First, request contact info for the seller from ebay. That should give you their phone number, email, whatever.
It's possible this person has an aol account or somthing and all their messages are getting filtered. I've seen this several times. (I hate AOL)
If the information isn't valid, complain to ebay immediately so the account can be disabled and nobody else gets stung.
Second... paypal gives you 45 days to file a complaint. That doesn't mean your money will be recoverable... just that you have more than 30 days to complain.
I've been stung before so now I always request contact info BEFORE I pay and try to verify if it's accurate. I only do this for accounds with under 100 positive feedbacks.
The time I got stung the seller had 40 positive feedbacks. The problem is, there were a couple dozzen people since those that hadn't receive items that were waiting patiently and not leaving negative feedback or complaining to ebay! Only AFTER I posted negative feedback did people start crawling out of the woodwork to leave negative feedback.
If the seller doesn't complete a transaction within 20 days and they don't say in advance it will take that long they are asking for negative feedback. Too many people are afraid of retaliation. You can always mutually agree to have negative feedback removed from both parties later. You may or may not get your money back if you are ripped off. I've gotten my money back on one occasion and didn't on another. YMMV
