eBay sucks :mad:

[callisto9]

I recently listed my boyfriend's laptop on eBay. I've been an eBay member for years, so I know all the tricks that can be pulled when selling an item. I know about bid sniping, new users trying to buy your stuff, people wanting you to end the item early and sell it to you on the side and all the ways in which people will try to con you - especially, it seems, on laptops. I watch the item until the end and have no problems canceling bids and blocking people, if need be.

Our item sold for exactly the reserve - $600. A great deal for the laptop, really. The buyer had 58 feedbacks - all positive. I didn't hear from him within a day, so I sent an invoice. Nothing. I send another email, asking how he's going to pay. I get this in response:

"Hello Erin,

i am truly sorry, but I am unable to complete the transaction. i am not going to give you a run around, so instead I figured I would let you know ASAP so you can get it back up for auction and make some money. Please let me know if there is anything I can do to avoid the "strike" from e-bay. I truly am sorry, and I wish I could have bought both units but I had to make a choice and I went with the "More Powerful" laptop. I really am sorry. Please let me know if there are any listing fees, I am more then happy to work with you to make sure we both have a good ending to this. I really am sorry.

Jeff D"

I went off the deep end and sent him a nasty-gram. I was really upset for him wasting my time and money and bidding on something he didn't intend to pay for. Long story short, he's refusing to pay, and tells me due to my attitude, he's not doing anything. Just refusing to pay. And, I get this other email today:

"You know what...

If you would have been respectful about the entire thing I would have paid you the 32 dollars and it would have been fine... But since you are so unprofessional about the entire thing I will take the strike. The only thing you can do to me is send a strike against me, (Sellers cant leave negative feedback anymore) and I will be off e-bay for a week. I have 100 percent feedback, so I highly doubt they will kick me off. I am VERY sorry that this happened, and to tell you the truth I asked to pay you 700 bucks a little while back and you said no. I found a MUCH BETTER laptop for a great deal, so I am very sorry that this has happened.

Instead of going off the handle (You are going to make more money on this LT when you repost it anyways... Set your Reserve at 625 now... Not a big deal) figure out a way to work with people. Relax and have a great day...

Jeff D"

I am so mad. And you know what? He's right! You can no longer leave negative feedback for a buyer!!! WTF? Now I have to sit here and wait 5 more days to even file an unpaid item dispute, then wait for him to respond, then duke it out. He did indeed offer me $700 (even though Buy It Now was no longer an option), but I would have had to take a leap of faith, end the item early and hope he paid. I told him no thanks.

I swear, eBay gets worse all the time and it seems like it's sellers they punish the most. I'm both a seller (on rare occasions) and a buyer on eBay and rarely do I have a good selling experience. I've had to relist laptops and cellphones several times and constantly watch them so "new users" from Nigeria don't bid on them. Where's the protection for the sellers?

Sorry, I just needed to vent. I am really upset about this, and right now, out $32 in FEES.

Poopies.

[Lnzbug]

That really bites Erin. John buys on EBAY all the time. We have been selling our stuff on Craigslist. No fees & you can request cash only. Some people don't show to look at it but I can deal with that. I just schedule a pick up when I'll be home anyway. Good luck getting it sold.

[callisto9]

Unfortuantely, Craigslist here isn't much of anything. I already tried every other avenue (work, the .org, local auction site) before listing it on eBay. eBay is always my last option. Always.

I'm just so mad that as a seller, my hands are tied.

[Lnzbug]

Yeah, that's a drawback you don't like to think will happen to you.

[Fowvay]

Erin, in that first email he seemed polite and did offer to pay the relist fee. Why didn't you just respond with an ok... no problem and relist it?

[HarlequinPixie]

I believe the not so horrible news is that when you file a non-paying bidder thing, they don't make you pay at least some of the fees.. at least that's how it worked last time when I had that problem.

[LadybugEwa]

Erin, that totally sucks! That seems quite out of character for you, to fly off the handle like that.
That happens when nice people come to the end of their thether.
In my experience, whenever I 'blow up' it's with results similar to yours; i.e., I pick the worst time and person for it and end up shooting myself in the foot.
You have my sympathy

[callisto9]

Originally Posted by Fowvay

Erin, in that first email he seemed polite and did offer to pay the relist fee. Why didn't you just respond with an ok... no problem and relist it?

I was upset because he wasted my time by bidding on something he didn't intend to pay for. That's not how eBay works. You don't bid on 2 items, win them both, then decide which one you want to pay for! That's rude to the seller. What if we all did that? Oh, sorry, just don't feel like buying it. Nevermind wasting your time.

Sure, he offered to pay my fees, but again, he's the one being unprofessional - you are legally bound (per eBay) to pay for something you bid on and won. I could understand if he won the item and then ended up in the hospital or lost his job the next day, but I'm sorry, "I'm not going to pay for it because I don't want to" just doesn't cut it with me.

Yeah, I did get quite nasty with him and I guess I'm screwed now. Ewa, it IS out of character for me to react like that, but I'm tired of being screwed over on eBay. I'm tired of people wasting my time when I do everything to protect myself. And I'm really upset that eBay tends to protect the buyer when sellers are where all their revenue comes from.

[BUGINME]

I have been selling on ebay for over 5 years, and every other month I am going to close my store. It seems that the buyers are even ruder than at retail stores!! My favorite one was the buyer asked if I could change the background color of the fabric I was selling!!

I would wait the 5 days, file for dispute and then you will get your money back from ebay, the buyer will get a strike and he will not be able to leave you feedback.

[callisto9]

Originally Posted by BUGINME

I have been selling on ebay for over 5 years, and every other month I am going to close my store. It seems that the buyers are even ruder than at retail stores!! My favorite one was the buyer asked if I could change the background color of the fabric I was selling!!

I would wait the 5 days, file for dispute and then you will get your money back from ebay, the buyer will get a strike and he will not be able to leave you feedback.

I'm definitely filing a dispute.

What I don't understand is eBay's new rule about not being able to leave feedback for a buyer! What's that all about?

[BUGINME]

Originally Posted by callisto9

I'm definitely filing a dispute.

What I don't understand is eBay's new rule about not being able to leave feedback for a buyer! What's that all about?

I don't understand it and I think it's going to cause some problems.

[HeatherBug]

I buy off Ebay all the time, I usually only get "Buy It Now" items and as soon as I hit the confirm buy.. I pay for it right then. Why wait?

I've sold a few items on Ebay too and had a TERRIBLE experience. I sold a ring on there for 600 dollars, the guy paid for it right away... we exchanged a few emails and I sent him the ring, I had a tracking number and everything. A week later, he recalled the money and said that he never received it. So I went to the post office and they tracked the package and they said that he got it and he even signed for it and she printed me off the paper of him signing for it. I emailed him for two weeks, no response. I finally just looked up his number (I stalked him lol) I called him and finally got a response out of him. He said that he used buyer credit on paypal and THEY recalled the money, he didn't even know about it. But when it was recalled, it said that the buyer recalled it. He was so lying to me. I finally got the money back from him but it took over a month. It was such a headache. That was the last time I sold anything on Ebay.

But on the same ring, we had THREE different buyers before him that would send us an email with all this bullcrap like "I'm buying this ring for my SON, I'll pay you 1,500 dollars just send it to here.. blah blah blah" But they would buy it at the last minute so we would be stuck with the fees and this happened THREE times. We got the fees back from Ebay because we told them the situation.

Sorry this happened to you Callisto, but you should be able to get the fee waived.

[GINA]

When I buy on ebay, I do the same as Heather; buy it now. I hate the whole bidding war, and I'm too impatient for it anyway I sold maybe just one or two things before, but it was years ago. Now I just sell and buy stuff through craigslist, or Vortex if it's car stuff

Erin, sounds like this was just the straw that broke the Erin's back. Sorry it happened

[05yellowbeetle]

Here's the real kicker... the buyer can get ebay to REMOVE the strike with no reason at all, they don't even contact you. The buyer can completely ignore you, you file the UPI, they respond, you give them the strike and they contact ebay, no more strike. I had one buyer who admitted to not checking her email for over a month, ebay removed the strike.

The only thing I can recommend is reporting him to them for whatever offense you can think of at the same time as the UPI, in this case, if you still have the email with headers when he offered you $700, report him for trying to make an off-ebay sale.

A couple possible options:
Help > Contact Us > Selling > Problems with Buyers > User is bidding/buying to harass seller/prevent sale (check his bid history, find the time of the bid on the other laptop and use that in your response)
Help > Contact Us > Selling > Fraud and Transaction Problems > Buyer Offered to Purchase an Item from You Outside of Ebay
Help > Contact Us > Selling > Unpaid Item Concerns and Appeals > The problem you are having with an Unpaid Item Isn't Listed (Copy and Paste his emails, tell them in NO WAY shape or form that he should have the strike that you are giving him removed, remind them that this is the ONLY way a seller can go after a bad buyer, since we can't neg them anymore)...

BTW, if it was my buyer, since more than likely he will neg you, I would leave him a positive (since that is all we can do anyway) that says NEGATIVE: Bid on TWO Laptops, REFUSED to HONOR Bid

Best of luck,

Shanna
aka oneredbug on ebay

[05yellowbeetle]

Originally Posted by BUGINME

I don't understand it and I think it's going to cause some problems.

All I can say is they better use their latest fee increase money to hire a ton of people for trust and safety because the extortionists are going to have a field day. But I will be done with ebay in just a couple weeks...

[callisto9]

Unfortunately, I didn't keep the inquiry where he offered me $700.

I just feel like my hands are tied here and this idiot is going to get off scott free. Really, he can just lie his way out of it and eBay seems to side with the buyer. Why, I have no idea.

I think I'm done selling on eBay. I've already sent them an email with my disapproval of this process, but I'm sure it will make no difference whatsoever.

[05yellowbeetle]

Did you keep the emails from your post? In the 2nd one he admits that is what he did.

[wawalker]

Originally Posted by Fowvay

Erin, in that first email he seemed polite and did offer to pay the relist fee. Why didn't you just respond with an ok... no problem and relist it?

I agree with Tom. When you are buying and selling in a basically anonymous environment like eBay you gotta expect this. I have had the same thing happen to me a few times. I've done around 400 eBay transactions and 99% of them work out including the relists. I really think this guy would've sent you the $32--I've had it happen for me. You really have no power here, it's not worth the fight, just relist, resell, and let it go.

[Chef Angry Mike]

Originally Posted by wawalker

I agree with Tom. When you are buying and selling in a basically anonymous environment like eBay you gotta expect this. I have had the same thing happen to me a few times. I've done around 400 eBay transactions and 99% of them work out including the relists. I really think this guy would've sent you the $32--I've had it happen for me. You really have no power here, it's not worth the fight, just relist, resell, and let it go.

I agree with these guys too. I've sold cars on ebay and you have to be prepared for some nonsense. It's no worse than listing things in the paper and having yahoo's call you up and waste your time. To be honest, that guy seemed like he wanted to make things up to you, and I would have accepted his money for the the fees and moved on. You are wasting a lot of good energy on being angry with the system.

[callisto9]

Well, I still politely disagree. So many people say to just let it go, but this butthole is likely to keep on doing this to people in the future and I didn't want to let it go without having my say. It's kind-of like getting bad customer service. Do you just let it go because, hey, it happens all the time? I feel if these people were held accountable, maybe crap like this wouldn't happen all the time.

What the buyer did was WRONG and I didn't want to give him a free pass and just walk through this experience on his terms. I did actually write back and say if he paid the $32, I would consider this resolved, but apparently he wasn't too keen on my tone. I just think it's crap that I should feel like I've done something wrong here. I haven't.

There's a difference between expressing interest and actually agreeing to pay for an item. It'd be one thing if he asked me a lot of questions about the item, but never bid. Or bid, but didn't win. Or came over to my place to look at the item for an hour but didn't buy. No, he WON the auction and by eBay's terms, you're bound to pay for the item. And this guys just says, "Oops, my bad, I found another one." Sorry, not cutting it for me.

But I guess most people disagree with me. I guess I'm tired of being nice to people who waste my time.