Great project! I was wondering: Do you offer any sort of purchase protections after a transaction is finalized? For example, a buyer orders an expensive item. Buyer receives it and everything looks good so escrow is released. They later find out the item is fake and want a refund. Is there any sort of dispute process for a scenario like this?
We certainly understand how this could become an issue at times. We don't want to provide any unnecessary delays in funds being released to the seller, since a common complaint from other centralized marketplaces is that sellers funds are held for long periods of time. And these long holds make sellers not want to use the services of these sites in many cases. Therefore, we encourage buyers to ensure that what they receive is as advertised (including authentication of goods if necessary) before releasing the escrow to the seller. For new sellers, or for sellers with lower feedback ratings, we are contemplating adding a delay time of somewhere between a few days and a week from when escrow is released to when the seller actually receives the funds. As an extra precaution to protect buyers in case an issue like this arises.
In the event the funds have already been released to the seller but the buyer can provide proof that the goods or services they received are not as advertised, the buyer still has a right to open a dispute and have it adjudicated in their favor. After which we can ask the seller to accept a return of the merchandise in exchange for a refund. If the seller were to not comply, their account would be suspended. It is important to note that if the funds have already been released to the seller, buyers will have a higher burden of proof in order to have a dispute decided in their favor. Because we don't want to unfairly force sellers to provide refunds if the funds have already been released to them and the transaction is finalized. How we handle this type of issue may also be addressed by our voting system. Where the token holders can vote on how they feel this particular issue should be handled. If users feel our method of handling this situation could be improved.