feeling totally defeated

[tesa6240]

I am old and Ebay has been a great way for me to survive this economy.  I spent the entire weekend depressed and in tears.

The feedback situation has left me defeated. With the uptake of non payment, I put a payment within 24 hrs  unless other arrangements made. My lastest was from someone with no sales that said I demanded payment in 2 hours, not true.  I have purchased thousand of dollars in product, I have 750 items and tried so very hard almost everyday to post, my husband gets them out same day, I spend hours on descriptions.  My rating at 98.8% after 1 year.  and only 182 feed back out of 500+ sales. I feel so vulnerable to  have had 2 disatisfied  customers control my fate and then how much longer before another. 

Ebay did back me up lately on one customer that wanted to return, which gave me hope.

Alot of you with thousands of sales did you go though this? I worked in retail for years, but my job was not in jeopardy each time someone was displeased. Always trying to make the customer happy , but with this system you get blind sided!

When should I liquidate, as  this is very shakey ground and dont want to be holding this inventory with out recouping my investment.

[tesa6240]

I am listing things I have invested a great deal of money in and have been sold for such .  If I was waiting on $12.00 sales I think I would have been alot more  patient.  Luckily Others with much more experience actually helped. I would suggest  when you answer someones question that you maybe have something to add  to helping 

 not your far out suspect and un EARNED opinions.

[turquoisetulips]

The OP came here for some honest  advice  and from what I've read of her responses  to others she's been very nice and polite . Frankly I'd be a lot more suspicious  of someone  who refuses to respond in kind . 

[m60driver]

Your sales seem to be fine.  The feedback will not hurt that much in the long run.  What will hurt is responses to negative feedback that include such ridiculous statements such as "Simply untrue, my policy is payment within 24 hrs. "UNLESS" a payment arrangement is made".  You have no right to require payment within 24 hours.  Your own statement will harm you more than the negative feedback.  And the solution is so very simply, simply require immediate payment when using a BIN and don't fret if payment is not instantly made when using offers.  I have lots of buyers who take several days to pay and I rarely get an actual non-payment scenario.  If the worst thing that happens to you on Ebay is a buyer not paying then consider yourself fortunate.

[candd205]

I love doing this too. And I understand taking it personal, but you can't let it get you that upset. Life is too short for that. Getting that upset is not good for your health.

Here is how to change all of your listings at once to immediate payment required:

Go to your list of items for sale.

On the row above your items for sale, click Edit. It gives you the choice to edit selected listings or edit all listings. Chose Edit All Listings.

It goes to a page with all your items listed and a box to the left of each listing. There is a box above those boxes, click that box, it puts a check in all the other boxes. So you will be editing all of them.

Just above that click Bulk Edit

Scroll down to Payment Options under preferences

There you get the choice to Add Immediate Payment to all those listings. Click that radial button. Follow the prompts.

If you have trouble with this, feel free to private message me if you want.

@tesa6240 

[luckythewinner]

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@tesa6240 wrote:

I am listing things I have invested a great deal of money in and have been sold for such .  If I was waiting on $12.00 sales I think I would have been alot more  patient.  Luckily Others with much more experience actually helped. I would suggest  when you answer someones question that you maybe have something to add  to helping 

 not your far out suspect and un EARNED opinions.

---

IMHO everything powell-memorabilia advised was on point and helpful to anyone who paid attention to the message it contained. There is was nothing "far out" or "suspect" about what powell-memorabilia advised.

[albertabrightalberta]

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@tesa6240 wrote:

I am listing things I have invested a great deal of money in and have been sold for such .  If I was waiting on $12.00 sales I think I would have been alot more  patient.  Luckily Others with much more experience actually helped. I would suggest  when you answer someones question that you maybe have something to add  to helping 

 not your far out suspect and un EARNED opinions.

---

Just because someone doesn't coddle you and tell you what you want to hear doesn't mean they aren't being helpful. @powell-memorabilia's post was accurate and to the point. 

I've said this before and it's worth repeating. If you want real honest and helpful advice, come here with your questions. If you want agreement (whether you're right or wrong), look in the mirror and describe your issues to the person looking back at you. 

It was recommended that for immediate payment, you list your fixed price items with IPR but you won't be able to do a best offer option. (Best offers don't require immediate payment.)

[the_fancy_fox]

I would attempt to get that negative removed. 

and as others have said, change your settings to immediate payment. Saves a lot of headaches. 

[maxine*j]

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@tesa6240 wrote:

...I feel so vulnerable to  have had 2 disatisfied  customers control my fate and then how much longer before another...

---

No one controls your fate but you.  Your own actions have brought you to this unpleasant point.   You cannot demand payment  within 24 hours, against eBay policy.  If you continue to do so, and continue to send, in your own words, "mulltable [sic] requests and reminders within that 24 hr frame" then it surely won't be long before you get another neg, or perhaps even a suspension.

If you came here for validation for your actions, you won't get it.   If you came here for advice, take it and change your ways.   In time, those negs will roll off the page and all will be well. 

P.S.  I don't know what being old has to do with anything, but if you mention it because you want advice from your peers, then please note that I'm pushing 80.   And after nearly eight decades of  surviving the vicissitudes of life, nothing related to selling on eBay can make me cry, I can tell you that.

-

[albertabrightalberta]

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@the_fancy_fox wrote:

I would attempt to get that negative removed. 

and as others have said, change your settings to immediate payment. Saves a lot of headaches. 

---

Why should the feedback be removed? The neg doesn't violate any ebay policy. Buyer was rightly disappointed because the seller canceled the sale, thereby not giving the buyer up to 4 days to pay for the item. As hard as it is to accept, the seller was in the wrong and hopefully, learned from this experience.

[fern*wood]

I'm curious about what reason you used to cancel the transaction?

@tesa6240 

[buyselljack2016]

powell presented the fact as they are.  Nothing cruel.

unenforceable payment policy, and spamming a buyer are not good practices.

(I sent her mulltable requests and reminders within that 24 hr frame.)

[candd205]

Can we all have a little grace for this seller. I'm pretty sure she has gotten the message now.

[omgitlightsup]

I was really bummed when I got my first negative.

Back then, toolhaus.org was available, and I searched the buyer's account. She was just a nasty person who left negative feedback for dozens of sellers, mainly "package never arrived." 

I looked at her house on google. It's half buried in weeds and underbrush, and her mailbox is invisible because of all the weeds around it. I'm sure my package and all those other ones she never received are just lying in the bushes and will serve as some kind of time capsule when they eventually bulldoze the house.

Try not to let it get to you.

[powell-memorabilia]

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@tesa6240 wrote:

I am listing things I have invested a great deal of money in and have been sold for such .  If I was waiting on $12.00 sales I think I would have been alot more  patient.  Luckily Others with much more experience actually helped. I would suggest  when you answer someones question that you maybe have something to add  to helping 

 not your far out suspect and un EARNED opinions.

---

Well, it is advice, and you can take it or leave it.  It is funny - I have multiple selling ID's, and do pretty well on eBay.  The truth is that I'm right - you don't have a leg to stand on when you make up your own TOS, against the eBay rules, and then complain about the negatives that you receive. 

Now, you might not like that I didn't coddle you, but that's life.  I prefer to give you some straight advice - not sell you short on your ability to change.  Others will tell you that you're 100% in the right, that no one can make it, and you shouldn't even try. 

The "can't-do" crowd is all over - up to you if you want to join.

[blingfling123]

I spent a few minutes looking at your listings. You have some gorgeous items. Seriously, you have stuff I have never seen before. (I am old too) 

I can tell that you love the things that you sell, and you have a lot of knowledge, but your descriptions are very hard to read in some cases. There is a huge hunk of text in very small font on a lot of them. You might have better luck if you space some stuff out and have less long run on sentences.  

If you need immediate payment, use that on a listing. If not, then you need to live with the eBay terms. The below is going to turn buyers off.  If you switch to immediate payment you need to remove any reference to any payment timeline in your listings. 

"***Immediate payment must be recieved in 6 hrs. Unless other arrangement made***"

You have descriptions on some of your items where you copied some information directly from the maker's website including registering your piece with "us" that makes you sound like the manufacturer of the item. That is against eBay policy and possibly copywrite. 

You have some stuff where it looks like autocorrect artist or brand name. Example Andrea Safekeeping (I think that is supposed to be Andrea Sadek). Shaffing dish was another. 

I think if you make some tweaks to your listings it will help with sales. 

With respect to getting a negative. Yeah, it really sucks, but you have to remember you are not going to change that person's mind. The odds that a person who leaves a negative will change the negative or buy from you again are pretty much 0.  

What you need to focus on is your response to those negatives.  The response is what other potential buyers are going to read and quite possibly use to decide if they want to do business with you or not. Making excuses, talking about being scammed in the past, how many purchases a buyer has made in the past, and your policies that are not in line with eBay policies is going to turn buyers off far quicker than the original negative.