If eBay can have an EIS shipping hub to protect sellers from issues related to International sales
then why can't eBay have a US hub to protect sellers from scammers, available to any US seller who wants to pay an extra fee for its services?
Call it the ASP (Anti-Scam Program) or whatever it might be more tactfully called. For example, if someone is selling a preowned laptop for $1100 or an antique painting for $1700 or whatever the expensive item is, the seller can opt to pay an extra fee to have it shipped to the ASP hub where it gets inspected to make sure that it matches the description of the listing. Once inspected (inspection fee charged to seller), it gets eBay's stamp of approval. Now there is no way for an INAD or buyers wanting a partial refund.
Then the ASP hub ships it off to the buyer (shipping cost paid by seller), leaving the only possibility of a return being a buyers remorse return. In a buyers remorse return, the buyer would have to ship it back to the ASP hub for inspectors to make sure it's the same exact item rather than an empty box or something missing parts. Once approved, the inspection hub ships it back to the seller and the seller gets the correct item back instead of losing the item and all their money to a scammer. (Return shipping costs paid by buyer).
And any buyer knows in advance that they are going to pay for any buyers remorse return out of their own pocket for any item they purchase if it's being sold through the ASP .
The question is, would sellers who are selling something very expensive be willing to pay for example $25 to $50 above their regular fees, to cover the cost of eBay's inspection, re-packing, and the extra shipping cost from the hub to the buyer for such a service that would protect them from any possible scam?
One problem I can think of is if a buyer claims an item was damaged in transit somewhere between eBay's ASP hub and their residence, but I'm sure there are probably a lot of other potential problems I haven't thought about, too.
Regardless of whether or not something like this would be feasible, eBay needs to figure out how to prevent all the scams that are costing sellers so much money. That eBay itself would also benefit from preventing scams should be incentive enough for them to figure it out and get it done.
onefootflipper
·2 years agoEvery form of insurance costs the person who buys it far more than the expected payout over time.
The only reason the international hub works is that ebay can consolidate packages and ship huge numbers of them to the same country together as the same shipment and then break it up once they get it there.
And in the case the extra overhead of the program would assure that outside of unique items the people using the program would get no sales.
Put 10 percent of the money aside in a cookie jar on every order you have large enough to worry about. At the end of the year you will likely have more money in that jar than you will loose to scammers in 10 years.
adkhighker
OP2 years agoEvery form of insurance costs the person who buys it far more than the expected payout over time.
I agree that would definitely be the case for the great majority of ma and pa sellers, but not necessarily the case for someone selling a high quality item worth well over $1000. For someone selling something like that, they could build the extra cost of selling through such a program into their overall price.
The only reason the international hub works is that ebay can consolidate packages and ship huge numbers of them to the same country together as the same shipment and then break it up once they get it there.
I don't know much about the inner workings of the international hub, but I'll take your word for it. Plus, I don't know if such a program I suggested would even be feasible for eBay to operate, as I mentioned in my post. If a program like I'm suggesting doesn't make money for eBay, then it would be dead in the water.
And in the case the extra overhead of the program would assure that outside of unique items the people using the program would get no sales.
For sure. I wouldn't expect any seller to opt into such a program unless it was for something not just unique, but also very expensive. Looking back over my years selling here, there is no way I would opt into it for 95% of the items I've sold in the past on eBay, but I would definitely have considered it for the other 5% of items I sold back then, items I would not even consider selling on todays eBay for fear of losing the item and the money for it.
Put 10 percent of the money aside in a cookie jar on every order you have large enough to worry about. At the end of the year you will likely have more money in that jar than you will loose to scammers in 10 years.
That's always a good philosophy and has worked well for me over the years because the money in my "cookie jar" I saved from not buying USPS insurance over the years. Even today I wouldn't opt into such an anti-scammers program for any of the items I normally sell unless it was for an item like the ones I suggested in my post. I certainly don't doubt that such a program might only be of interest to someone who deals in very expensive items, the types of things that seem to pull all the scammers out of the woodwork. I don't sell items anymore that fall into that kind of a price category, but there are more than a few sellers who do.