Pain in the eBay arse

[Ray Travez]

My favourite buyer- a guy messaged me to ask where the skull that he won was. I explained that, after the auction ended he hadn't paid for two days, so I'd opened up a non-paying buyer case; that had run for two days and completed so then I'd relisted the item, a seven-day auction, which another buyer had subsequently won, so I'd posted the skull to them, it had arrived and they'd left me feedback a week or so previously, so if he was after the skull he was A BIT FUCKEN LATE.

My favourite seller- a guy got shirty and really quite nasty after I asked for a refund on a faulty item. You'd think he was used to a certain amount of refunds, given that a large percentage of his sales were SECOND-HAND INFLATABLE BEDS. Actually, not to mince words he was a really horribly nasty piece of work. After I left him negative feedback, he used a secondary account to buy one of my items with the express purpose of wasting my money on a return and leaving me a retaliatory neg. After this I got myself a second Ebay account; one for buying and one for sales. (Didn't post the item, got Ebay to remove the neg)

Agree with Janie- fuck this guy off. The time to bug a seller with questions about the item, is before the end of the auction.

[kalowski]

Slightly different pain in the arse but someone has just sold a bootleg of Tom Waits The Black Rider vinyl for £142 by claiming it was a recent reissue. Caveat emptor and all that, but I reported it to eBay and they didn't give a fuck.
£142 for a fake!

[peanutbutter]

I always list stuff at a way higher price with best offer enabled and telling people to ask questions and stuff beforehand. It's pretty clear which offers to reject usually.
Probably helps that I generally sell niche enough stuff.

Update on this one, I accepted one offer a bit to haphazardly from a guy who in retrospect was obviously gonna be a pain in the arse and it was a nightmare dealing with him.
Basically harassed the fuck out of him and found all the ways he was technically operating within the rules but being a total cunt about it. Got neutral feedback in the end probably because he thought I was gonna report him to the police or something.

Don't really think negative feedback means all that much anymore, once they're over 90% (for smaller sellers) and the negative feedback doesn't all sound dodgy as fuck it's worth a punt. Things are so heavily biased towards the buyers that it's inevitable some prick is gonna try and force you into a partial refund. Feel like you almost have to list electronic items as for parts to avoid dealing with some nightmare.

[Ray Travez]

Slightly different pain in the arse but someone has just sold a bootleg of Tom Waits The Black Rider vinyl for £142 by claiming it was a recent reissue. Caveat emptor and all that, but I reported it to eBay and they didn't give a fuck.
£142 for a fake!

I was on the opposite end of this recently, selling some Converse trainers. Someone must have reported them, because the auction was removed with the stated reason- counterfeit item. There's no way for me to fight it or submit proof and I'm not allowed to relist them ever. They weren't fakes, I suspect it was a rival seller. It's just bullshit when you've got no right of reply. Sold them on vinted in the end.

So I'm surprised Ebay didn't remove it, from my experience they are biased towards taking any report too seriously.

[kalowski]

I was on the opposite end of this recently, selling some Converse trainers. Someone must have reported them, because the auction was removed with the stated reason- counterfeit item. There's no way for me to fight it or submit proof and I'm not allowed to relist them ever. They weren't fakes, I suspect it was a rival seller. It's just bullshit when you've got no right of reply. Sold them on vinted in the end.

So I'm surprised Ebay didn't remove it, from my experience they are biased towards taking any report too seriously.

I've had this too. A record I bought in good faith so it might have been a bootleg  but they've still given me no evidence that it was.
Whereas this one definitely is. I got in touch with the seller (it's a record I've been after for years) and I asked him where is was on Discogs.
He told me it was the bootleg version but still sold it to some poor Duffer for £142!!

[Famous Mortimer]

After my last experience, which I presumably banged on about on here at the time, I went through the laborious process of deleting my account, and am glad I did.

[checkoutgirl]

"Have they been worn in the sea?"

People buy second hand footwear? Yuk.

[Fr.Bigley]

He's a gift horser, a cunt that although manages a bargain, still thinks they deserve a full consumer rights remit. My best advice is to tell this cunt to buy it or fuck off because he's a professional time waster.


I pity the mother he still lives with.

[Captain Z]

People buy second hand footwear? Yuk.

Wait till you find out what they do with them

[The Ombudsman]

eBay really is grim. I bought a second hand tumble dryer 3+ years ago on there, paid right after the auction ended. I sent a 1 or 2 messages over the next week, asking when I can come to collect and heard nothing. I then started the refund procedure, which if I recall meant the seller had 7 days to sort it out or it would be processed in my favour, which it did as they never responded. About 3 weeks after that, they got in touch to say that they were away when the auction was won and were annoyed I'd bought it then asked for a refund (a week after no response remember), but that I could come and collect it that weekend and pay them £20 more than the amount I won it for in cash.

[Fambo Number Mive]

What was the rationale for them asking for an extra £20?

[MojoJojo]

I was on the opposite end of this recently, selling some Converse trainers. Someone must have reported them, because the auction was removed with the stated reason- counterfeit item.

Big brand companies have trade associations that actively try and crush fake branded stuff, and they'll be leaning pretty hard on ebay. Which isn't the case for niche vinyl.

[Paul Calf]

My mate is making an absolute killing selling used trainers to deviants on eBay. The buyers ask all sorts of weird questions about locations in which the items have been worn ("Have they been worn in the sea?", "Have they seen the inside of a ladies changing room?", etc.). Apparently the grubbier and smellier the better.

We did look up one of the buyers on LinkedIn and he was a head honcho at some multinational investment firm. How the other half live, eh?

Secondary revenue stream:

"2k a month or we'll tell everyone you've been putting your dick in soiled footwear"

[The Ombudsman]

What was the rationale for them asking for an extra £20?

No idea, assume they were trying some reverse psychology or perhaps they were just thick.

I was given a dishwasher in the end so used the space up. I use the dishwasher much more than I would a tumble dryer, so I had the last laugh. Even though I'm up the laundrette in winter to dry my towels and bedding.

[jfjnpxmy]

Have any of yous ever done a car boot sale? I suspect it's the exact same goblin people that bootsale that're hassling peeps on eBay. Hadn't even switched off my car engine when they were tapping the window - "huv ye goat any gold? huv ye goat any LEGO? huv ye goat any vinyl?" - and one cunt actually got between me and my car boot, preventing me from unpacking, so he could demand a complete list of what I had before "those people" swarmed me. Every fucker running their greasy claws over your possessions, and then demanding deep discounts on their already discounted wares.

Something about OMG BARGAINZ and OMG HAGGLING breaks British brains, I'm positive.

[LORD BAD VIBE]

Have any of yous ever done a car boot sale? I suspect it's the exact same goblin people that bootsale that're hassling peeps on eBay. Hadn't even switched off my car engine when they were tapping the window - "huv ye goat any gold? huv ye goat any LEGO? huv ye goat any vinyl?" - and one cunt actually got between me and my car boot, preventing me from unpacking, so he could demand a complete list of what I had before "those people" swarmed me. Every fucker running their greasy claws over your possessions, and then demanding deep discounts on their already discounted wares.

Something about OMG BARGAINZ and OMG HAGGLING breaks British brains, I'm positive.

Yes, did some car boots sales as a teenager back in the early 90s. I was getting rid of all my old toys and a few other bits of tat so I could raise the money for a new guitar amp.

It was pretty much as you described. Bargain-hungry tossers swarming like flies round shit before you'd even got the boot open. You're trying to unpack everything and get your float sorted and they're off - "'Ow much is this?", "I'll give yer ten pee forrit."

I got my amp in the end after doing about three or four of them - never again.

[canadagoose]

The thing I hate most on eBay is stupid plonkers bidding on things and not paying, or being too far away for me to post it (at the price I specified). It's just such a waste of time.

[The Crumb]

My mate is making an absolute killing selling used trainers to deviants on eBay. The buyers ask all sorts of weird questions about locations in which the items have been worn ("Have they been worn in the sea?", "Have they seen the inside of a ladies changing room?", etc.). Apparently the grubbier and smellier the better.

We did look up one of the buyers on LinkedIn and he was a head honcho at some multinational investment firm. How the other half live, eh?

Should I be harvesting old trainers left out on the street? Surely there's no reason not to answer yes to all their probing questions? They're not exactly going to report you to trading standards

[Panbaams]

I guess I've been lucky – my experiences as a buyer and seller have been pretty good over the last three years. The most I had to deal with chancers was selling a Game Gear for parts (although a bit of TLC and know-how could have got it working properly again, maybe) with a bundle of games. "Will you take £50 mate?" Er, I put it up two hours ago, it's got a dozen watchers and that's less than the starting price. So probably not. "Mate."

[Famous Mortimer]

I'm convinced the "will you take (starting price minus an amount)?" is a bot, because everyone's had it, it never works and is irritating as fuck.

[Janie Jones]

The thing I hate most on eBay is stupid plonkers ... being too far away for me to post it (at the price I specified). It's just such a waste of time.

This is an intensely boring post for which I apologise in advance but what you describe there shouldn't happen. You specify in your listing what they pay for UK postage, that's easy and it doesn't matter where in the UK they are, Cornwall or Scotland or Northern Ireland, it costs the same. If the buyer is outside the UK they can use Global Shipping Programme which is nowt to do with you, that's between them and eBay, or they contact you to ask what you'll charge to post to their country. There's many ways to come a cropper on eBay but charging the correct amount for postage is pretty simple.

[canadagoose]

This is an intensely boring post for which I apologise in advance but what you describe there shouldn't happen. You specify in your listing what they pay for UK postage, that's easy and it doesn't matter where in the UK they are, Cornwall or Scotland or Northern Ireland, it costs the same. If the buyer is outside the UK they can use Global Shipping Programme which is nowt to do with you, that's between them and eBay, or they contact you to ask what you'll charge to post to their country. There's many ways to come a cropper on eBay but charging the correct amount for postage is pretty simple.

What I think had happened was although I said I didn't post outside the UK, I didn't specifically restrict bidders to the UK, which I had to dig about in the settings to do. The thing is, these bidders don't even pay either. I don't know why they do it. Boredom?

[touchingcloth]

What I think had happened was although I said I didn't post outside the UK, I didn't specifically restrict bidders to the UK, which I had to dig about in the settings to do. The thing is, these bidders don't even pay either. I don't know why they do it. Boredom?

It's simple enough - as @Janie Jones says - to set the prices for shipping appropriately, but it's not obvious to a new seller just how easy and common it is for international bids to be made. I had a surprise once when a laptop I was selling got a winning bid from France, which I hadn't anticipated at all based on my experiences with eBay up to that point - buying and selling inexpensive second hand items, often with explicitly as collection-only.

It turned out to be a scamming purchase (they paid, and started raising disputes with, to start with, genuine issues which I'd already made clear in the listing before moving onto outright fabrications), so since then I've only ever sold locally or domestically. 

[touchingcloth]

Off topic, but when did eBay last revamp their interface? It feels creakingly shit these days, easily one of the worst shopping sites there is.

[TommyTurnips]

You can turn off offers, but then if your item doesn't sell first time round and gets relisted then ebay automatically enables offers again and there is no way to turn it off. And so it starts. People trying to get 70% off the starting bid.

I was selling old pokemon games on there and a couple of people who sent me low ball offers had their own ebay shop full of pokemon merchandise at ridiculously inflated prices. No doubt they were trying to buy off me to secure more stock for their own ebay shop.

[Smeraldina Rima]

My low-bid-won first edition book was eaten by mice, what a misfortune.

[Famous Mortimer]

Having encountered multiple "didn't respond to your bids because I was away" responses, I now believe that the life of an eBay seller must be a non-stop whirlwind of parties and international jet-setting.

[TommyTurnips]

Having encountered multiple "didn't respond to your bids because I was away" responses, I now believe that the life of an eBay seller must be a non-stop whirlwind of parties and international jet-setting.

I had to do that once. I had a game up on ebay and no one bought it. It was up there for weeks and weeks, I kind of forgot it was there. Anyway, it sold when I was away on holiday so I had to send the buyer a message saying I'm on holiday and I'll be home in a few days. Luckily they were understanding about it.

[Ray Travez]

Ebay have taken down my listing of a shekere (percussion instrument made from a gourd) because I happened to mention in the description that it had the word 'Cuba' inscribed on it. Apparently I can't sell it because the United States has an embargo on Cuba.

It was bought in a charity shop in North Yorkshire, and I am selling it from a house in North Yorkshire. I am nowhere near the United States or Cuba and have never been to the United States or Cuba. I find it somewhat weird that I'm not allowed to do local business within the UK due to the US foreign policy.

[madhair60]

yeah whatever commie