Very well written and very true. I have been watching the boards for some time, lightly participating, and I see the same thing happening again and again to many of the small sellers. The only good thing about that is that it reaffirmed to me that I'm not crazy! As I said previously, the ebay of yesteryear is no more.
I have a pending return -- before I changed my policy to no returns. The body of the ad did say no returns but it appears that ebay changed all my listings until I changed them back. My fault that I did not catch it sooner.
The return is from a 0 feedback opportunist/scammer, of course, who used the item for a full 29 days and then put in for a return and says it does not fit. Hmmm ....you do not know if an item fits for 29 days. Ha! You used it for 29 days! So, providing the item is in usable condition - of course, it is not unworn now, I will have no choice to refund it. It is a $100 plus item and I have already made up my mind that if it is in poor condition I will not refund it and I am ready to give up my seller account over it. --- if it comes to that.
What is interesting is that I was looking at the yet another new ebay policy --- this time for the timeframe for seller refunds - 2 business days and when I read through it really hit me that we are being set up to fail from the onset.
One of the first things it basically says is that you can get a refund even if the seller does not accept refunds.
"If the item you received doesn't match the description in the original listing, or if it arrived faulty or damaged, you're covered under the eBay Money Back Guarantee. You can return it even if the seller's returns policy says they don't accept returns."
The customer has 5 business days to send it back but the seller does not receive the same consideration. In my case, I use a PO box so two days is not the greatest timeframe for me.
Again it is the buyer receiving the preferential treatment yet I am the one paying for a store, for tweaks to the listings, for final fees, for other fees just to get any visibility, for final fees on shipping and on and on and on .... for a store and paying extra fees to gain any visibility. Not a good balance. I can guarantee you that BHFO and other big sellers have a longer timeframe to process their refund.
I think that ebay should stop accepting preowned items for sale. Seriously.
My turn on the 6 week or so algorithm should hit right before thankgiving so I may pick up a few more sales but it looks like I will miss the fairly "godebayadminer" who grants visiblity for black friday.
Good luck to all of you. I hope your sales pick up.
