After 19 Years Selling on eBay I'm about to move everything over to Mercari. Here's why....

[homecarecomputer]

My ads say I don't take returns. I do under certain circumstances and basically, eBay forces you to if a con artist complains enough......and that's what happened here.

The last 5 calls I made about this return were greeted with "Thank you for 19 years of selling"....well, I guess I won't be making it to 20, though I have 1,100 items for sale so it will take me a while to transfer it over.  
The disrespect with which eBay handled my situation was above and beyond reproach. I spoke to 6 different people who gave me 6 different policies and not one thing that was said to me was consistent. 

A woman bought an item from me listed as "hand-crafted" with LED lighting and I had 9 pictures and half a page of description. I'm very thorough that way.  I also let people know I don't take returns so study photos and ask your questions before purchasing.  This woman harassed me about the price before she bought the item and continued to harass me about other similar items I had wanting more but not wanting to pay my prices and then started sending me comparisons of other people selling what she considered similar items which were not.

I lowered the price by $40.  I double-boxed this delicate item and sent it off.  She received it and the complaints started.  NOT that anything was actually wrong with it --but the lights were so bright she had to wear sunglasses ?? Yes, she actually said this.  That the bottom was warped (the photos are exact and it is an imperfect handcrafted item).  She called eBay for a return and having sold on eBay for 19 years, I saw this as buyer's remorse.  I would gladly take back the item but paying for shipping to and from this woman was something I was not inclined to do.

I was told by 6 different people many different terms of their policy.  "Don't do anything and eBay will send her a label which you will not have to pay for".  So I listened to his instructions and eBay charged me for that label.  They told me to wait until a particular date and then call back and they will take care of what has happened on this date because "buyers remorse" is not consistent with a refund for "damage" which she did not send photos of or prove.  This went on and on for a week.  I got screwed at every turn.  The kick was when I received the item in the mail and all the windows of the house were off and sitting in the box  ??
There is no way these windows would have come off themselves. There was no damage to any of the 2 boxes she returned them in.  It had to have been done out of maliciousness.  There is no other possibility. I called again.  The item s damaged upon return. I sent over photos. They told me not to do a thing...not to let the return go through. They would get back to me.  An hour later my money was out of my account and they had given her a refund.  They said there was no sign of damage to the box......

Wow.  SO this lady got her money back. I paid her shipping both ways and she destroyed my item and out of 19 years of respect eBay just took money out of my pocket.

To be honest, this year I have sold just as much on Mercari as I have on eBay.  No-fuss, no muss, they buy the shipping labels and I just print them.  They treat you with respect.  They take less in fees. People have to pay as soon as they buy something and I get my money after everyone is satisfied.  There is no "6 weeks later notice that the customer says the item is damaged" there is less con-artistry.  

for 19 years I have been a diligent seller and I have packed my items with care and when I do get feedback (because on eBay most buyers never leave it --on Mercari, I'm left feedback for every single item whether it's the customer or Mercari itself--  They answer my emails and I don't have to hear 6 different policies from 6 different people who are all lying to me.
So yes, it's going to take me a bit to transfer over but unless eBay does something to show some respect to its sellers in the coming weeks I'm gone.  

Thank you for listening.  I"m just so upset I had to talk to someone who understood.  I'm sure I'll get some nasty comments (I seem to see that a lot on here with people who are just expressing their frustrations --there is always that one guy making people feel stupid --"you should have known better").  But no one can **bleep** me off any more than I am now.  

[downunder-61]

Hope Mercari works out for you. 

Good luck in your future endeavours

[stuff4divas]

Don't have the time to read such a long post right now, but Good Luck selling elsewhere

[coastaltechsolution]

Cannot read all of the post right now but first paragraph is enough

Stating no returns on a listing just means you do not want the item back NOT that the buyer cannot be covered by eBay's MBG (all sellers participate in the mandatory MBG) 

I wish you best of luck at that other place 

[flyingmvp]

Sorry for your recent experience, there are entitled buyers everywhere, some venues allow them to abuse the seller more, some less.

Good luck with Mercari, Check out Poshmark Housewares, you might find it suitable for some of your items as well. 

[aabalat_fine_and_rare_wines]

I hear you.   All you have to do is read the posts around here, its the same thing again and again.    I cringe every time there is an issue and I need to contact so called customer service.   Its great they have offshored their agents to other countries so they can pay pennies a day, but you get what you pay for and its not much.   Thankfully we do so little here its rare these days.

We have greatly reduced the number of items on ebay and have moved more than 80% of our business to other platforms with that trend continuing.   We stopped leaving feedback years ago when it was made lopsided, there is no real point to it any more.   Sales here are so slow it does not really matter anyway, business is booming, just not here.  

[north40sales]

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@stuff4divas wrote:

Don't have the time to read such a long post right now, but Good Luck selling elsewhere

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any yet you managed to find time to type out a thoughtful and caring reply like that.  That is amazingly considerate.

[katzrul15]

@homecarecomputer 

Unfortunately, No returns does not usually equate to No refunds.

Good luck on whatever new platform makes sense.  Wish you well!

[north40sales]

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@coastaltechsolution wrote:

Cannot read all of the post right now but first paragraph is enough

Stating no returns on a listing just means you do not want the item back NOT that the buyer cannot be covered by eBay's MBG (all sellers participate in the mandatory MBG) 

I wish you best of luck at that other place 

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If you bothered to read the rest of their post, the context of that first paragraph becomes much more evident. 

[house*of*paws]

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@homecarecomputer wrote:

This woman harassed me about the price before she bought the item and continued to harass me about other similar items I had wanting more but not wanting to pay my prices and then started sending me comparisons of other people selling what she considered similar items which were not.

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Hi @homecarecomputer 

I'm so sorry this happened ... but I hope you learned from the experience, regardless of where you sell:  Any buyer who is a PITA before purchasing will continue being a PITA after the sale.  😒

BTW, the house is lovely ... but I had to laugh at its 'name'.  [It's a word I'm familiar with in Yiddish.]  🤣

[glasser]

Sorry to hear you situation and hope other venues work for you. Your complaint is one often hear around these parts. Poor--ill informed--customer service appears to be the norm on eBay on these boards. 

eBay has confused everyone--except the scammers--with the way returns are handled. There is no way an eBay CS rep can determine damage to a box or item, nor should they be engaged in that at all.

I will say that one bad experience should not sour 19 years of experience. There are bad apples out there for every business. The restaurant owner who has someone walk on a check, the retail outlet that gets shoplifted, the contractor that gets stiffed by a client. The customer who will ever be happy with anything is a known entity.

eBay's response and their convoluted systems need an overhaul. If you want to try one more time, people say they get pretty fast and adequate responses by contacting CS via the FB business page and DM. 

Good luck out there.

[homecarecomputer]

Thank you Glasser for your reply. It helps 🙂

[homecarecomputer]

Thank you for your understanding. It helps 🙂

[femmefan1946]

EBay allows a No Returns policy.

And yes, a seller with a No Returns policy can still demand the return, although she may have to pay for it.

What eBay* does not allow is a No Refunds policy.

Faced  with a Not As Described dispute, the seller can decide to abandon the product and refund or demand the return of the product before refunding.

This has been eBay's basic policy for all of the 21st century.

Before that with cash, money order or personal check payments, eBay could not offer that protection to buyers. And with cash in particular the buyer had no way of proving that he had paid.

Billpoint, Paypal and now Managed Payments changed that.

*Nor does Paypal or Visa or MasterCard...

[donsdetour]

Hmm and you do not seem to believe that by the user agreement: you agree to the EMBG??

https://pages.ebay.com/ebay-money-back-guarantee/ 

https://www.ebay.com/help/policies/ebay-money-back-guarantee-policy/ebay-money-back-guarantee-policy... 

https://pages.ebay.com/cl/en-us/coverage/BuyerProtectionForBuyers.html