More incidences of winning bidders not paying compared to the old days?

[seng_bl]

Is it just me or is it very common now for winning bidders to not pay? I don't remember this being an issue in the old days.

I think eBay is too friendly towards buyers. They need to feel the consequences of their actions more. They need to encourage buyers to THINK before placing a bid, rather than bidding out of emotion because they were outbid by someone else or whatnot.

So does eBay do anything to buyers who don't pay?

[katzrul15]

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@seng_bl wrote:

Is it just me or is it very common now for winning bidders to not pay? I don't remember this being an issue in the old days.

I think eBay is too friendly towards buyers. They need to feel the consequences of their actions more. They need to encourage buyers to THINK before placing a bid, rather than bidding out of emotion because they were outbid by someone else or whatnot.

So does eBay do anything to buyers who don't pay?

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They do if enough Sellers let them get a strike for their non-payment.  You can block those with certain numbers of them in a period of time.  It works too.  They email you and ask why they cannot buy - your buyer blocks tells you it was for NPBs

[pburn]

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@seng_bl wrote:

So does eBay do anything to buyers who don't pay?

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@seng_bl 

If you and all other sellers will utilize the cancellation for nonpayment, the buyer will receive a strike on his/her account. You can block buyers who have as few as two unpaid item cancellations in a 12-month period (the most restrictive setting).  These are two tools eBay has developed to reduce the number of nonpaying customers.

Here's an explanation of the nonpayment cancellation process:

Resolving unpaid items with buyers 

And here's the page where you can apply the block for nonpaying members:

Buyer Requirements 

eBay is also rolling out a third tool that will require customers to pay immediately when an offer is accepted. You can read about it in the two most recent seller updates:

2022 Winter Seller Update 

2022 Spring Seller Update 

Perhaps the future will see a similar requirement for members who win auctions, as well. We live in hope.

[reallynicestamps]

If you are using Auctions you will get many more Unpaids than you did back at the turn of the millennium when eBay actually was an Auction site.

Although eBay still brands itself that way, over 85% of transactions are actually Fixed Price and even auctions usually have a Buy It Now or Best Offer option which ends the listing prematurely.

And that's because buyers don't like auctions.

They still have some use in Collectibles, where sharpeyed collectors are searching for naive sellers who underprice their auctions, but between thrill bidders, bidders who are outbid and buy elsewhere only to learn their bid was still live when another retracts a bid, bidders placing bids on multiple auctions and then only paying for one, most seller shave moved to Fixed Price-- allowing Best Offer for some haggling.

And some even add Immediate Payment Required, which leaves the listing visible for 30 days or until someone actually pays.

However, FP or Auction, if a transaction goes Unpaid for four days eBay will now automatically Cancel it.

The seller can now relist, if it is not done automatically, or make Second Chance Offers.

The buyer gets a Strike, which makes it harder to bid on eBay in future, since most sellers have an automatic Block on deadbeats with Strikes.

And the deadbeat cannot leave FB, which is unimportant, since eBay does not use FB to assess member accounts and hasn't for over a decade.

TL/DR

Don't use Auctions.

Use Immediate Payment Required

Block deadbeats with your Seller Preferences/Buyer Requirements.