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Tell me your WORST buyer horror story

99.9% of buyers I work with are an absolute joy. I just ran into one after 16 years on eBay who was the absolute WORST I've ever encountered. Yee gads.

 

Note that all communication was through eBay's messaging system!

 

Started out with the buyer asking me for a discount on a multi-item purchase. I politely pointed out the items were already on sale, and offered her free shipping.

 

She took the offer ... then paid immediately, before I could invoice her for the free shipping ... and then sent me a message that she was "sad" about having to pay shipping when I'd promised her free.

 

*head desk* I immediately refunded her the shipping.

 

THEN she demanded that I falsify the customs infomation. (International buyer.)

 

Ummm ... no.

 

I sent her a polite note explaining I could not do this, referring her the appropriate page on eBay, and cringed, because I had a feeling this was going to go south.

 

Yup. Entitled buyer felt entitled. She demanded I either falsify the customs info or ship in two package so the $$ amts would be less so she wouldn't have to pay customs fees. Or, she wanted me to cancel the order and refund her money. She also complained about the GAS and time needed to pick the items up at her post office, as if this was my fault and something I should refund her for. (Basically, she stated that if she was paying "X" amount for shoes, she shouldn't have to pay for the gas to go get them, too.)

 

Yeaaaaah. I refunded her order and sent her a cancel transaction request.

 

Cue immediate threats to leave me negative feedback if I didn't ship her the order RIGHT NOW and ranting that I just didn't understand. (Note: I've refunded her at this point!.)

 

2 1/2 hours of hold time later, I managed to get somebody at eBay who spoke passable English, and filed a report with Trust and Safety. While I was on hold, the buyer sent me a message indicating she'd reported me to eBay and they said I had to ship to her and demanding again I ship in two packages. (Though this time she offered to pay for shipping, implying that she'd planned on that from the beginning. We'd initially agreed to free shipping. In any case, I've been told by Trust and Safety as a friendly warning in the past that splitting an order into multiple packages is still considered customs fraud if the purpose is to avoid fees.)

 

I had already blocked the buyer, but informed her she was blocked, and told her to never buy from me again, and reminded her that her money was refunded. I suggested she find another seller(s) with the same items, and buy at different times or buy from two different sellers, if she wanted to keep the cost below the point at which she would be assessed a customs fee. 

 

Buyer's response was so profanity laden I couldn't post it here without getting banned from the boards myself, and it wouldn't make much sense if I redacted the profanity. Suffice to say she wants me to go somewhere hot, and also feels I'm a deveil, whatever that is. She also threatened to have all her friends buy from me and leave me negs. I reported her for the abusive language and threats. I resisted the temptation to respond with something along the lines of, "Do you mean devil, dummKopf?" (Really, if you're going to curse at someone, at least learn to spell the words correctly.)

 

I blocked all of Germany.

 

Then she purchased two of the SAME items from me, using a different ID ... with the same last name, mailing address, and paypal account. (Dunno how that happened as I had her entire country blocked, unless a block takes a few minutes to take effect.) What, she thought I was going to ship them to her AFTER she threatened to have all her friends neg me into oblivion, threatened me with a neg for refusing to falsify customs info, and also told me she'd reported me to eBay? Entitled dummKopf is a dummKopf.

 

I then called eBay and reported her for being an unwanted bidder and using a second account to circumvent my block.
I refunded her money, and sent a cancel transaction request, which I figured she wouldn't accept, but at least I could close it after seven days.

 

Buyer denied the cancel transaction request.

 

I called eBay AGAIN and, to eBay's credit, the rep was able to credit me my fees and assured me she was bumping this issue up to her supervisor for immediate review. I expect the buyer will be NARU'd very quickly.

 

I'm just ... boggled, however. She's not a newbie (2006 account), she's a competing seller, she's not a child based on her profile photo, and ... what, I caught her on a bad hair day? My first thought was that I was dealing with somebody's self-entitled 13 year old brat, but the account's been around since 2006 and she didn't buy things I would expect a kid to buy. She bought vintage Barbie shoes.

 

O've been on eBay since 1998.  For sheer irrationality, she was my Worst. Buyer. Ever.

Message 1 of 85
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Re: Tell me your WORST buyer horror story

this is news to me! usually buyers never contact me until they are ready and I don't think about it until about 3 days. I thought that was the norm. Wow, I have never heard of the knocking something off of the market thing. People can be rotters I guess and am thankful I haven't run into anything like that. The most annoying thing I have run into on ebay as a seller and this has happened a few times with outfits: someone will buy them not leave feedback and when I go over to see if they've left others feedback find they are a seller too and they've put something they got from me on one of their dolls hiked the price and sold it and still didn't leave me feedback 😞

There's truth in lies and lies in truth, would I lie to you???
Message 46 of 85
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Re: Tell me your WORST buyer horror story

p.s if I am takin over a day I will contact seller


There's truth in lies and lies in truth, would I lie to you???
Message 47 of 85
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Re: Tell me your WORST buyer horror story

Hi Rose, that's the eBay standard for paying now - that a buyer is expected to pay within 2 days, and then a seller can file Unpaid Item.  

 

So the seller was following the current standard practice, not doing anything wrong or unusual.  See the info here:

http://pages.ebay.com/help/policies/unpaid-item.html

 

Many years ago it used to be 7 days, then was changed to 4 days, and now it's 2 days before filing Unpaid Item (I can't remember exactly when they changed to 2 days, it was sometime within the last 2 to 3 years).

tree*fern
Volunteer Community Mentor

Message 48 of 85
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Re: Tell me your WORST buyer horror story

well, that shows how dated I am! If it weren't for you and various emails from them or trying to figure out all the boxes after an update I would remain clueless! I still give people a week and more if they are know customers and need it. Get the same from a few sellers that I've dealt with for years [when they have a sale or dolls that are limited that I want but can't pay for right away]


There's truth in lies and lies in truth, would I lie to you???
Message 49 of 85
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Re: Tell me your WORST buyer horror story

They change things so often, it's hard to keep up with it all.  I do the same as you generally.  In listings I ask that buyers pay in 2 days, but in reality I usually contact them in 2 days and let them slide up to a week before filing Unpaid Item.  But I wouldn't want buyers to just expect that from everyone without asking first, and I can't fault anyone for following the eBay standard.

tree*fern
Volunteer Community Mentor

Message 50 of 85
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Re: Tell me your WORST buyer horror story

I just saw how they are removing the free listings perk and are pushing me to get a store. I stopped listing all but a couple things here for about a year then came back again because of the traffic. Was told I'd get my best seller back the end of this month am gonna use the rest of my free listings good until the 15th and decide what I'm going to do. It would be fine if all I did was sit at home and make doll jewelry but that isn't the case and if my work load gets heavy in other things I wont have the time to list and make enough things to make that viable, we'll see

There's truth in lies and lies in truth, would I lie to you???
Message 51 of 85
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Re: Tell me your WORST buyer horror story

They're only removing Fixed Price from the monthly free listings allowance, and only in 14 categories.  

 

They're adding another 50 free monthly (and are supposed to add the extra 50 more right after May 15).  So each month you can list 100 auction or auction-with-Buy-It-Now free.  Just not Fixed Price free any more unless you have a store.  And yep, you're right, the fee change is part of the constant pushing to commit to a store.

 

http://announcements.ebay.com/2014/04/sellers-updates-to-fees-in-select-categories-could-mean-more-f...

tree*fern
Volunteer Community Mentor

Message 52 of 85
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Re: Tell me your WORST buyer horror story

Thanks tree*fern for the reassurance. And, the seller for the Grecian barbie already shipped my barbie, so hopefully i would receive it sometime next week. Yea, that effanbee doll was the one I've been watching for months and something I've wanted to buy but couldn't afford.
Message 53 of 85
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Re: Tell me your WORST buyer horror story

I do understand why the seller was frustrated, although, yea, it wasn't nice of her to do. I also had to deal with sellers who took a week before they can ship my item. I remember once last year when I was really really new here and a seller didn't send me any message or update about a doll I bought for a week and that made me worry. Then after a week of speculation, her husband sent me a message just to tell me that she was hospitalized and rushed to ER due to pneumonia and they didn't know when she would be out of the hospital. Fortunately, I received it after two weeks, and I never sent any rude messages telling them I would open a case or leave a bad fb, because I want to know first why they couldn't ship my item. i even wished her well and to get well soon.

Anyways, yea, I guess I got offended with this other recent seller due to her short, but a bit aggressive, message. But, everything's fine now since then. I apologized to her and she also shipped the doll so hopefully I'll receive mine this week.
Message 54 of 85
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Re: Tell me your WORST buyer horror story

I'm a buyer, I won an auction for a limited edition super smash bros nintendo 3ds xl. Description of item was "brand new in original box".

Once I won I asked for a list of items included, if the item had been opened, was the item damaged.
The seller provided different pictures than the pictures in the listing. The new pictures gave cause for concern. They showed the item out of box and one picture appeared to show damage to the item.

I voiced my concern and contacted ebay.

Having been in contact with the seller, they have sent multiple pictures of the item in different light with various backgrounds. I told the seller to use a mirror to show the casing of the unbound item to prove that it was in fact the limited edition all while being able to show the condition of the screen which had appeared to be water damaged.

The seller refused any further contact and said that they were finished sending pictures.

I gave them negative feedback and included the item description as well as the damaged area description, listing being fraudulent.

Am I wrong?
Message 55 of 85
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Re: Tell me your WORST buyer horror story

Zombie Thread. Over a year old.

Message 56 of 85
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Re: Tell me your WORST buyer horror story

Braynz


€,`^{=
Message 57 of 85
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Re: Tell me your WORST buyer horror story

allot of times people will start up a thread again if they feel a need to. This thread is relevant enough to do so. I'm in a situation right now that is starting to turn into a horror story due to a mistake I made with two different orders. I packed them at the same time with half a dozen other orders [sell on more than one site] and apparently mixed them up. One of the buyers is being really weird about shipping back items to me or the intended customer and the other is very agreeable but I have no idea what she has done with the ones order [ship to me or him]

There's truth in lies and lies in truth, would I lie to you???
Message 58 of 85
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Re: Tell me your WORST buyer horror story

well, since I was the one supporting the relavance of bumping this thread so far though I'm out about 20.00 in shipping and merchandise it looks like a happy ending is coming and everyone will be satisfied and all is moving right along.

There's truth in lies and lies in truth, would I lie to you???
Message 59 of 85
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Re: Tell me your WORST buyer horror story

Dead threads don't usually get much attention. Better to start a new one.

Message 60 of 85
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