I think we are on the same page. I would not be willing to refund grading fees. To answer your question, I am not a high-volume seller on eBay the way I used to be long-ago. I sell maybe a couple dozen items a month on average with an average sales price of around $100.

I think there is a very good chance he did not read the description when he bid, or read over it. This is not on you. My thinking is there is not a big transaction cost to taking the card back and listing it again.

You are clearly dealing with an idiot. No way in Hell would I pay this idiots fees associated with grading. The card was stated as trimmed and the buyer knew this when purchasing the card. He hoped that the card would get through the cracks and that the graders would miss the trim. He gambled and lost plain and simply.

The only bad thing about this is that eBay allows this kind of idiot to post negative feedback. My wife had a situation with a buyer 6 months ago where she had listed a women's sweater for sale and a newbie buyer bought it. The sweater was listed as a large, tags showed large, pictures showed sweater was a large, and this idiot tried to say that the sweater was not a large as it didn't fit her. Not our fault that this most likely obese person couldn't fit into the sweater that was properly listed, but eBay allowed the feedback to stand even though it was not truthful. In this situation, we did not refund because it was listed correctly and the person who had bid up the item wouldn't have reversed the feedback left anyway.

You are in a no win situation so I would tell this guy to jump off a bridge. If he leaves negative feedback, reply to it so the world cand see how stupid he is and block him from bidding.

Kmac

Buyer's no idiot
 

The buyer is no newbie to eBay. His feedback is 6948. He is no idiot but he is a first class A-hole. I'm surprised that he doesn't have any negative feedback himself!!!

Refund his money and shipping and tell him to take a hike if he insists on screwing you out of the costs for grading. How nicely you tell him that, I'll leave up to you. ;)

I'd lose the Cobb image. It has nothing to do with the item you were selling. Also, there is no need to put "TRIMMED" in the title. The title line is limited. That's why we have a description area for the details.

my opinion
 

In my opinion, there's only one instance where refunding grading costs would be warranted. That is the case where the seller explicitly states that the card is NOT trimmed and/or that the card is guaranteed to receive a numerical grade.

I play the grading game a lot. Try to buy (gamble) cards that I "think" will grade well and submit them. Sometimes I win, sometimes I lose, sometimes it rains. I've bought several raw T206s that ended up 5.5+; I've also bought several that were trimmed (including three in my latest submission). I chalk it up to playing the game... definitely not going to win them all.

The buyer (with that feedback) must know the game and certainly wouldn't have given Larry additional money had the card graded a 6.

Should you refund him in any way? Unquestionably NO!!! Clearly a scammer. If he's being a d_ck to you, be one right back!!

However, you seem to be getting a lot of input here from sellers and most are very biased points of view. Sellers want to maximize their profits, so they feel they never do anything wrong.

If nothing else, you should listen to some of us buyers, too. If you're listing a trimmed card, you need to make it much clearer. It's right there in your auction--in red--so I'm not putting any blame on you. But if I was looking at that auction, I'd be disturbed by the almost complete lack of a description. If it's trimmed, say "This card has obviously been trimmed" in your description.

Oh, and get rid of that Cobb picture. :)