on just the card - but he pays for shipping back to you though. But hey, that's just me. You do you! :D

Edit: Typos!
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I agree with this.
 
Nimisys said:
My experience with heatware has been that it is very poor indicator of the quality of the buyer or seller. I've had great experiences with people without heat and terrible experiences from people with a ton of heat.
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I think a lot of people are too scared to leave negative feedback on heatware, even if the transaction wasn't very good.
 
Taco bought a used gpu(strix960). The gpu worked almost ok, but was overheating pretty bad, fans ramming 100% and temps 89c. That particular card runs very quiet and usually in 60's.

Taco took apart the card and scratched off a ridge on heatsink nd repasted nd put her back together. It was causing poor contact and there was lots of thermo paste. Card runs very quiet now nd lower temps in the 60's, just like intended.

If she stopped working tomorrow or day after, taco wouldn't consider contacting seller with a complain. It would suck, but

t was a 65dollar card. If it were 400dollar used card, taco would be very melancholy, but that's the reason taco wouldn't consider buying a 400 used because Mike bought a used, never to be seen again. I think that's a lesson well learned for mike.
 
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trasixes said:
You know, I have a working 580 4gb that I no longer need, and this is exactly why I haven't sold it. I know it works fine, with no issues, but this scenario is why it is collecting dust.
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Same here with a 1080 vanilla. It's the backup of my backup 2080Ti, and like as not, will end up in the trash or given away in a year or two rather than me taking time to sell it.

As a couple side notes, only $400? I have seen 1080's go for near $1K. It's ridiculous.
And, from what I understand, mining stresses the card, especially memory, differently than the intended use of the cards, playing games, does. A card that may work great for gaming, may have issues mining.
 
trasixes said:
You know, I have a working 580 4gb that I no longer need, and this is exactly why I haven't sold it. I know it works fine, with no issues, but this scenario is why it is collecting dust.
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Same, I have a Gigabyte GTX670 I’ve been letting collect dust forever but it’s not worth the hassle of trying to sell it. Not only this scenario but also with crap getting lost or damaged by USPS.
 
Assuming you plan on holding on the line of "it's yours now" I would make sure you hold onto all your conversations and such. Screenshot them, not just keep them online since sometimes folks can retroactively delete their own text.

I'm of two minds. On the one hand, I only guarantee that an item will arrive in the condition it left in. If it was working for me, and it's working for the buyer, then as far as I'm concerned I've fulfilled my end of the bargain. If it breaks a week later, at that point it belongs to the buyer. Obviously I would help if something was still under manufacturer's warranty or something like that, but at some point there is a dividing line between when the card stopped being mine and started being the buyer's, and for me that line is when they 'accept' the purchase. If your buyer received the card, fixed something that could easily have happened in shipping (maybe the box took a bump and the heatsink needed to be reseated or something, which he did when he repasted) and then it was accepted as 'working' then they have accepted the card in my mind.

On the other hand, obviously if I was the buyer in the scenario I'd be a bit pissed that I bought a card that only worked a week. I would *of course* reach out to the seller and try to get them to help or to take the card back; I'm not *stupid*, lots of sellers would want to 'make it right' which would work out very well for me. However, I don't think the seller *has* to 'make it right' - I was buying used hardware without a warranty. Unless I agreed with the seller beforehand on some kind of a 'return policy' then I figure I'm mostly shit out of luck.

In general I come down on the 'in favor of the seller' option in general, because with the card outside of your control who knows what the buyer has done. For all you know it wasn't mining at the rate the buyer was expecting and so they 'broke' it on purpose to try to get a refund, because 'it mines too slow' isn't a good reason for someone to accept a return or to facilitate buyer's remorse. I'm not saying that happened here, I'm saying that as the seller you just don't know, and that as a frequent seller my responsibilities end as soon as the card isn't mine anymore.
 
did he flash the bios on it? I don't see how else it would stop working unless he totally failed at repasting it.

Is he currently trying to run an overclock on it? does it output anything at all? if it works for bios/post he might be applying a mining overclock on it that is unstable. Has he tried in it a separate system?

idk what troubleshooting he has done or shared with you but I'd go through it all before offering any sort of partial/full refund.
 
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