eBay

[Nintendo]

In this thread we can discuss your eBay experiences or any funny stories you might have had during the years.

Spoiler

Anyway, yesterday ago I purchased this item from an Aussie eBayer and when sent him a message letting him/her know that I will be paying when the bank opens next I received a very unfortunate reply.


SELLER

Hello,

There was a error in the postage now.


Please allow 20$ extra for the postage.


What a great deal at 260$!

BUYER (ME)

Sorry, the sale is a legal binding contract, so error or not free postage means free postage. Besides, you had 7 whole days to revise your listing, as your sale was a 7 day listing.
I also noticed that you made a revision that read, "On 11-Jul-11 at 23:17:25 AEST, seller added the following information:





Hello,





I have already Packed up this Unit, and is ready to be sent ASAP.", so why didn't you ever mention this "EXTRA 20 dollars" till now???

SELLER

Hello,

My bank details are:


Westpac


BSB : 732 713


A/C : 647 289


Please understand it was a honest mistake, and this device cost me 2300$


If you could kindly deposit 260$ + 20$ postage that will greatly help.


thank you

BUYER (ME)

I understand, but please understand my point of view that I also factored FREE POSTAGE into this sale...meaning if, in the beginning I saw it had $20 postage then I might not have bid as high as I would have.
You see, when people see FREE POSTAGE it is a huge consideration and a big factor in their decision making.

 

[DaMummy]

couple years back, i have two of the same items on sale, i put one on ebay, and one on amazon. i had the same person buy bought items, but i guess he didnt update his address on one of the accounts, and i sent the items to different addresses which were given to me by ebay/amazon, couple days later, i get email that buyer didnt receive of the items. long story short, i was out of a $35 audio cd because i was too new to the ebay/amazon business to keep receipts.

 

[Nintendo]

What was the buyers excuse for not updating his addresses?

 

[GiraffeeDreams]

Sold a GBA to a guy in italy about 2 years ago, a month later I travelled to Texas for around 3 months, he claimed he never received it...


Ebay has left me bitter after many many bad experiences, as a result I will never sell on there again, the problem is too many idiot buyers, now I use gumtree or craigslist or just do a carboot sale, I've got a few bits that would fetch a pretty penny but I don't trust ebay anymore.

 

[moz]

I'm in the same boat as you, I only sell on gumtree nowadays, I still buy on ebay as I haven't had any problems buying.

 

[Jumpman]

Well, I've only only had few bad situations as a buyer, and those mainly delt with poor packaging. Although I did get a bootleg GBA game once, but the seller was real cool about it(he said he didn't know), and he refunded my money ASAP.


As far as selling goes, I can't remember all the horror stories. :lol: , but considering that I have sold thousands of items around the world for 10 years or so, I would say I have racked up less losses than someone running a standard business I would think.


When you sell every once in awhile, consumers tend to take advantage of those who are green, or new to the game. Ebay and Paypal also seem to be geared at about 95% towards buyers, and 5% to sellers. So when you do have a problem selling, it is next to impossible to get any kind of satisfaction. When Ebay took away the ability for sellers to leave negative feedback for buyers, they tied the sellers hands, and have not done anything to help since.


Buying on Ebay is a real pleasure mostly. If you have the slightest problem ever, they will bend over backwards to make sure you are satisfied. If I ever have a slight issue, I will complain, since I'm normally on the receiving end of BS. I like to balance the scales when I can!


So for me, there are other alternatives(Craigs list, Gamers Gavel, ect.), but none that get me the kind of traffic, business, and funds Ebay can. Ebay and Paypal are beyond greedy, and are of little help in most cases, but the are the goose that lays the golden eggs. You don't kill the goose and have him for dinner just because he eats to much, and shits all over the house, because at the end of the day, he still lays golden eggs.


Chris

 

[bismuthdrummer]

I've sold once on eBay, bought a small number of things (~20-30), the riskiest purchase by far being my Pandora. No problems, but again I haven't shopped much and I am very wary about how the seller presents their product. I shy away from obnoxious formatting and grammar nightmares, and I pay attention to what it DOESN'T say as much as it does say.


SONY how can you both have had a bad experience and not had a bad experience? I feel like the question is a binary one...

 

[Nintendo]

Getting ripped off and then everything coming good via PayPal buyers protection.

 

[Blue Protoman]

I wonder if...Craigix uses Craigslist?

 

[Sugar_Kane]

I'm in the process of selling a billion things on ebay. I've gotten through most of it, but there's still some to go.


I have had a few bad experiences in the past. Once I got done out of over £200 selling reading festival tickets on yahoo auctions, my friend bailed on me and I was only going to see weezer, who subsequently pulled out, so I sold the tickets to some guy, realised that I'd have to post them that day if he was going to get them and then just told him that and that I'd trust him for the cash, well you can guess can't you? The twat never payed me, and then vanished. I never thought anyone would be such a low-life, but I was young.


I've had someone in France claim that an item never arrived, which was sent over christmas so I explained that he should probably give it a couple of weeks for the mail to clear, but he ceased communication and immediately put in a claim through ebay, which I had to pay no matter what I did because they were just going to take it directly out of my bank if I refused. I spoke to them directly and they just said that I'd better make sure to send everything with a signature in the future... So basically it's that simple to scam somebody, buy something on ebay, wait until it arrives, if you don't have to sign for it then simply claim you never received and they will be compelled to pay you back.


I just sold a lot of games in the past couple of weeks, and I've just got another message stating that someone hadn't received theirs. I sent a lot of them overseas and always send via 'international signed for' now, but I did neglect to do it for one of them, and I thought to myself screw it, I'll give the human race another chance to prove it's decency! I truly hope that this isn't that one, it'll massively reinforce my jaded outlook.


If dealing with that mess isn't enough, then there's always the outrageous questions and requests that you get from potential buyers. People asking if you'll close an auction early for a pitiful amount of money, or an extremely dubious cash offer. Asking if you'll do something that you have specifically stated that you would not do, eg:


L@@K USED MENS UNDERPANTS, MINT, RARE! UK SALE ONLY


"Hi, will you post to the Ukraine?... "


This weekend I had someone ask me if a keyboard I am selling was boxed, and how much I wanted for it. I explained that it was not boxed, and I was not sure of the value hence the auction and not a buy it now. She came back with "right, well my daughter's keyboard has packed up and I don't want to spend much money, so what can you do for me?" I advised that I am trying to raise money to defeat some of my debts and that every penny counts, so will be leaving the item on auction to see how far it goes, and that I suggest that she places a maximum bid that she was comfortable with and hope that she wins, Firm but fair! I thought 'that'll be that' but she contacted me again to offer me £8 for it despite all I had said. Also, this is £8 for an auction that was already on £10.50 with two days to go...


Then there's the fees! I could literally go on and on about this topic.


Incidentally, anybody want to buy an extremely expensive joystick or two?.........

 

[Asmo]

I'm very reluctant to sell on eBay anymore. The internet is a big place, if you have something really saleable, it's easy enough to find other places like specialist dealers not populated with morons and thieves where you can offer your wares. I've sold watches, microphones, games and more this way and made at least as much as I'd seen the items go for on eBay, with none of the fees and no hassle.


I just encountered the cretin factor once too often selling on eBay. Buyers winning my auctions, then not responding to complete the deal. After 2 weeks on one, I left negative feedback and they responded by doing the same, accusing me of all kinds of BS. I must have caught eBay on a good day though, because after detailing my communications with the 'buyer' they suspended them, and deleted their feedback (but left my negative on them!).


Buying has (almost) always gone smoothly. I've bagged some crazy stuff.

 

[Sugar_Kane]

Anybody have any trouble on gumtree then? I need to sell two joysticks that I can't get any interest in from dedicated sites, unfortunately most of the denizens there are kids.

 

[Tom`]

If dealing with that mess isn't enough, then there's always the outrageous questions and requests that you get from potential buyers. People asking if you'll close an auction early for a pitiful amount of money, or an extremely dubious cash offer. Asking if you'll do something that you have specifically stated that you would not do, eg:


L@@K USED MENS UNDERPANTS, MINT, RARE! UK SALE ONLY


"Hi, will you post to the Ukraine?... "

Well, in this case I don't see what's wrong with asking the seller if he'd be willing to ship to the Ukraine, provided you (the buyer) paid the extra shipping. If you're looking for some uncommon item that isn't available in your country, I would think it would be worth it.

 

[MarioPandio]

My first attempt to purchase a Gp32 the Blu one I think it was, went awry. I won it from a chap in Canada for about £80 but it never arrived. He claimed it sent and it dragged out over a month, so paypal wouldn't refund it. For all I know it may have genuinely got lost in transit. Regardless I later looked back at that and found the Gp2x which I got from Craigix, as a good little video/mp3/pdf reader but despite sticking menu2x on it I found it a little difficult to get games and such set up on it, mostly used it for MAME. When I looked back on that in turn, incase of any follow ups I spotted the Pandora project and got in within the first minutes of pre-orders, so I dont regret that ebay incident at all


Other than that I once won a high spec Alienware desktop PC for a silly sum below its value and the buyer was good enough to honour it but he wanted me to pay via DHL as an intermediary who would then deliver it. I sent the DHL website link direct to DHL and they said it was a very elaborate/sophisticated copy of their website but it was of course a SCAM! The ebay account was frozen etc.


My wife buys and sells tons on their though and in general it works out well. I agree they have stitched the sellers hands with the feedback issues though and the fees are ludicrous nowadays, so she prefers to sell elsewhere more now.

 

[Nintendo]

Interesting stories in here.

I'm very reluctant to sell on eBay anymore. The internet is a big place, if you have something really saleable, it's easy enough to find other places like specialist dealers not populated with morons and thieves where you can offer your wares. I've sold watches, microphones, games and more this way and made at least as much as I'd seen the items go for on eBay, with none of the fees and no hassle.


I just encountered the cretin factor once too often selling on eBay. Buyers winning my auctions, then not responding to complete the deal. After 2 weeks on one, I left negative feedback and they responded by doing the same, accusing me of all kinds of BS. I must have caught eBay on a good day though, because after detailing my communications with the 'buyer' they suspended them, and deleted their feedback (but left my negative on them!).


Buying has (almost) always gone smoothly. I've bagged some crazy stuff.

I hope everybody is aware that buyers have more power than sellers now, as in buyers can leave negative feedback (minus (-)) to sellers, but not the other way around.

 

[ikreos]

I bought an Amiga 500 customized with a hard drive that came with a 1084S monitor a few peripherals and the description said a bunch of games. When I got it there were no game disks and the monitor had a bad flyback transformer. I asked the seller where the games were and he told me they were on the hard drive which I had already wiped and reformatted, and he said the monitor worked before he shipped it. I wasn't worried about the games because I already have over 1000 disks full of games, and the monitor I can repair. It just kind of urked me. I don't normally buy off ebay unless it's something I really want. Mainly old hardware and home computer/game consoles.


My mother sells a lot of her crafts and stuff on ebay and hasn't really had any problems.


EDIT: If anyone is interested California Digital sells brand new in the box never opened Tano Dragon 64 consoles.

 

[Nintendo]

By the way, is anyone a huge Tetris fan like myself, and has a cool spare million dollars to throw away?

Q: Hello! I would like to know if you have the original negatives of your picture with Alexey, and if you are willing to include it in the auction. Your looks are close enough to mine that I don't think any of my friends would be able to tell the difference. Thanks! Jul-16-11
A: Hello, I use digital camera so no negatives can be included...


Q: I have 12,000 GBP. Is that even in the area of what you want? Jul-15-11


A: Hello sir, thanks for your serious offer; however I've already rejected 2 offers over 12.000 GBP. I accept fractionary payment. Best regards.


Q: Hello, I am interested. Can you please advise on your declined offers. Thanks, Lorraine Jul-14-11


A: Hello sir, I will not comment publicly on the amount of the declined bids because I think is the right of the buyer to decide to make public the value of the game or not. Feel free to send me an offer, then we talk. Best regards.


Q: The only problem is that Aleksei’s family name is Pazhitnov, not Patzinov . lol Jul-14-11


A: Fixed. Thanks!


Q: Hi, was you in a rock band?? Jul-14-11


A: Yes, I am. http://www.facebook.com/pages/Rembrandt42/229389615055


Q: Hi My Name is Joel , I am a game collector, I saw you ad, Just wanted to let you know that there are 25 tetris games made, I hear 10 were given to sega staff and rest destroyed. I have one the was given to me by sega back in 1991. I have this info from Sega japan http://www.youtube.com/user/TheLastGamertube?feature=mhee Joel Jul-14-11


A: Hello, thanks for the info but I don't believe it until I see with my own eyes. I know a lot of collectors who own a fake unit believing it is real; a lot of bootlegs have been made using the scans of Tetris Sega Ages for Playstation.


Q: Could you wipe the signature off before you send it? Jul-13-11


A: The case is a regular MD case, so feel free to change it yourself.

 

[Sugar_Kane]

pfft, $1,000,000? That's only £620,615! Bargain

 

[moz]

Ghost in a bottle, only $19.99US:


http://cgi.ebay.com/GHOST-BOTTLE-/320701865474?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item4aab521e02


Give me a break <_<

 

[Nintendo]

^ I was just about to buy one of those 'ghost in bottle' bottles, until I noticed how much shipping was...


:blink:

pfft, $1,000,000? That's only £620,615! Bargain

I hate GBP >_>