Buyers who send buyers notes are a problem 90% of the time

[rmv5555]

I went back through my sales history and discovered that buyers who send buyers notes when buying are an issue 90% of the time.  They always find a problem. Anyone else have this correlation?  The second group of red flag buyers are those that message for a lower price.  They are also never satisfied it seems.  Ive begun just blocking both these types of buyers immediately

[adamcartwright]

@rmv5555 

I have not noticed that these types of buyers have presented problems for me, but I have noticed that these buyers are the ones who will NOT leave positive feedback 100% of the time.

[gurlcat]

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@fbusoni wrote:

Other categories of buyers I immediately block:

--Those who message me with the salutation "Hey."

--Those who message me with no salutation and merely ask a question.  

--Those who end their sentences with exclamation points.

--Those who give me orders.

--Those who display a bad tone or who exhibit even the slightest hint of impoliteness.

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Wait, what???   So you block someone if they just ask something like "Does this come with the manual?" if they don't write "Dear Sir or Ma'am," or "To whom it may concern," or whatever above the question???  

I'm pretty old fashioned but I can't see taking that as far as expecting an eBay message to be like a professional business letter. 🤣

[inhawaii]

WOW!

You block potential customers if they message you "please ship asap" or "please pack carefully"?

It must be nice having that luxury.

Quick story.

I never send "please pack carefully" messages but I recently bought 2 visions cookware that both arrived shattered. when I ordered the 3rd one I did include a "please pack carefully" message.  Thankfully that seller was not offended.  The 3rd one arrived fine. 

[gurlcat]

@rmv5555  I took your post to mean strictly the message a buyer can include with a PAID transaction.  Is that what you meant, or did you also mean messages sent through our regular inbox?  

I got this one on a sold item the other day.  I loved it for a couple of reasons.  1. I too prefer it when a seller doesn't over-pack.  It's annoying having to open every little thing individually, and sometimes they wrap/tape so much just trying to open it puts the item at risk.  2. Ask me to do LESS work and use LESS of my supplies?  You got it!  

[rmv5555]

I absolutely block them for that.  Red flag not worth the risk

[rmv5555]

They will leave negative feedback for ANY reason whatsoever tho

[ethylsgarage · Accepted solution]

I've discovered that most of my competitors in my category (Automotive Service Manuals) don't respond to questions. I do. The most common question is "Is this the right book for my car?" Those other sellers are losing sales to me because I answer. I never accept an offer. My prices are fair and are backed up by statistics from Product Research (formerly Terrapeak). If someone is too cheap to pay a fair price I don't want to deal with them.

[jg.mason]

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@adamcartwright wrote:

I have not noticed that these types of buyers have presented problems for me, but I have noticed that these buyers are the ones who will NOT leave positive feedback 100% of the time.

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I would have agreed with that until last week. I got a couple messages before he bought it, then the day I told him I would ship Tracking was lagging got a message about that then when tracking caught up I got a message about that. The day it was delivered I got a message telling me how much better it was than what I described then I got a nice positive feedback from him.

Will that happen again, probably not but now I can't say they won't leave feedback 100% of the time it's more like 99%. 😁

[rmv5555]

that's a unicorn or he was on his meds that day

[fashunu4eeuh]

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@rmv5555 wrote:

In my years of experience I've learned eBay has the worst buyers in all of retail.  Not even close.  

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Disagree with your assertion, @rmv5555 . I would amend that above statement.

It sounds like your items/categories/terms are attracting the worst buyers. If eBay were wholesale attracting the worst buyers, we’d all be having bad experiences. Which i have not had with my buyers—except for the very few non-payers on a very few auctions quite a few years back. (So i shifted to Immediate Payment Required and fixed-price listings. That solved that.)

How do you rectify your claims of blocking buyers who ask questions, with the contradictory notice in your descriptions? It states:

”If you are unsure of anything message and we will confirm.”

In addition, part of your poor experiences with buyers can be attributed to the lack of descriptive information in your listings. Instead of noting the specific conditions found on each of the trading cards, there is a blanket statement that reads: 

“If you see vertical streaks or other pixelation errors on these images it is most likely from the scanning process and not defects of the card.”

You are basically telling your buyers that they must guess what any anomaly they might see on the card might be. You are shooting yourself in the proverbial foot, setting yourself up for Not As Described claims.

[rmv5555]

I literally do not care.  I tried doing it all right and it got nothing.  Might as well just do minimum effort and results will be about the same.  I want buyers who buy my stuff and never talk to me.  you will get the item pictured and it'll be packed well.  there's no reason for us to talk.  and if they find a reason it's most likely time to block them

[inhawaii]

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@rmv5555 wrote:

I absolutely block them for that.  Red flag not worth the risk

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Blocking someone just for messaging you or asking a question?

I totally disagree with that, but you should run your business how you see fit.

[onefootflippers]

One thing that people may not realize is that the correlation between presale customer contact or messages to seller are going to vary WILDLY depending on what sort of thing you sell. 

While I don't sell in all categories I have found items that would interest immature young adult men to have the largest correlation between contact and problems. 

While normal functioning used household items that are not "collectible" to have the lowest.

Pokemon card buyers file claims constantly, while I have yet to ever have a sports card or sports memorabilia customer file a claim, and this is including when I ran the ebay account for the sports card store.

[rmv5555]

Cause i just dont anymore.  Any description that says is old and no longer relevant.  And if they message because of that?  I dont care either

[rmv5555]

Id ageee woth that.  Collectors category items are the neediest and craziest buyers