Your eBay horror stories

Have you had any horror stories dealing with a buyer or seller on eBay? I once had someone bid on a $1,000 item only to find out she was a 16 year old who never had any intention of paying for the auction.

 

Three recent items I have listed as 'Buy it Now' (all over $100) were 'bought' within hours of my listing them.

All 3 times, the 'buyer' had a 0 feedback rating, and emailed me that they would pay more than I asked if I would do some kind of Western Union deal with them.

In all 3 cases, when I went to check out the username, they all indicate 'no longer a member'. I just reported to ebay and relisted.

I never lost any money, but it delayed potential sales, and has really discouraged me from using the 'Buy it Now' option, which had been pretty successful.

I've also had numerous items go for WAY less than market value - the most stunning was a lot of 5 Criterion DVDs (including Killer and Hard Boiled) that I listed for a penny with free shipping, after an ebay seminar suggested that would draw more and higher bids. They sold for $16.00, so I ended up spending money on a deal that should have sold for over $200.00.

 

So why didn't you set them as reserve price auctions (or better yet set the starting price at whatever you wanted for them)?

 

Be aware of people who buy 100 bucks+ item and start complaining 3 days later having not received the item, when they are in another country. They will reclaim their money back, and if you can't prove you send them registered, they will both get their money back and the item.
Happened to me a couple of times. It also works with 30 bucks item or less.

By experience : the people that hassle the sellers are usually the one the most risky of being dishonest (regular buyers don't mind receiving the item a week or even three weeks later if send economy).

 

Be sure to set up your auction so that only people in the US (or wherever you are) can bid.

 

I recently had a customer in Belgium (feedback -5), buy a cd , he
wasn't happy with it. I had a feedback rating of 223-100% positive.
Before I could reply - he posted a neg.feedback.I state on my lisitings
if you are not happy for any reason, return item within 7 days
for a full refund.He wanted a refund,but he didn't want to return the cd In selling on Ebay for a few years this was the first time I dealt with someone so unreasonable.He posted a neg.feedback within just a few hours of receiving the cd. I'm thinking about not selling on Ebay anymore -with the fees from Ebay and the Paypal fees and the hassle from customers like that -I'm thinking it's just not worth it anymore. Anyway it was good while it lasted.Incredible.
Maybe I should limit my sales to US customers only ?

 

Well, I know to do that now. At the time, I was a newbie and actually listed them that way based on recommendations from a local ebay seminar. It was definitely counter-intuitive at the time, even to me, but I figured they knew what they were talking about better than I did.

I think the ebay environment has changed considerably since that time, and that may very well have been the recommended technique back then.

Something else I was taught there but don't necessarily agree with, was that setting a very low staring bid (under a dollar), and having a reserve that is substantially higher, actually discourages bidding.

 

Do you really think this would not happen with U.S. customers?

 

Make sure you set your preferences to block bidders with negative overall ratings or bidders who've had more than one NPB strike filed against them in the last 30 days. This is something eBay rolled out a few years ago and has worked wonders weeding out the knuckleheads.

 

Where else can you sell? The options aren't all that numerous any more. Besides, this one incident has really effected you this badly? I guess I'm just not sure why its really an eBay issue. People are nutty no matter where or how you sell.

 

I don't have any HORROR stories, and only a couple of negative experiences. I bid on something a year or two ago but the guy took the money and ran. Paypal got me a partial refund - I think I lost $25 but got back the other $15 or so.

Back when I used to sell on Yahoo Auctions, one guy used their propietary Paypayl-esque payment system to pay for my auctions and a bunch of others. He then had everything charged back to his card, so he ripped off me and a lot of other sellers. I only was out the $20 or so he'd paid - still royally cheesed me off, though.

Otherwise all my experiences have been good to great...

 

Selling, no problems.

Buying, problems. People who lie about the condition of records. I've stopped buying records on eBay as a result.

 

Hi,

I never knew that. Where exactly can I find this?

Thanks

 

You can set your preferences when you're preparing a listing.

You can also set them as follows:
1) go to your "My eBay" page, the left-hand column, "my account"
2) click on "preferences"
3) go to "selling preferences", "buyer requirements"
4) click on "show" and set the preferences as you wish.

 

Thanks a lot. I just did that.

 

I've been on eBay nine years now. I've had three people leave negatives out of several thousand transactions. (Plus one that was a mistake and not ill intentioned.) These were probably unavoidable - the odds of running into nut cases are like that of any other business so I count myself lucky. I had an older lady make promises to pay for an item for well over a month, then when I explained (after going thru the ebay non-bidder process) I was re-listing the item, she left me a negative and said I was mean and rude to her. I had another guy, when I first started, who was a certified nut case. He demanded a refund for an item claiming it was not authentic. I was an expert on the item and he clearly did not know what he was talking about, but per my policy I told him to return it and I'd refund his purchase. He didn't want to return it he just wanted the money back. I finally figured out he had several ebay user accounts going and was shill bidding on his 'other' auctions. (Most of his auctions were spurious items and fakes by the way) So I turned him in and he was suspended. Then I had a older fellow with only a couple feedbacks leave me a negative without notice about two weeks after an auction ended, then sent me an pretty terse email stating 'wheres the item?' (Heres the one time I was less than congenial about the matter..) I hadn't even received payment yet and told him so. Finally, after a month of his idiotic emails, I received a letter from him that I presume was the payment. The mailing date was at least a week after his negative. After what had happened so far, I wanted this deal to be done - it was clear we were going to have more problems no matter what. So I just tore up his check. After him emailing me with his ramblings for two more weeks I finally told him the deal was off and that he could just leave me a negative if he'd like. Oh thats right - he already did. Well whaddya know.

Once I paid for some items I won from a new-ish seller and received only a few of the items. He ignored my emails. His feedback rapidly grew and indicated a problem - soon it was maybe 300 positives and 75 negatives, almost all the negs were indicating items never received or only some of the winning items. So I eventually called the city police there and made a complaint. The guy, interestingly, used an actual street address. (eBay of course did nothing). I only lost ten dollars or so, so I wasn't too put out. However about a year later I heard a funny story through the collecting fraternity that the guy wound up doing this near the same time to a local gentleman who just happened to be a member of a 'motorcycle fraternity' (NOT the Honda Gold Wing club btw..) So he was personally visited by the ripped off guy (and probably a few bud's as well). The story went: the guy had no cash on hand to reimburse him so he got to pick through his collection for reimbursement - and did quite well!

 

My horror story is eBay changing their listing forms from their old style. It used to be that you could do everything on one page and list a CD in seconds, but now you have to wade through page after page of junk. In trying to make the site easier for newbies, they've made it too ponderous for me. I used to list stuff on eBay all the time, but now I don't list anything unless it's a high-value item.

 

I agree with it. I never use a reserve--if I'm feeling bold or don't care very much, I'll start it at a dollar and let it ride. And if I AM worried, I'll make the minimum what I would have had at my reserve, or about that. I know that, speaking from a buyer's perspective, I hardly ever bid on a reserve item. Better to just make the minimum higher, and that way there's no information gap, something that is offputting to me and probably most buyers.

That said, if I had a truly rare or exceptional item, I'd use the reserve system; barring that, it's usually a bad idea.

 

Yeah, I don't sell anything there anymore, either, for the same reason. Most of what I sell is music, and here and Amazon are better places to sell it. You don't get enough selling books, so I give those away. Audiogon works for selling stereo equipment. Craigslist for local/large items. It's probably a couple of years since I sold anything on eBay.

 

Buying Lp's on Ebay has been a mixed bag, I've really had to learn the hard way and now always ask questions.


Selling, no problems so far.


Also, I avoid auctions where the bidders identities are kept secret.



Haas

 

No real horror stories about eBay... a couple of incidents sure.

My HORROR stories are all reserved for PayPal... the most ingenious scam ever invented.

 

As far as online music purchases arriving at the door in fine shape, I've gotta say that I've had far better luck with eBay'ers than with several of the well known online audiophile shops. Just received a nice banged up copy of the new Milt Jackson MFSL mini-lp from one of 'em today.....'twas a crushed Nat King Cole LP from another a few months ago....and before that, another banged up LP from........ It's these guys who are the real horror show if ya ask me! Sigh.

 

I'm around 6 years on ebay. For all time with me happened only one horror story,when some guy from Spain try to steal 700 euros from me.He ordered laptop,after one week opened claim for not delivered ware.PayPal blocked 700 euros,so my balance on PayPal account was -700 euros.It takes long time & cost me some nervous cells,until I fixed situation thanks German Post & Police.

Was also around 5-6 small stories (no refund for bad ware,not paid auctions etc),but this was not a big deals (money amounts was up to 50 euros)

In general ebay is OK,but be very careful if you sell expensive ware using PayPal.

 

p.s

After this story was resolved (with laptop),I complained to PayPal about their draconian policies and after... they are deleted all logs for my transactions within last 3 months (may be to avoid legal issues). Very bad practice!!!

 

I have a current situation going on now... I hoping it doesn't turn into a horror story but... it's heading in that direction.

A few weeks back, I bought a DCC Wheels Of Fire 2CD set from a seller there. She had a 99.5% rating and she seemed legit. I sent a few email questions to her in advance to make sure the item was what I wanted, and I was satisfied with her answers.
I won her item. She sent it out to me and it was very well-packaged. It was also in near-mint condition, just as she had described... just beautifully well-preserved.

However, on closer inspection after removing the bubblewrap, I noticed some of the inserts were missing from the CD box.
The seller had claimed in her online description that "all the inserts were there". She had also answered this question previously in one of my emailed questions to her.

Second thing that was wrong... one of the discs was supposed to have three hidden bonus tracks on Disc One. This question was also answered in her online Q&A. And... her posted tracklist also showed the three tracks as 11, 12 & 13 on Disc One. No problem, right?
Wrong. When I put the Disc One into my CD player, the three hidden bonus tracks for tracks 11-13 didn't show up on my CD player. They simply weren't there.

I proceeded to email the seller and told her of the two problems, the missing insert and the missing tracks. I also asked her if she had possibly sent me the wrong set (as she had previously confided to me that she owned thousands of gold discs).
She replied back that I was mistaken and I was wrong - the inserts were in the box when she mailed them, and... the bonus tracks were all there. She also snidely asked me if I had read her Q&A section where she had claimed the bonus tracks were all there.

Well, I wrote her back and clearly showed her that her listing had misrepresented the item with false information, and that she was *responsible* for all the information that she had claimed. Even her online posted photo of the item did not show the missing inserts... that she claimed were all there.

I also reminded her that I had asked questions ahead of time on which version of this DCC disc she had up for auction, and that I was interested only in the version with the extra tracks.
She confirmed that this is what she had.

I pointed out (after discovering that the three bonus tracks were missing from Disc One) that her posted track listing was wrong and the names of the tracks she claimed also was inaccurate. I sent her some Hoffman-related links on this DCC disc to back that up. Had she read what I sent, she would clearly see she was wrong in her description of the item.
Also, since she had an *opened* item... she easily could have confirmed that indeed Disc One contained those bonus tracks making up tracks 11-13.
She apparently didn't do this.

I asked her for a resolution, either a full refund or at least a partial refund because the item I received was not as described.
I paid a lot of money for an item that was misrepresented and incomplete. (I told her I would have never bid on her item had she correctly posted what item she had.)

I have written her four times over the past week.
She has had sufficient time to respond back and has not, so I assume she isn't going to cooperate.

I'm not sure what to do next, but I have had more people direct me to try to resolve this matter with PayPal's Resolution Center than by taking it to eBay. PayPal I'm told often will refund my money.

I've never had any problems buying on eBay, and I have always found most people I have encountered there (thus far) to be fair when things are wrong.
This seller I believe made an honest mistake. I don't believe she intentionally tried to mislead anyone, but she did.
Her refusal to discuss this matter and resolve the problem is truly baffling. I would think she would want to resolve this, rather than going through a PayPal dispute process.

If anyone has any suggestions, it would be appreciated. I know a lot of you may have more eBay experience than me.
This has started to sour me on using eBay any further.

Many thanks for any advice...

Steve