Reprinted from Yahoo!'s Buyer Protection Policy

Copyright © 2002 Yahoo! Inc. All rights reserved.

"File a complaint -- If you feel that you've been a victim of fraud, you may qualify for coverage with the Yahoo! Buyer Protection Program. Under our protection program, fraud is said to occur when you pay for an item and don't receive it or you receive an item that is materially different than the item described on auction. Learn more about the Yahoo! Buyer Protection Program and the process for filing a complaint."

READ THE FOLLOWING YAHOO! LINK FOR MORE INFORMATION:

What about fraud on Yahoo!? How are you protected?

Excerpts from Yahoo's Fraud Reporting Pages

What if I do not receive the item I paid for or the item I received is different than the item I bid on? Although Yahoo! is not a party to the sales transaction between the bidder and the seller that may result from a Yahoo! auction, and we are not in a position to investigate your complaint, we want to make everyone's experience with Yahoo! Auctions a good one. If you have attempted to contact the seller regarding this problem, and the seller has been unresponsive or has failed to resolve the problem to your satisfaction, we suggest the following actions:

You may be qualified for our Yahoo! Buyer Protection Program. If the auction you won began on or after October 12, 2000, and your auction qualified for this program, you can file a formal complaint through this program.

If your auction was posted before October 12, 2000, or does not fall with in the specified criteria, you may wish to follow these additional steps.

Through Yahoo!'s feedback system, you can assign the seller a negative rating for the failure to be responsive or failure to ship an item after receiving payment. Negative feedback is an important disincentive to seller misconduct and provides useful warnings to other potential bidders. Learn more about the Yahoo! Auctions rating system.

If you received an item of substantially different quality from what is typical of the brand of the item, it may be an indication that the item is a counterfeit. If the item is of a substantially different nature from the one advertised on the auction, the seller may be engaging in fraudulent activities.

If you suspect that the item you received is counterfeit, you may want to contact your local law enforcement officials or refer the matter to an appropriate federal law enforcement agency, such as the Federal Bureau of Investigation or the U.S. Customs Service. For more information, you may want to visit:

http://www.fbi.gov

http://www.customs.treas.gov

Furthermore, if you believe that fraud is involved, you may want to contact the Internet Fraud Complaint Center, your local postal inspector, and/or the Federal Trade Commission at:

https://www.ifccfbi.gov/ http://www.usps.gov/web sites/depart/inspect https://www.ftc.gov/ftc/complaint.htm

In an ongoing effort to improve security and protect against fraud on Yahoo! Auctions, we are pleased to add the Yahoo! Buyer Protection Program to our list of services. Most items on Yahoo! Auctions are covered by this Buyer Protection Program. We offer this program to our buyers free of charge. Although the vast majority of Yahoo! Auctions transactions are trouble-free, in the event of fraud the Yahoo! Buyer Protection Program provides an additional measure of safety.

Fraud is defined as:
1. Paying for an item that is not received; or
2. Receiving an item that is materially different than what is described.

What is the Yahoo! Buyer Protection Program? The Yahoo! Buyer Protection Program covers auction items (excluding real estate auctions) which close at prices above $25 and below $10,000. The program covers auctions launched on the U.S. site (http://auctions.yahoo.com); auctions on Yahoo!'s international sites are not covered. Sellers with a negative rating at the time of auction close are not covered.

There are two levels of protection: with Standard Protection, winning bidders are protected for up to $200 minus a $25 deduction. With Premium Protection, winning bidders are protected for up to $1000 minus a $25 deduction. This higher level of protection is only available when the entire transaction is completed through Yahoo! PayDirect, our person-to-person online payment system, and when the seller and buyer have been verified through our online or address verification process. Please note that the Yahoo Buyer Protection Program only covers buyers.

The period for filing a claim with cynoSure Financial, our claims administrator, extends until 60 days after close of auction. There is a lifetime limit of two claims per user.

How does it work?
If you are a buyer with an auction complaint and feel that you need to use our Buyer Protection Program, here are the steps you should follow:

1. First, make sure that you've allowed enough time for your auction item to arrive in the mail. Sometimes, it takes up to 14 days for an item to arrive after a seller has shipped it. During this period of time, you might find that an effective solution is try to communicate directly with the seller. Many problems are simple misunderstandings. You'll find the seller's email address on your closed item page.

2. If you are unable to resolve the matter with the seller, and at least 25 days have passed since the close of auction date, you may file a complaint with Yahoo!'s complaint system. After submitting a complaint, you can access it by going to My Auctions, clicking on the "Won" tab, and then selecting the closed item page for the auction at issue. Please note, in order to have sufficient time to escalate your complaint to a claim, you will need to file your complaint within 55 days of the close of auction.

3. Once the complaint has been submitted, the seller is notified of your complaint by e-mail. At that point, you should try to resolve the dispute with the seller directly. Buyers have incentive to resolve the dispute in order to avoid using one of their limited claims (only two (2) claims per buyer during their lifetime). Sellers have incentive to resolve the issue in order to protect, or even improve, their rating.

4. There will be a five-day period after you have filed a complaint in which you should communicate with the seller in an attempt to resolve the dispute. If after five days, the issue is not resolved, you will have access to a link that takes you to a blank claim form which you can print.

5. After printing a blank claim, handwrite or type all of the relevant claim information and mail it to our claims administrator, cynoSure Financial, along with copies of all supporting documents, such as email communications with the seller, proof of payment, photographs of the item, etc. Any illegible or incomplete claim forms will be rejected. Always save copies of receipts and correspondence. Your claim must be postmarked within 60 days after the close of the disputed auction.

6. Once you've filed your claim, the claims administrator at cynoSure will investigate the auction to determine whether fraud has occurred. The administrator will contact you with their decision within 45 days after receipt of your claim and all relevant documents. If you are involved in a claim, Yahoo! may share certain transactional information and personal information with cynoSure Financial in order to help facilitate the investigation and resolution of the claim. cynoSure Financial may only use this information only to process claims and may not use this information for any other purpose.

Protection Highlights

• Protection is available to winning bidders only
• Sellers with a negative rating at the time of the auction close are not covered.
• The program does not cover the payment if any part of the payment was sent by wire transfer or sent to a post office box or sent to any international location.
• $25 will be deducted from the claim.
• Standard maximum protection is $200 per auction. PayDirect maximum protection is $1,000 per auction.

Before you fill out the complaint form, please review the conditions of the Yahoo! Buyer Protection Program and the process for first filing a complaint and then, if necessary, submitting a claim:
• Protection is available to winning bidders only. Reserve Bidders are protected only if the seller has officially promoted them to "Winning Bidder" status.
• Both buyer and seller must be in good standing on Yahoo! Auctions, i.e., the feedback ratings of both users must be zero or above when the contested auction is closed. An auction that includes either a buyer or a seller with a negative rating at close of auction does not qualify for our Buyer Protection Program.
• The auction item must conform to the rules outlined in our User Agreement. If you are not sure whether your item qualifies, please review the list of excluded items.
• The final value of the item must be greater than $25 and less than $10,000. A deduction of $25 is required. Shipping and handling costs are not covered.
• The buyer has sent the money in good faith to the seller and never received the item, or the item received is materially different from the auction item described.
• Items lost or damaged in shipment are not covered. Please contact the shipping carrier for information about their reimbursement policy.
• The buyer must file their claim with our claims administrator within 60 days after the close of auction. This means that the final claim must be sent to our claims administrator, postmarked by the 60th day after close of auction.
• The claims administrator will determine whether fraud has been committed. cynoSure Financial will contact both the buyer and seller to verify that payment was made by the buyer and that the item was shipped by the seller.
• There is a lifetime limit of two paid claims per user for items covered under Yahoo!'s Buyer Protection Program.
• The program does not cover the payment if any part of the payment was sent by wire transfer or sent to a post office box or sent to any international location.

There are two levels of protection on Yahoo! Auctions:
• Standard Protection - Our standard program protects you for up to $200 with a $25 deduction on items with a final value greater than $25 and less than $10,000.

• Premium Protection - If you paid for the item via Yahoo! PayDirect - that is, the entire transaction went through PayDirect - and if the seller and buyer have completed our online or physical address verification process, you'll be protected for up to $1,000 with a $25 deduction. You can tell if you are PayDirect verified by viewing your "Account Profile" page in PayDirect. Please note that if you send split payments - part via Yahoo! PayDirect and part via check, money order, or other means - the auction will not qualify for Premium Protection. You must include your PayDirect transaction number on the complaint form. Items covered by premium protection are indicated by the star icon in the Protection section on the auction item page.

What am I not allowed to sell?
Here's a list of some of the types of items that generally are not allowed on Yahoo! Auctions. We've provided a few illustrative examples and suggested URLs where you may be able to do further research about the specific item that you're interested in selling. Please refer to the Yahoo! Auctions Guidelines for our complete policy.

Poupette's Note: This is an abbreviated list:

Copyright or Trademark-Sensitive Goods:
• Bootlegs
Learn more about copyright and trademark issues:
United States Copyright Office
United States Patent and Trademark Office
Counterfeit or Knock-Off Goods:
• Fake brand name goods

Please follow the steps below to file your Yahoo!'s Buyer Protection Program complaint:
1. Register your complaint.
- Many disputes between buyer and seller are simple misunderstandings. You must wait at least 25 days after the close of auction before you can register a complaint. Once the complaint has been submitted, the seller is notified of your complaint by e-mail. At that point, you should try to resolve the dispute with the seller directly. Buyers have incentive to resolve the dispute in order to avoid using one of their limited claims (only two (2) claims per buyer during their lifetime). Sellers have incentive to resolve the issue in order to protect, or even improve, their rating.
2. Try to resolve your complaint by communicating directly with the seller.
- The Buyer and Seller have a five day period to communicate and resolve the issue. If after five days, the issue is not resolved, you may submit a claim.
3. Update the status of your complaint.
- To update your complaint, and start the claim filing process, return to the closed auction page, accessible through the "Won" tab on My Auctions.
- Provide additional information documenting your communications with the seller, or cancel your complaint if you have resolved the dispute.
- Once the claim form is complete, you need to print the final form and mail it to cynoSure Financial, our claims administrator, along with all relevant documentation (printed closed item page, proof of payment, photographs, etc.). Incomplete or illegible claim forms will not be accepted.
4. Send your claim to cynoSure Financial, Yahoo!'s Claims Administrator.

- In order for your claim to be valid, you must file it within 60 days after the close of auction. This means that your claim form and all required information or supporting documentation must be postmarked by the 60th day after the close of auction.
- As they investigate to determine whether fraud has been committed, cynoSure Financial will contact the buyer for proof that payment was made, and will contact the seller for proof of shipment. As a buyer, it is a good idea to use a method of payment that enables you to document your payment (i.e. Yahoo's PayDirect, postal money order, personal check, etc.). Please keep in mind that payments sent with a wire transfer, to a post office box or to an international location are not covered. As a seller, it is a good idea to use a shipping method that provides proof of shipment such as a tracking number. Don't forget to keep your receipts.
- A claim administrator will contact you to let you know the results of the investigation within 45 days from the date your claim is received.