Sold items are showing back up in my active listings

[vintagedragonfly61]

In the past several months I have had 4 items resell, it seems those sold items are being relisted.  Today I am going through my active listing tweaking some listings and found two more that have sold relisted.  Are there other sellers having this issue?  Is there a glitch with ebay?  Should I contact ebay.....these items are going against my account when sold.  

[movieman630]

This is a phenomena called a "ghost listing".  It's a nightmare.  Hasn't happened to me in a while but some years ago it was really bad.

[vintagedragonfly61]

So there's no way to stop this?    If this continues it will tank my sellers level.  

[mcdougle4248]

@vintagedragonfly61 

Follow the steps provided in the Community post linked below to report ghost listings.

https://community.ebay.com/t5/Selling/How-to-report-GHOST-LISTINGS/td-p/34527800 

[quicksilverdiecast]

Yes not often but enough to make you crazy...they are called Ghost listings and ebay knows it and has no idea how to fix or stop it...or why had a couple with in the last month.

[tobaccocardyahoo]

It occurs on most sites which use distributed databases, and is more likely to occur at peak traffic times.

It is a fundamental design issue with distributed database systems which was first identified in the late 1970s and early 1980s before anyone had built any. They built them anyway because the relatively new career of computer science does not understand anything about the plumbing underlying the levels of software which they work with.

It is unlikely to ever be corrected. For those who want to know more about this issue, it relates to there being no cross processor equivalent to record locking being effective. Those who know about it are generally pushing 80 like I am.

If you find the duplicate listings, end them to avoid selling them.

[quicksilverdiecast]

After setting here awhile back trying to figure out how it happens...this is my THEORY on only that with only a thought of how it MIGHT happen.

Ebay is constantly having platform issues and some may require service to fix on the platform requiring it to be taken down...well ebay cannot just shut down the entire platform while figuring out the issue at hand, so I am assuming they have an alternate platform that runs along side the live platform and when the need arises ebay inserts the alternate platform until the main Live platform is repaired...it is then when an item may sell on the alternate platform, and when it is replaced with the main live platform it shows it as still being available and if it gets sold again is when we go crazy trying to find it to ship...This is fairly obvious if you only have a few items listed and know you inventory well, or know you only had 1 and it had sold in the past....but when you have a lot of listings and cannot keep track of every sale in your mind..then you begin questioning your sanity...  AGAIN this is only a theory that only ebay can confirm or deny. If it is recent enough you may check your archives to see when it sold the 1st time...this has been as others have said going on for years...the only real answer you can provide to your buyer is to explain it or give them the link to report as another has posted....I have had a couple buyers whom I am sure raised an eyebrow not believing you...so it is best to lead them to the link....as far as getting yur account dinged by ebay for it...you will need to apply the heat where it belongs...

[dtexley3]

Been happening for years, I don't think eBay has any idea of the cause.  It doesn't affect eBay so they really don't care.

[ltldpr]

Great, we have "ghost listings" and "hallucinating" ai that can lock people out of their accounts including their banking, lock them inside their houses and even go rogue and disable their own shut down code.

Beam me up, Scotty, because Calgon just ain't gonna cut it!

[quicksilverdiecast]

"Welcome to the jungle"

[tobaccocardyahoo]

---

@ltldpr wrote:

Great, we have "ghost listings" and "hallucinating" ai that can lock people out of their accounts including their banking, lock them inside their houses and even go rogue and disable their own shut down code.

Beam me up, Scotty, because Calgon just ain't gonna cut it!

---

And don't forget Nest Thermostats which can be hacked to raise or lower the temperature in our homes, either by hackers or by our utilities who offered us a deal on buying them and then use them to reduce demand on their system.

[movieman630]

I don't think it's anything sellers are doing. I think it's some sort of glitch in the system that pops up under certain circumstances.  Nobody has ever really figured out what causes it to happen.  

[squinkercat59]

The first time it  happened to me was 16 or so years ago, so it's been going on a long time, and has been acknowledged by Ebay.  The only thing you can do is periodically check your listings against your inventory, which gets harder to do the more listings you have. 

[steve_stuff]

Welcome to the club - 

We had 10, 15 on this account over a two year period but none in last three plus years. On other account two or three over same period and then none. Other id's never.

We got into the habit of writing down the number of total active listing so we could tell if it goes up.

We also keep every 'your item sold' email to show ghost buyers when it really sold.

Also when you 'sell' a ghost you get buyer's mailing info, so when you contact them to ask them to request to cancel  ebay decides you're sell it off site so you get hit for the fees.

[broto_64]

Never, not even once.