Literally Insane eBay Seller

Also, with ebay, you have to wait a certain time period before you can leave Neutral or negative feedback. Some people don't want to wait, so they leave "Positive" with a scathing remark. Not so helpful unless you read all the feedback.

 

If I buy something from eBay, I use eBay's stated standards. They're listed right there with the auction - why would I ignore those and go with grading from another site instead?

 

You can do whatever you like.

In my opinion you got what you paid for and it was graded accurately. The seller obivously is insane, but he can grade.

 

There are without a doubt some very disturbed folks (both sellers and buyers) out there. I had a very special experience last year as a seller on ebay. I first posted the following comments in a FB group (copied from there):

Sorry for OT but it might be interesting for some sellers here: I sold a CD to a buyer on ebay in February. I asked him if he would prefer registered shipping but he declined. On March 4th he contacted me saying he did not receive the CD and he gives me two days to take care of this problem. So i was frustrated of course but knew that i would have no chance because i had no tracking number. Long story cut short i fully refunded him the same day. A few days ago this guy suddenly opened a case against me wanting a refund for a not received CD. I told him that he already had been refunded weeks ago (and although he of course knew that ) he began insulting me calling me *********,prick...and left negative feedback. I sent screenshots of the paypal refund to ebay's customer service several times but always received different replies. So today i gave Germany's ebay support a call and they told me as i sold the CD on ebay.uk there is nothing they could do but at least they redirected me to the British support and so i had a telephone conversation with them They checked the case again and within a few minutes closed it. Just a few minutes ago the buyer opened another case now on paypal to get another refund. Will have to give them a call tomorrow to clear things up. Can you believe that: This person already got a full refund + he most probably has my CD (so i lost both my money and the CD and that is still not enough for him). Sometimes it is really no fun to sell anything when you have to deal with complete sickos like this. Just a heads up for you in case the guy bids on one of your items.

Paypal closed the case the next day and i thought it would be over. But then later that year (again copied from my FB post):

Update: The psycho is back. He closed his old account and his latest ebay ID is now -------. Bought a CD yesterday from me using a different account but it was the same address. So i gave ebay a call and the guy on the phone advised me to cancel the sale and refund him. That's what i did and within a few minutes he left negative feedback and the first message arrived: "Hey Axxhole! Why the fuxx did you cancel the order?" With my experience from February with him in mind i knew it would be impossible to have a halfway normal conversation so i didn't even answer. More messages arrived during the evening that were so obscene that i don't want to recite them here. Spent around an hour on the phone with ebay's customer service tonight and finally had the chance to talk to someone who was really able to help. After explaining my past experiences with that guy he took a closer look at his account (obviously his third this year) removed the neg feedback and promised that now some serious action against this lunar will be taken. He also checked the messages that the guy sent me saying he has seen quite some weird stuff during his time in ebay's support team but never something like this. So i hope i will never hear from this psycho again but i doubt it... Of course he joined my blacklist but he will most probably create a new account if this one will be closed down. Another option would be to exclude that whole country from my shipping list which would be sad but what else can you do. Ebay can be so much fun sometimes...

Haven't heard from him since that but i know until today he still has his account on ebay (just changed his user name this time). Hard to understand why ebay didn't close this account despite their promise to "take serious action" against him.

 

But it wasn't graded accurately based on what eBay's standards are.

And he now recognizes that - I happened upon one of his new listings today, and he bumped it down to "Acceptable".

He also added this blurb!

"all cds are played to ensure, they play flawlessly prior to selling them.
this cd plays fine, enjoy.
I am required to chose a condition of the item for sale, so i have selected, acceptable, i would rather leave that empty, a CD is a piece of music, either it plays fine, or it doesn't. This is an USED item , anything that is of wear and tear is to be expected. I don't make misrepresentations , of what i sell, because people have varying degrees of how they evaluate things. So what i sell, ranges in my view from good to as new, but they are unrated, buying a CD from me, means as stated above, that it honestly PLAYS FINE . So No Returns, are accepted, for the CDs, based on issues, related to the wear and tear of the CD or any other marks or that it does not play. I have made absolutely sure of the playability of the item by playing them prior to listing them.
So buy AS IS as per, description and conditions, stated within the line starting with label P1, until end of description of item , line labeled end P1"

 

Yeah, I understand where he is coming from. He probably feels cheated by you. Not rightfully so, but I can relate why. I sell stuff on Amazon and Discogs and I used to sell stuff on ebay, but have not for a long time.

Both Amazon and Discogs have very similar grading guidlines and these do differentiate between "like new" and "heavily used" in a meaningful way. However ebay apparently allows sellers only to sell different versions of "pristine", which is just not realistic.

But this thread was certainly helpful in alerting me to these absurd ebay-guidlines and making sure, I am not selling anything there.

 

I do understand that gray area exists in terms of the CDs' condition, as "VG" leaves wiggle room.

A sane seller would've had a reasonable discussion about my concerns and tried to work with me.

This one claimed I lied about the flaws, and when I proved their existence, he said the flaws didn't matter.

He made no attempts to work with me - he just went DEFCON 5 and turned into a raving lunatic.

I went into my initial emails to him from the POV that we could work out a compromise - Nutbag Joe wanted none of that.

BTW, not sure how I "cheated" him - I indicated displeasure and pursued the issue via eBay, so I'm not sure how that "cheated" him...

 

You only "cheated" him in his mind. He (in his mind) works very hard to make sure that every CD plays and you get a CD that plays and still complain. To him that is unreasonable. He is crazy, you are totally right about that. I am sure you could have figured something out, but he was just so certain that he was right (even if he was not, due to ebay's guidlines).

 

It's lucky that Ebay generally sides with the buyer in this case.

 

That whole missive is a red flag. Hopefully, anyone else who cares about condition will now also realize this seller is not to be trusted.

 

It's lucky he was insane and sent 1000 harassing emails!