[hcv123]

Again - thank you all for your input - the conflicting perspectives highlight well the dilemma and questions.

1) Is it reasonable to expect that the buyer would keep the poster in its unopened state seems like the really important consideration.

My thought after mulling this over is that it is a more reasonable scenario in the case of a poster (significantly different in my mind from an unopened pack of cards) that a buyer will want to open and display it and would be purchasing one that was unopened expecting it to be in better condition than an opened one.

2) There was no "intent to deceive" on either part - of course I couldn't know about the damage and nor could the buyer.

3) The poster including shipping was about $200 - somewhat irrelevant in my mind to the question at hand.

4) Everything that has been stated about Ebay - in my experience is 100% accurate and if it got to a "not as described case" I am almost certain Ebay would side with the buyer - regardless of reasonable mitigating circumstances.

5) The buyer has in the mean time communicated he wants a 100% refund. I am going to give it to him - 90% because I believe that is reasonable given the circumstances and 10% because any other decision would more than likely come back to bite me in the ass with Ebay!