need advice -offer from buyer who's changed User ID many times and has private FB

[ensus2015]

Hi,

  On my selling account (had for 17 plus years) I have an offer on an item from a buyer with private feedback.   They have been on Ebay for about 12 years and have changed their user ID 8 times - they are on their 9th ID as of April 23rd.   This offer is several hundred dollars.   

   I try not to be overly cautious but this one makes me very leery.   I would appreciate your experienced thoughts on this.  😊

  thanks!

[frodobagginskennedy]

I have had the same ID since 2001.  No need to change in my opinion. but some people may get bored.  What would concern me is their private feedback.  I would not take the offer and block.

[beautifulbeauty2012]

Trust your instincts! This is definitely not normal with changing id so frequently (I, for one, never changed mine either) and raise more questions when a user hides feedback. I would not sell to this user.

[japan-treazures]

I would be leary on this one. With the COVID crisis going on there have been a lot of scams happening here. To me it wouldn't be worth it to take the chance, especially if your item is several hundreds of dollars, you could end up loosing a lot of money. 

I have been here for 20+ years and have never changed my username by choice. Back in 1996, my account got hacked some how and someone tried to scam people by offering super rare paintings. After, I reported it eBay took action, but, closed my original account for security reasons and opened me up a new account with a new username. 

I know many sellers and buyers here who have also have had their usernames for years. A buyer that has changed their username that many times makes one wonder why? On top of that to have their feedback private makes one wonder even more. I have not come across many users here that do that. 

I would decline the offer and block the buyer. 

Hope this helps!

[byrd69er]

Block the ID faster than you can run behind yourself.

[onlinecentral]

At the turn of the century, most people used their email address as their eBay ID.
Web crawlers gathered those email addresses and sent out tons of spam.
So everybody changed their ID.
I have had buyers with private feedback purchase with Buy-It-Now.
I have can not block them in advance and never had a problem.
If a person is changing their ID numerous times and using private feedback, they are up to some no good nonsense.
They don't want other previous buyers or sellers to get a hold of them.
I would decline the Best-Offer and add them to my Blocked-Bidder list.

[ensus2015]

Thank you all - I was thinking the same thing.  I appreciate the confirmation!  🙂  

  Happy sales!

[sg51]

It's easy to understand being leary.

The good thing here is that you are in control.  You can reject the offer if you like, and you can block the buyer...until he changes the id yet again.

When I've blocked someone before, usually because they were demanding extreme level details in a question, I also asked them "please do not bid on my items".   

[nocoolnamejane]

Changing IDs  in of itself isn’t a big deal. I’ve changed mine a couple of times, cause I was bored of it, because my interests changed, etc.

Now if someone changes their ID every other month, that might be weird but other than that... ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ 

[ainpie-10]

Trust your gut instinct! It’s usually right! I would even message the buyer and say something about why they have changed ID’s and private feedback! I would then block them, but that’s just me!

[ainpie-10]

How do I find out how many times someone’s ID has been changed?

[walwalwill]

I don't understand everyone saying that a buyer with private feedback is some sort of red flag.

Buyers can only get positive feedback with positive comments. If a buyer got a negative comment that they wouldn't want people to be able to see, it'd be immediately and easily removable.

To me, it seems far more likely that a buyer with private feedback is trying to hide their purchase history, which is publicly available as a link through their FB page for up to 90 days & as a searchable item number for far longer than that, unless the seller designated the listing as private.

Are there red flag reasons for that? Sure. But there are also far more innocuous ones. It could also conceivably be the reason they change their username so often (seller's buying account that competitors keep catching on to/following is one that's been brought up in this community a couple of times as a reason for both, same with nosy family/neighbors, vengeful exes, the list goes on).

You have every right to sell or not sell to whomever you wish, within the law & eBay policy. But I'm not seeing the redflags that everyone else is seeing.

[nobody*s_perfect]

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@onlinecentral wrote:

At the turn of the century, most people used their email address as their eBay ID.
Web crawlers gathered those email addresses and sent out tons of spam.
So everybody changed their ID.....

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Yup, when I signed up for eBay in 1999, their default was to use your email address as your user ID!  Around 2007, eBay actually required members to change their ID to remove the email address, so older accounts will always have at least one change.

I see nothing alarming at all about changes in a user ID. I can't even think of what "red flags" it might raise.  

Members change their ID because they change the nature of what they're selling, or because they got tired of the old one or perhaps even embarasesed by it.  Some members think they can hide from snoopy family and friends who have discovered their ID, but unfortuately for them, a search on the old ID will bring up the new one for 30 days after the change.

[nobody*s_perfect]

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@japan-treazures wrote: ... I have been here for 20+ years and have never changed my username by choice. ....  

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You seem to have forgotten something:

[fern*wood]

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@walwalwill wrote:

Buyers can only get positive feedback with positive comments. If a buyer got a negative comment that they wouldn't want people to be able to see, it'd be immediately and easily removable.

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Private feedback also hides the feedback that person gives, which can be far more revealing with some.