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I had a laptop that I was trying to sell on Facebook marketplace back in August and I ended up trading it for an iPhone 14 on September 1st.
- I did my due diligence as best I could. Checked blacklist status, checked iCloud lock, no SIM restrictions, and the device was nearly a year old - purchased in Oct 2022, so I knew that it wasn't coming from an account that was opened fraudulently. Everything came back clean. Worked fine on my T-Mobile account and the previous owner used on Verizon.
- Held onto the device until October 15th. No Blacklist, no SIM restrictions, everything cool...so I sold it. Person purchased locally for cash.
- Received a message yesterday from that buyer stating that the phone now no longer works and that someone reported it as stolen and it's blacklisted. I still had screen shots of the IMEI and sure enough it's now blacklisted.
- It's certainly possible that the buyer filed an insurance claim and is trying to scam me, but the more likely scenario is the person who traded it to me filed a claim and it took what..10 weeks?...for it to appear as blacklisted?
- Buyer is holding me accountable and says they filed a police report.
I feel for the buyer. It sucks. My feeling is that we both got scammed. I purchased the iPhone believing in good faith that it was not stolen, held onto it for 6 weeks to confirm, then sold in good faith that it was not stolen.
I'm open to suggestions, but I don't feel like holding the entire bag myself. I feel like the phone has value as a parts device. eBay comps put it at around $300 or so as it sits now. I'd be willing to share the cost so that we're both "out" equally, but the buyer has been pretty aggressive (and rightly so).
AITA?