Yesterday I’ve made a post about PayPal’s and eBay’s time limits on refunds and negative feedback after I hadn’t received a Pikachu card I’ve ordered, and now this happens…
Two weeks ago I won a bidding war for what I thought was a Thin 1st Edition Base Pikachu. More than one other person also wanted it, but I eventually won it for 122.50 USD. The seller was very nice. He was even concerned about the shipping method of eBay to my country since some other buyers he sold to lost their packaged even though the tracking number said delivered (I had the same thing happen to me twice so far, so I knew what he was talking about and appreciated his concerns). So, he send them to me through UPS privately and I paid him through PayPal directly instead of through eBay. The card arrived earlier this week, and I was happy to see it was the one I ordered.
Today I was looking online for pictures of a Red Cheeks Thin 1st Edition Pikachu to see if it exists or not. I’ve heard some rumor about it, but I’ve never seen one. Thin prints are pretty rare to begin with for some cards (like Pikachu). Because of that I also looked at the cards I already had and when I looked at my bought Thin print Yellow Cheeks Pikachu I was shocked. It wasn’t shadowless… 
Here is the eBay auction including the pictures. As you can see it has a Thin print. The card seemed real in my eyes, and when I saw the Thin print I was apparently blind for everything else (since I hadn’t noticed the shadows)… When I test it with a flashlight it indeed confirms it is fake, and the back also seems slightly off compared to a real card. Apart from that it is a REALLY convincing counterfeit. But, 1st edition Base set with shadows just doesn’t exist…
I contacted the seller a few moments ago, and also send a message to PayPal. I tried to open a claim on PayPal, but since I was an idiot and had paid with “friends/family” option to save a few bucks I can’t. Hopefully PayPal can help me with some advice… I’m not entirely sure if the seller knew it was fake. From his behavior I don’t think he knew, but I could of course be mistaken. Regardless if he knew or didn’t knew, I asked for the 122.50 USD refund. The 50 USD to ship it to me he can keep, and I take that as a stupid mistake/lesson to myself.
As I said in the title, this really isn’t my day… 
fml
Greetz,
Quuador
EDIT: The seller immediately got back to me after I send the message. As I was suspecting, he indeed didn’t knew it was fake and offered me a refund for the 122.50 USD. Here is his message:
I’m glad this was handled so quickly. I did waste 50 USD, but I learned my lesson to be more careful when buying something. Luckily this was a really nice seller, but next time it might indeed be a scammer.
Again, I’m really relieved this was handled so quickly. Now I just have to find a Thin print Pikachu again… 