eBay

smaffet · ‎03-18-2024

Hello everyone,

Have had a couple VeROs listing Delta plumbing faucets an the like. Stopped using the stock photos even though eBay provides them when listing (so frustrating!). Trying our best to follow the rules, most other companies don’t seem to care but whatever. Only using our own photos when listing Delta and still got a VeRO!!! Attaching a screenshot of a listing, does anyone know what we are doing wrong?

smaffet · ‎03-22-2024

Somenumber - So sorry for your issues, it is very wrong and ebay does nothing. They do worse than nothing by helping groundless fraudulent claims.

ebay provides a forum of buyers which is an incredibly valuable service that we pay significant fees for. What they also promise is seller protections, a claim they utterly fail to deliver on. We have NEVER benefited from eBay protections, quite the opposite. Sellers and manufacturers steal and defraud us and ebay only exasperates the problems. They protect and encourage fraudulent buyers by always siding with them and not allowing negative buyer feedback. Then on the other side they assist and enable manufacturers in harassing sellers with groundless claims.

The marketplace is seeing there is an opportunity and there are other options are out there. We are cross listing and doing our best to reduce our dependency on eBay.

robbie31415 · ‎03-22-2024

Okay, and it's way worse on marketplaces like Amazon.

So many areas require proof of invoices and approval from manufactures to even list the item in the first place.

eBay has more of a list then we may pull it approach.

Buyer protections all follow consumer protection laws, and agreements made with financial processors like Visa, etc. If eBay decreased buyer protections then chargebacks would increase. This decreases sellers ability to reclaim property, and eBay is certainly not going to be paying based on the word of the seller.

eBay has adopted programs such as authenticity gaurentee where it decreases fraud because at least then eBay can actually dispute issues because a third party verification was involved before getting to the customer.

With sellers shipping directly to buyers there will always be buyer centric policies.

smaffet · ‎03-23-2024

Robbie sounds like they are on the eBay payroll. It would make sense except that eBay/robbie goes out of their way to side with buyers even when they don’t have to.

There is no legal reason that sellers aren’t allowed to leave negative feedback for buyers but eBay has chosen to implement it. Other selling platforms allow negative buyer feedback and it promotes a level playing field. Sellers know it and exploit it.

robbie31415 · ‎03-23-2024

Uh I'm telling you the truth.

Just because you don't like it isn't my problem.

Ebay has the right to limit any item they want.

Your legal right to sell means nothing. You can sell it on your own site.

broto_64 · ‎03-23-2024

Let me be blunt...

If I report a listing as a Vero rights owner, that listing goes down.

No questions asked.

It has to do with the "safe harbor" provision which means the rights owner agrees to release ebay from liability so long they comply with the requirements of the program: And that means if I report a listing and ebay takes it down, I will not hold them liable for violating my rights.

You understand, all it means ebay is covering their hind end and they don't really get into defending anything because it's so simple for them: Take down the reported item or face potential liability, so ebay takes it down, easy peasy.

Yes, this absolutely lends itself to abuse.

Unfortunately many rights owners are as powerless, they hand over the function of the program (and the enforcement) to a piece of software... In fact there is probably a company out there that performs "Vero checks" for the rights owners all for a convenient monthly fee, so where we are now?

Rights owner sub-contracts Vero enforcement to third party, who in turn files complaints with ebay, and ebay complies with Vero requirements in order to avoid liability. You, the seller, are the fourth party here.

Ebay, Rights Owner, Vero sub-contractor, seller... I can see the confusion from here, I don't need a stroke of genius to tell me that this isn't going to work as intended. Does that make sense?

Sadly it all involves a ton of "right hand does not have a clue what the left hand is doing" and as is usually the case, this is the reason why it takes an act of Congress to change a light bulb and also why we can't have anything nice in this world.

I hope you get your issues resolved, I went through it myself some years ago, I am still a teenie bit ...

Not sore but...

I guess permanently disillusioned with the world.

broto_64 · ‎03-23-2024

@rfmtm wrote:
You also could file a counter notice, and while this is only legally recognized for copyright, ebay treats it differently and will require the rights holder to show he has started legal action against you for the infringement, or will otherwise let you relist the item.

Not to disagree, I love your informative post, however I did want to add that this particular motion is a double-edged sword should the rights owner start actual legal action (and may even do so simply because of this motion). It has happened, and it ended up costing the seller quite a bit to get out of that mess (even thou I am sure the seller was in the right all along).

It is a big bad mess.

rockystradingpost · ‎03-23-2024

It might be because you listed it as new.

I purchased a Delta Faucet on ebay last year, but it was labeled as used/open box.

rfmtm · ‎03-24-2024

When a rights owner is abusing the system, it would be pretty stupid to start a case they can't win since the burden of proof is on them to show item is counterfeit. Of course that doesn't mean they won't or at least threaten it to scare you. Rather than the counter notice it would be better to start by having an attorney send a letter to Delta with a copy to ebay's legal department.

VeRO is often abused, and the DMCA often misused, but still ebay gets to do what it wants. In a nutshell, when a VeRO member requests it, eBay removes an item in question, whether it has to legally or not. Still a letter from your attorney gets their attention and if this is your main business, well worth the expense.

Note that the actual DMCA law, which ebay's VeRO program is loosely based on, applies to copyright violations only. Authenticity (counterfeits) and trademark abuse are not covered by the DMCA for web site removal under the law. It's eBay's own policy that extends the DMCA like behavior to this. The downside is that as a result you don't get the DMCA mandated remedies against people who abuse it, which is why many abusers choose the counterfeit claim.

smaffet · ‎03-28-2024

Quick update, we challenged the Vero on Delta products and actually won. We are grateful and thankful. eBay said they reinstated the listings they took down but after going through the list line by line only one out of about 20 listings was put back up and we had to manually relist taking a few hours to retake pictures and the whole process.

Couple hours later we got another VeRO alert of a number of our Brizo faucets and fixtures listings and told the listings we taken down. Brizo is a brand owned by Delta… round two of this harassment that eBay enables. eBay should protect us sellers for these groundless claims not enable them.

rfmtm · ‎03-28-2024

@smaffet Great that is good news. However, I'd still consider getting your attorney to send a letter to both Delta and eBay's legal team and be sure to mention that ebay reinstated you. Otherwise this likely will keep happening. As only ebay's legal team can block this from happening in the future.