I had a situation similar to RoryRory except that I was the buyer. I bought a wardrobe for DS's room on ebay and kept emailing the seller with no response. I even wrote in the final email that if there was no contact in the next couple of days I would leave negative feedback. Then I found somewhere on ebay that you could actually get the sellers contact details which included a contact telephone number. My DH rang them for me and the sellers husband answered the phone. Turned out that the womans brother had just died in a car accident. I felt terrible that I had been mean in the email. We told them not to worry about it, and worked out how to cancel the auction with them.