Scammers

[oliquidation]

With all the fees and taxes we have to pay now it seems that we could eliminate the scammers who create a profile, bid on an item, and then want us to contact them via personal phone number to ask questions or to ask for our email for the PayPal account, etc. These people make outrageous bids on items. 

Why can't their IP address be traced if we report them? What happens if they come across an older person and scam their accounts because they called them. 

A request for somebody to call you should be against eBay community standards... So why doesn't eBay detect these things and stop it. I've had three in the last 2 weeks. One sale is currently pending $400 for a Santa Claus... 

How do we stop it?

[inceptions]

This is not the ideal solution, but if you list as fixed price and turn on the Immediate Payment Required option, no one can buy the item until they checkout and pay for it.

[eburtonlab]

You can avoid many common scams by listing your item for a fixed price with immediate payment required and by not making or accepting any offers. That way the buyer must complete checkout and actually pay in order to proceed.

eBay does not actually have the power to prevent scammers from existing.

eBay can suspend or close an account, but that rarely stops a determined scammer. Someone who is willing to lie and cheat others for their own benefit is often also willing to lie or cheat to register a new account or hijack another's account to continue scamming.

Exchanging contact information prior to transaction payment is against eBay policy. But scammers do not care about following policy, and determined scammers will go to great lengths to get around roadblocks that eBay puts in their way. Sellers must remain constantly vigilant and not allow a scammer to draw the seller into violating eBay policy and taking a transaction off of eBay where the seller has no protection.