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Question About This Selling Practice

My wife loves this item and we saw it at a local estate sale.  The seller there was asking $5500.  Now it appears he listed it here on Ebay.  

 

Seller states shipping is $5000 and he wants cash at pickup and will not accept Paypal.  When messaged states local pick up is not free as noted in details.  Its actually $5000. 

 

Is this really an acceptable practice when listing on Ebay? Im assuming its not however the listing is still up so im not certain.  As far as im concerned my wife will have to love the piece from afar as this listing seems designed to circumvent Ebay fees and aggravate buyers as its rather smarmy.  

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Question About This Selling Practice

 Thank you all for your response.  I have learned much.  

 

To recap my lessons for the day:

 

1.  My husband and i will not be listing items for free local pick up as we dont want to wade into the Paypal or cash issue.  We will simply continue to sell at shows where we have done well.  Thank you to Wisconsin for our most recent successful show.  Buyers there did not seem to be at all hampered by the elsewhere suggested idea for slow sales which included lack of interest in our items or collectibles in general nor the economic situation and for that we are thankful as we have a huge house, two barns and two smaller summer homes to clear yet not to mention the cabins. 

 

2.   We are going to take the advice of the posters who suggested we stay as far away from the seller and the blanket chest as possible.  You all have opened my eyes to a number of issues and i thank you all for sharing your wisdom with me and taking the time to answer my husbands post noting many things i hadnt considered.

 

3.  Ebay is a complicated place.  Certainly to do business here as well as to shop.  One meets all sorts of people with conflicting end goals.  I must remember that and then remind myself that i can only control my actions and those actions must be things i can live with.  I have no desire to be involved in anything where another, even a business entity, could possibly be doing something smarmy.  Im just too close in age to going through those pearly gates to rack up a strike frankly!😋  We likely did enough of that when we were younger.

 

4.  When something is no longer fun and becomes simply another formvof ever increasing stress in one must re evaluate continued participation in the activity.  Selling and buying on Ebay has become something of that for my husband and I after these last few weeks. Perhaps i should take up painting instead.  Learning Folk Art painting sounds interesting to me and i thank you for that suggestion.

 

Best of luck to all sellers and Thank you again for your time and responses in educating this confused old woman and her grumpy old husband.  By the way he is thrilled to be keeping the money safely tucked away in his boot.  And im cooking him a cheesecake for winning this argument.   

 

Thank you again for all your help and time.  

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Message 18 of 18
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Question About This Selling Practice

On eBay - when one offers anything for sale for local pickup - PayPal is NOT acceped 99.9% of the time it is cash only. Yes, standard procedure.  If pickup, there is no shipping charge.

I am a founding member of the eBay Community Expert Group: a USA volunteer mentor with over a decade of experience. I am not an eBay employee.

Live simply. Care deeply. Love generously. Speak kindly. Laugh loudly. Act responsibly. Rejoice daily. Help cheerfully. Plan carefully. Criticize sparingly. Invest wisely. Forgive willingly. Shop seriously. Play fairly. Learn graciously.
Message 2 of 18
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Question About This Selling Practice

Is this really an acceptable practice when listing on Ebay?

 

No.

 

Also, for that supposed age, I would expect it to be a 6 board blanket chest. This one is not.

 

 

_____________________________
"Nothing is obvious to the oblivious"
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Question About This Selling Practice


@nc-daydreamer wrote:

On eBay - when one offers anything for sale for local pickup - PayPal is NOT acceped 99.9% of the time it is cash only. Yes, standard procedure.  If pickup, there is no shipping charge.


You must have missed this part:

When messaged states local pick up is not free as noted in details.  Its actually $5000. 

 

_____________________________
"Nothing is obvious to the oblivious"
Message 4 of 18
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Question About This Selling Practice

I don't believe they're allowed to categorically refuse PP when offered in the listings.

 

And the way FVFs are being assesed now, they will apply on any sale that originates on the site.  Even in some cases where the sale is NOT recorded here, or when there was no sale at all.

 

 


Forget keeping up with the Joneses. Be the Finklegrubers!
OK kids, time to get the Dodge loaded up again. I hear 'Poppy's By the Tree' calling. This trip might be a long one too.
Message 5 of 18
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Question About This Selling Practice

On eBay - when one offers anything for sale for local pickup - PayPal is NOT acceped 99.9% of the time it is cash only. Yes, standard procedure. 

 

That is not true.

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Question About This Selling Practice


@d-k_treasures wrote:

@nc-daydreamer wrote:

On eBay - when one offers anything for sale for local pickup - PayPal is NOT acceped 99.9% of the time it is cash only. Yes, standard procedure.  If pickup, there is no shipping charge.


You must have missed this part:

When messaged states local pick up is not free as noted in details.  Its actually $5000. 

 


So they are contradicting themselves becuase that isn't what it says in the listing.

Message 7 of 18
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Question About This Selling Practice

Seller is engaging in fee avoidance if there is a $5000 pickup fee. He wants someone to buy it for $500 thus generating a $50 fee for ebay but then pay $5500 when picking up. Classic case of fee avoidance.

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Question About This Selling Practice


@chipper01work wrote:

Seller is engaging in fee avoidance if there is a $5000 pickup fee. He wants someone to buy it for $500 thus generating a $50 fee for ebay but then pay $5500 when picking up. Classic case of fee avoidance.


There is no "pickup fee".  He will be charged fvf on $5,500 sale - $500 item price and $5,000 shipping fee.

 

Seller probably hasn't a clue that fvf is charged on total price since he has no clue that a listing will not go live without an electronic form of payment aka PayPal.

 

I'd buy it and show up with $500, which is exactly what the listing promises - no shipping on local pickup! Or BIN and PayPal $500 for local pick-up. But I wouldn't buy it because it is worn out, overpriced, and initials stencil made me raise my eyebrows.

Life shrinks or expands in proportion to one’s courage. ~ Anais Nin
Message 9 of 18
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Question About This Selling Practice

Ask the opinion of a dealer who handles these kinds of "antiques" before you put out 5 grand or anything close for this

 

There are all kinds of smells of a married piece here, and that painting on the box is not old. it is made to look antique.

 

The top is possibly an older box, not especially good quality, put on top of a newer base. Those drawers look questionable lol without going into too much detail

 

Has your wife considered giving folk art painting a try? You can pick up a piece at an auction for cheap these days that needs refinishing, and she can do folk art painting much nicer. There are videos about it. There are lots of books about it, and she can buy milk paint made with old recipes.

Message 10 of 18
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Question About This Selling Practice


@*eponymous* wrote:

@chipper01work wrote:

Seller is engaging in fee avoidance if there is a $5000 pickup fee. He wants someone to buy it for $500 thus generating a $50 fee for ebay but then pay $5500 when picking up. Classic case of fee avoidance.


There is no "pickup fee".  He will be charged fvf on $5,500 sale - $500 item price and $5,000 shipping fee.

 

Seller probably hasn't a clue that fvf is charged on total price since he has no clue that a listing will not go live without an electronic form of payment aka PayPal.

 

I'd buy it and show up with $500, which is exactly what the listing promises - no shipping on local pickup! Or BIN and PayPal $500 for local pick-up. But I wouldn't buy it because it is worn out, overpriced, and initials stencil made me raise my eyebrows.


The OP contacted the seller and was told there was a $5000 pickup fee. The seller will not be charged for $5500 worth of fvf's if someone buys it and picks it up and pays when picking up. They will be charged $50. The eBay final value fee is charged when someone hits the BIN button. The fvf on shipping is charged when they make payment with an electronic payment. This seller wants someone to buy it for $500 on eBay and show up with $5500 payment based upon what the OP has posted.

Do you understand now?

Message 11 of 18
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Question About This Selling Practice

His listing states the price is $500  and  under the shipping information, it is $5000 for shipping and goes on to show the option of FREE local pickup. 

 

How is he offering FREE local pickup, and then saying it costs $5000 for local pickup?

Message 12 of 18
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Question About This Selling Practice

Making matters even worse, if someone did purchase it and wanted it shipped, it could not be shipped via USPS Priority as stated, as the maximum package size for Priority is 130" (length + distance around largest point).  It would have to ship Parcel, unless I'm miscalculating something!

“It took me quite a long time to develop a voice, and now that I have it, I am not going to be silent” ― Madeleine K. Albright

Great! 45.8% down over the same time last year with 2x+ items listed. Are you impressed? I'm certainly not!
Message 13 of 18
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Question About This Selling Practice

He stated listing has already been removed once.  And hopefully it will be again.

 

Yup fee avoidance so he only has to pay on the $500.

 

If this were a true local pickup then there should be no shipping charge.

 

Sick of sellers like this because it is disceptions like this as to why ebay cracks down even harder on the rest of us.

Message 14 of 18
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Question About This Selling Practice

I'd stay far far away from both that chest and the seller,  for numerous reasons. 

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