Quandary?

[wellREDman]

 I need some advice,
   I am an ex roadie who now works as a carer/rock n roll coach at a small charity run special needs unit.
I still do a bit of local crewing when it fits around my school shifts, and when I do I often hit up the backline guys  for skins/sticks/strings etc. for my kids.
  when Status Quo last came round I gave my pitch to their drum tech, and he apologized that he had just changed skins yesterday and was low on sticks but how would I like a signed drumskin to ebay to raise money for music equipment. 
while the auction was running a collector from Australia contacted me to ask if I would ship to Australia, he also asked if I had any  photos etc to prove it was genuine. I told him the story of how I got it.

  When he won the auction at  £75 he contacted me and asked me if I would hold off sending it til he had emailed me a letter of provenance paraphrasing my story which he wanted me to print, sign and include in the package, we also went back and forward a bit with the postage cos he wanted it sent surface mail so I had find out the  options for that including insurance etc. for him. When we had agreed on the new postage he paid me by paypal

  so then when a few weeks had gone by and no provenance letter was emailed, I emailed him to check I was still supposed to be waiting to send it. ... no reply.

  a few weeks later I tried again, both through email and ebay messaging....still no reply

fast forward 8 months and having again had no reply to email(i could now no longer call it up in my ebay cos it had gone over time) I tried to contact ebay through their arbitration section, after an hour of trying to find a category in the multiple guess hell that covered my issue I gave up and phoned ebay.

I then had a very frustrating chat with a guy in a call centre who's English just wasn't up to the job of understanding what I was saying: he obviously couldn't access the details because of over-time either, and kept talking about a different sale i had done of a drum shell.
    when I had finally (I think) got him to understand what my dilemma was he told me he couldn't cancel the auction because it was too long ago, He advised me against just sending it to the guys address as his "non responsiveness means he may not receive it "  and that I should just hold on to the item and wait and see

I have tried to see if I can track him down online, but he as a really common name and Melbourne is a big city, and because it has dropped out of my ebay history I no longer have  his address so can't write a letter

what should I do?

I can only think that the guy has passed away or skipped town or something so I'd really like to re-sell the thing, especially as the school PA has blown a channel and I'm currently fund raising to try and sort that out

[Barklessdog]

File a claim dispute in the regulation center, then after a week, close the case and relist it. Also get the letter of authenticity by the time you relist it.

[dadagoboi]

he paid me by paypal

The guy paid you?

Relist it and see if he surfaces.  If so, send him the head, no provenance.  If not, resell it.  You've made an honest effort to find him. 

[fur85]

If he paid you, even if it was eight months ago, it belongs to him. Your Paypal account will have his shipping address in your transaction history.

If I were in your shoes I would do one of two things. Either ship it (without the letter) to the address he sent you with the payment or hang on to the skin until he responds to your email.

If you decide to relist it you should refund his Paypal account.

[Dave W]

Yes, refund his Paypal account and be done with it. If that causes him to resurface, then you can always reverse the refund and sent it to him.