eBay

jarber-72 · ‎01-02-2021

I have sold on ebay before (years ago) but would like to start selling much more frequently. However, I have always had the fear of dishonest or bad buyers. How common are they in your experience?

I'm afraid one day of selling something expensive and then the seller lying and saying I shipped something else or it's damaged (if they broke it, not shipping) or plenty of other possible issues.

I wish it was possible to sell to only well rated sellers (maybe it is?) but as far as I know I'm uncertain of that. I just don't want to sell some expensive item to a guy with 0 history/ratings who doesn't respond to messages at all I would be worried.

kiss-3 · ‎01-03-2021

Actually diamonds sell pretty well.

I sell moderately priced (under $100), small items that I ship first class. Knock on wood but have not been scammed yet. I am a cautious person, my sister calls me "the original party pooper". Just last week I had a buyer, who was new to E-bay purchase two items. I sent out one invoice with combined shipping. One and 1/2 days after the sale, they finally contact me with a request (in broken English) I split their invoice and ship to two separate locations. I understand that E-bay allows sellers to split invoices and ship to separate locations but my radar was up. The buyer started getting snippy, demanding and down right nasty, so I cut them off and refused to make changes. The buyer never paid, so I was able to get out of the deal easily. I reported the buyer to E-bay, put them on my "do not sell to list". When the buyer did not pay in two days, I was able to close the case and relist the two items. I lost a $150 sale but when a simple transaction becomes complicated, I just as soon not deal with it. The buyer claimed "they had rights". Well sellers have rights too, which is not to sell to suspicious, nasty (called me a crook) or demanding buyers.

This sale is in no way consistent with the many buyers I deal with monthly/yearly. I am thankful everyday to the buyers, who ask questions, make offers and purchases my items. Over three years of selling on E-bay, the above buyer is maybe an example four or five bad buyer experiences. I have built up many repeat or new buyers, who are a pleasure to work with and I say to them THANK YOU. I will keep on selling but on E-bay the old adage "buyer beware" has now become "seller beware".

maxine*j · ‎01-03-2021

Gosh! You've had ten transactions in the past month and left three negs. I can see why you wonder what it's like to be a seller on eBay, if you've had that many problems as a buyer.

farmalljr · ‎01-03-2021

My suggestions:

1 Read the TOS. You need to fully understand the rules of eBay and know your place. You need to fully understand what your responsibility and liabilities are. You need to understand there are truthfully not many "protections". Understanding the rules is the MOST important aspect. Don't dismiss this, because success or disaster HING on it.

2 Understand that 99% of the buyers are good, honest people. There are a few who are not and they will take advantage of you if given the opportunity. DON'T sell items you can't afford to lose. Avoid categories (at least for awhile) like cell phones, lap tops, computers, and coins/bullion (if you can sell in the coin/bullion categories). While there are LOADS of complaints here, this does not represent the majority of sales. Again, 99% of buyers are good, honest people.

3 Follow the rules at ALL times. Never ship to an address that's not what eBay told you to ship to. Never text a buyer even if they ask you to. Never ship any items unless eBay or PayPal told you it's been paid for. Don't have contact with buyers outside of eBay.

4 Avoid international selling until you get really comfortable with selling within the US. There are more risks and more complications selling internationally.

5 Be a good seller. This means describe your items right and truthfully, be NICE to buyers (even when they aren't), know how to ship properly, and be attentive. Treat each buyer as good or better then you would want your mother treated. Take excellent photos. Ship properly and package safely. You will want to take some time to learn the photo and shipping FIRST, before you start selling. Not after your first sale. Pictures "sell" your item. Shipping properly make the difference between a happy buyer and one who is mad and leaves negative feedback. It is YOUR responsibility to get the item to the buyer. Make sure you get it right. You also will need to learn to ship right. Knowing shipping is IMPORTANT. Shipping costs can make or break a seller. Avoid "free" shipping and instead do calculated, until you get the hang of everything. Pack your items you list, and enter the proper dimensions and weight until you get to know shipping well. There are LOTS of YouTube videos out there to help you understand shipping. Take the time to gain some knowledge BEFORE you sell anything.

6 KNOW the rules. Yes, I repeated that. 99% of the complaints on this board could have easily been avoided, IF the seller knew and followed the rules. Bare that in mind when reading these posts. 99% of complaints are due to sellers doing something they shouldn't have, or not knowing what they should have. Lots of people just want to "jump in" and figure it out later. That's a bad idea and ends up costing them. Sometimes it costs them thousands.

7 Lastly, if/when you have a bad sale, you have to learn to NOT let it eat you up. Sometimes it happens. Once in a while, you may run across someone who tries to take advantage of you. It's honestly the extreme minority that do that. Come to the board and people here will try and help you solve the problem. Try to learn from a bad situation to improve. Those lessons may be costly, but everyone has to learn to be better. eBay is fun and a good way to make money, but only if you know how to do it. You have to be willing to admit to yourself you screwed up and learn from it to be better. Getting mad and pointing fingers isn't going to help you.

Have fun and I hope you take the time to learn to do it right. Take what everyone tells you with a grain of salt, ESPECIALLY if you go to YouTube to learn eBay selling. Most of the YouTube "creators" don't always tell the truth about things. Learn the rules FIRST and foremost, then go from there.

ra_201044 · ‎01-03-2021

Just last week I had a buyer, who was new to E-bay purchase two items. I sent out one invoice with combined shipping. One and 1/2 days after the sale, they finally contact me with a request (in broken English) I split their invoice and ship to two separate locations. I understand that E-bay allows sellers to split invoices and ship to separate locations but my radar was up. The buyer started getting snippy, demanding and down right nasty, so I cut them off and refused to make changes. The buyer never paid, so I was able to get out of the deal easily. I reported the buyer to E-bay ....

You kinda have that all reversed. Ebay allows sellers to COMBINE invoices. YOU were the one that combined them. All the buyer basically asked for was 2 invoices. Then one would have been paid for and shipped to X, and the other paid for and shipped to Y. Instead all you ended up doing was losing 2 sales, all for not sending separate invoices when asked after combining the purchased listings into one invoice on your own.

I believe that a buyer can uncombine the invoices themselves, though. I haven't had to do that in a while, so I don't know if that ability is still there or not. Even if it was, and the buyer had a hard time with the English language, then they probably wouldn't know about that.

All you had to do to save the sales and have no worries would have been to send 2 invoices, considering that they hadn't paid yet.

1grandmashope_1 · ‎01-03-2021

@farmalljr

What great concise information. You took the time and to be so kind to this poster, as well.

I thank you for all of those that may lookup this information and get your knowledgeable response.

Best in 2021,

Grandma

brwil85 · ‎01-03-2021

Bad or dishonest buyers are extremely rare. The vast overwhelming majority of buyers are honest.

I had a lady get a package that was empty a few months ago. My immediate thought was scam,. There was a handwritten note on the package. I called their local post office and the person working there said "she was the one who wrote the note because the package was torn open"

The problem is stupid buyers. 1% or 2% of people are monsters who create 95% of problems. The other 5% is just normal stuff that goes wrong.

Almost ALL of these problem buyers will have an address in either Doral, FL or New Castle, DE.

kiss-3 · ‎01-03-2021

E-bay generates a combined invoice when a buyer purchases several items within a hour and this is the invoice I sent to the buyer, except I did a combined shipping fee. It was not so much that the buyer wanted two separate invoices, but that they waited a day and a half to make the request and then they wanted the items shipped to two different locations. I tried to explain about separating the invoice and about making address changes after the sale but the buyer did not want to hear any of it. Like I said when they started getting snippy, demanding and down right nasty, and I cut them off.

Anyway, thanks for your response. I feel very comfortable with how I dealt with this buyer. They have their money and I have already resold one of the items to another buyer.

bimm_corp · ‎01-03-2021

@caldreamer

>Getting stuff "for free" seems to be the new thing on EBAY

You got that right, especially with advertising out there like this,

https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=how+to+get+free+stuff+on+ebay

https://community.ebay.com/t5/Shipping-Returns/Local-Radio-DJs-advertised-ebay-s-return-loophole/m-p...

reallynicestamps · ‎01-03-2021

Almost ALL of these problem buyers will have an address in either Doral, FL or New Castle, DE.

Only if the seller does not understand her rights under the Money Back Guarantee.

Those two towns are centres for Freight Forwarders.

The customers is not there, he is overseas.

And when a shipment arrives at a freight forwarder, your job for delivery ends. As do most parts of the Money Back Guarantee.

Also, even sellers who (foolishly in my opinion) have a No Returns policy, can demand that the disputed item be returned before refunding. But the seller only needs to provide a return shipping label to the address she shipped to-- which is the forwarder.

It's up to the complaining buyer to get the item back to the forwarder and to pay the forwarder to process the overseas shipment back to the seller.

With tracking.

And only then does the seller have to refund.

If the time for returns has not run out.

Freight forwarders are the second safest addresses for shipping, after PO boxes.

marie185antiques · ‎01-04-2021

WOW.....what an eye-opener! Thanks for the heads up!

cham.wann · ‎01-04-2021

Any business have risk. you must take risk and continue your business. start again and work hard. good luck

daffodils_fashions · ‎01-06-2021

In my experience the vast majority of buyers are good, honest, descent people, actually wonderful people that I'm happy to do business with. There is also a handful of manipulative opportunists. I would make sure that you have enough +FB built up in order to take some -FB. I would increase your inventory by selling lower end items at a reasonable price in order to build that feedback and don't set the price too low. When you want to sell higher end items put them up at an elevated price and add "Best Offer". Once an offer is made, click on their user name and see "feedback left for others". If you see multiple negatives or nasty neutrals you'll know what your dealing with. I recommend either not replying or not accepting their offer and just blocking them. Eventually you will have a good buyer that has not left multiple "nasties" for others and you can accept/counter their offer. Always check their FB left for others - Did I say always? Oh yeah, and whatever you do, don't start selling those higher priced items now, wait for the USPS to catch up on the lost/late package Holiday Nightmare Apocalyptic Crisis. Best Wishes for your future success.

magic*moonbeams · ‎01-06-2021

Unfortunately, this site is one where the buyer is always right in eBay's eyes, even if they are breaking eBay policy.... it's hit or miss here. A lot of lying scammers, bags of B....S... know the deal and take full advantage.

Basically, the buyer can return a brick instead of the $500 designer handbag you sold them and as long as it shows the "item" was returned to the seller, eBay will make you refund. You can report them, and the form letter response is basically, thank you for your report regarding this buyer... Please refund the buyer.

Sad but true state of affairs around here.