eBay Consumer Reviews - Page 6

MINNESOTA -- I bid on a guitar for a seller on eBay on February 17, 2006 in the amount of $1,825.00. When at the conclusion of the bidding I got a Second Chance Offer sent from eBay's email address with their Masthead, Gold Seal and all eBay's security assurances. The alleged seller asked me to e-mail him at **.

The Seller's name and address was listed for payment on the Second Chance Offer and when the Seller wanted the money sent by Western Union I refused as the eBay site warns you not to wire money. I contacted the Trust and Safety department immediately to verify the Seller and address and to question this offer. I was e-mailed back by a "Fenton" in Trust and Safety who e-mailed me back before I wired the money:

"Thank you for writing eBay regarding item #**. My named is Fenton. I will be happy to help you further. It is common after an auction for the seller to contact a buyer who did not win the auction, and offer the item. This may be because the highest bidder backed out of the transaction, or because the reserve of the auction was not met.
Even without seeing the entire email with headers, I can tell that the email you received is legit and we have double checked seller's ID.

We usually send those warnings regarding Western Union Money transfer ONLY to prevent deals made outside eBay which will not offer protection to the buyer. In some cases (like this one) we do accept Western Union Money Transfer as the seller's preferred payment method, when the seller is out of the country, or some other exceptional situations. In order to successfully complete this transaction, you must follow the directions indicated by our first e-mail with instructions regarding the payment procedure. Thanks again for writing, and thank you for being part of the eBay community."

I emailed Fenton back: "Thank you kindly. To follow the instructions first sent was the one where it was to send money by Western Union to Jack **, right?" Fenton responds: "That is correct." I wired the money and the Jack **. Turned out to be a fraud. Later the real seller (who was totally innocent and gracious) contacted me asking for payment. I immediately notified eBay by email. It is virtually impossible to contact eBay by phone.

Nearly a week later they emailed me their boilerplate responses telling me the exact opposite that I should not trust wiring money, etc. I e-mailed back and attached all of the documents showing the Second Chance Offer and Fenton's response. They do not mention Fenton or his response, just more of their boilerplate responses saying "Do not make transactions outside of eBay." The Second Chance offer came from an eBay address which I still did not trust so I verified it with their TRUST and SAFETY DEPARTMENT and eBay verified it as legit.

I am an attorney-at-law with 23 years experience with fraud cases. eBay actually made it possible for the fraudulent Seller to defraud me by verifying his name and address as the Seller. I never would have wired the money BUT FOR their verification of the Seller. I looked for other complaints on the Internet and found one exactly like mine from last August for a motorcycle which the buyer lost $3,500.00. Also if you want to file a Court case with eBay you must do it in Santa Clara, CA.

SAN JOSE, CALIFORNIA -- eBay prevented my account from activity for over a month, due to their system failure, and failed to remit my seller funds, and refused to return numerous calls for help. This large company took my few dollars of a sale, and said, "tough, live with it."

** eBay, they do not cater at all to sellers and charge 10% for items you sell including having to pay for damn shipping if you listed it as so. Every crackhead is on to get deals so don't auction or else you'll get ripped off. I bought a game for $42 off eBay and a month later it sold for $26?! WTF. I wouldn't mind if I could see cost of shipping or cancel transaction before bum pays but eBay provided no such thing. I need to call one of their representatives and blow up on them.

FREEBIE Time on Ebay. Go get your free products compliments of EBAY. Let's take a long look at what is EBay. First we look at the agreement conditions and their incorrect wording and meanings. They try to state it'€™s not an auction only a platform to allow buyers and sellers to trade. An auction by any standard, all fees apply and it'€™s run on a normal web auction lines. Now consider there is more private person selling online than dealers, yet EBay classifies everyone as trade or corporate sellers so the trade practices laws apply but in all cases they do not.

Like any auction event trade the auction laws are simply buyer beware. So why do this, well it's a game EBay's plays, they classify the buyers having 90% protection and the sellers almost none. Again one must take a serious look at how this is set up and why, the system is derived around a feedback from the buyers to the sellers and the greater the amount of good feedback the higher the sales will be. But the catch with EBay is only three bad feedbacks and the seller is terminated and in a real dirty tricks way.

On Termination everyone is let known this trader is a crook and all sales or pending sales will be cancelled forthwith, the business of this trader is over due to non credibility. Consider many have been in operation for years and have gathered thousands of good feedback, great seller, great product, all lost. Totally unfair of EBAY.
Take a look at many of the seller auction. One would see disclaimers to the fact of offering the buyer the opportunity to contact them to sort out any problems before and red bad feedback it placed. Fear of being terminated is always high on the list.

What EBay is doing is scaring the Sellers to give away free stocks and or credits to keep his place on EBay. If one was stupid enough to try to fight this with either EBay or PayPal the seller would be at a 99% disadvantage and will lose, even if the buyer is lying. Under the conditions the buyer can say it was not as advertised, say anything or not received it makes no matter, so the buyer can get a free products every time. Most sellers give products and credit away. As it cost more to be terminated. Than losing a single item.

Now if it goes to a fight and the seller states he wants the product returned before a credit is raised and that would be the best method for all. But PayPal has a stupid method. It lets the lying buyer go and get a Post or freight tracking number and they credit on that, the buyer does not send back the item it's only method of Instant credit with no checks.

Here is an international comment from a seller and his reason to change way over the cost to cover that problem: When I accept a payment without insurance all you have to do is saying PayPal that the item didn't arrive at your place, then you get your money back. If it really arrives or not! Is this reason enough for you. IT'S FREEBIE time for everyone on eBay as that's their rules.

This only applies to the lying cheating buyers as any honest buyer would first send an email to the seller explain his/her problem and like most sellers that would be taken care of. Here is one good seller that got the chop by 3 sellers saying bad things about the products, did eBay consider this no, he/she is history... Swimwear company. And this one was an excellent seller with over 4000 great feedback comments and eBay did not consider that.

What happens is the red bad feedback is placed online first and no amount of talking to these buyers would produce a result as it's only free item they are interested in. Ebay rules SUCK. They are designed to protect Buyers even if they are dishonest.

I have been selling on eBay for 6 years now and we have and had too many problems with their policies. First of all there are no Seller Protection and eBay is just turning the consumers into thieves that can and are able to rob and steal daylight without having any fear. Here is an example that has happened to us recently:

A customer bought a transmission from us that came with 30 days warranty and 7 days exchange starting from the day received. The customer contacted us after 38 days saying that we sent him a wrong transmission, he asked us to give him another transmission or he will open a dispute with eBay against us. I called eBay and reported the problem, eBay asked me to communicate with the buyer through emails and I did and the next thing I saw was a Dispute opened on eBay.

I asked the customer to email us pictures of the transmissions showing us the difference but since he knew he was wrong, he Escalated the case and eBay closed the case in buyer's favor and asked him to return the transmission back to us.

I called eBay and spoke to Appeal Dept and explained the situation that he should at least allow us getting those photos before closing the case and the respond was, it is really funny (the representative told me that since the decision is made they can not do anything and I should wait until I receive the transmission and once it is received then I can appeal it and it eBay made a bad decision then we will get our money back). We have heard this so many times before. Last time when we called eBay reporting the problem, eBay told us that they can not do anything and we should report the buyer to the local authorities (Police).

We called the Police and they told us that is a Civil matter and we should take the buyer to court. The buyer was in Washington State and we are in Texas and when I call back eBay explaining the situation, eBay told me that they can not do anything about it. We are doing our best to do a clean and honest business but in return eBay is teaching and protecting these kind of consumers how to buy, use and then get your money back from sellers. My only hope and wish is that somebody do something about eBay's extortion.

Around 2 years ago, we called eBay and kind of argued with our account representative and he then suspended our account for around 5 to 7 business days and the reason because we fought for our right, and then reactivated our account with being managed and we got 8 Negative feedback in 1 month plus losing so many disputes.

The other day, I called our local district attorney and she told me that the only people that might do something would be the lobbyists in Washington D.C. but since they get so much contributions from eBay, I am not sure even if they do something about eBay's policies. Thanks and hope someone do something to help us!

Buyers beware. I was a eBay member for 6 years, with 100% rating. It started to go wrong when I bid on a all leather belt and won but the company never responded. When I contacted the seller, I was told they sold out of that item and they would refund my money but I found the same belt on many of their other listings and on their Store site. I contacted eBay and was told if they gave me my money back what was my issue? Duh, I wanted the item but they didn't want to sell it for price I won bid at. Then, it all broke loose when I bid on a very popular DVD and won. I paid for the item through PayPal as I always did and forgot about the transaction.

The next day I received an Email from eBay telling me the item was removed from their listing as they believed it was a fraudulent item and if I hadn't paid for it yet, don't and if I had, file a dispute form. I did everything the Email told me to do. In the meantime I needed the DVD for my child, another duh moment that is why I bid on first place. So I went back to the drawing board and bid on another and won. Well, I never got resolution on first DVD transaction.

It took me forever to get ahold of eBay and once I did they told me since I received the item I would have to deal with seller direct. (Okay what's wrong with this picture?) And one small problem, seller was in China but represented themselves as being in USA until item was received with China address on it. When I told customer service representative this he didn't seem concerned, I also explained I had already bid on same item from different seller and received it. His response was, "Well who told you to do that?" As if, how rude and if it wasn't for their first stupid Email, I would have received the item and would not have had any hassles.

I attempted to reach seller but site was no longer available. So, second attempt to contact eBay customer service went no better, I was told to return the item AT MY EXPENSE and then if my money was not returned eBay would give me my money back but I had to provide a tracking number to them. I mailed item back to China, cost me $32.00 to mail and no tracking number available due to out of country address because once item leaves USA no way for Postal Service to track.

Final decision by eBay resolution center was for seller, since I could not provide a tracking number for an item that was supposed to be sold in the USA in the first place. So I would not recommend buying any item on eBay ever. Their cookie cutter rules and so called "customer protection services" actually screws you, but seller came out smelling like a rose.

PayPal/eBay Resolution Departments. Reference/eBay Resolution Case # **. Andre ** bid on an amp that I had placed for auction, and paid for it on August 8th. My eBay page states that I will ship orders within five days. I packaged and shipped the amp on August 13th. There were several communications from Mr. ** asking when and how the amp would be shipped, and one letter dated August 12th, asking if the amp could be hooked up to his three way speakers. I spoke to the buyer by phone on the 13th of August at 3:23 P.M. I advised him that the amp had been shipped via parcel post.

On the 24th Mr. ** had not received the amp, and he demanded a refund. I reminded him that I had shipped the amp on the 13th, within the time frame my eBay page outlines. I provided him with a tracking number and information from the post office indicating that package was still in transit. I communicated that I was surprised that delivery was taking so long, but clearly it was out of my hands. Mr. ** wrote back that he did not want the amp, and that if he received it he would return it to me.

In spite of being able to see from the post office tracking information that the package had been shipped on the 13th, he insisted that I was not telling the truth. Mr. ** opened a case with the eBay Resolution Center on the 24th; Case # **. The Resolution Center urged me to respond by August 31st. The next day, without allowing me time to respond to the case, eBay issued a refund to Mr. ** for the amount of $62.95. If a resolution representative had reviewed the communications between Mr. ** and me, they would have seen that the amp was in transit, and that any delay in receipt was not caused by me.

The amp was delivered to the customer on the 27th of August. Because of eBay's rapid refund to Mr. **, in spite of evidence that the order was in transit and due for delivery within a short time, my PayPal account was debited for $65.08. A fee of $2.13 cents was charged. I have not seen a fee for this type of transaction in the past. In summary: Mr. ** is now in possession of the amp he ordered, as well as a full refund. I, on the other hand, have no amp, and $65.08 less in my PayPal account. eBay's decision to side with the buyer and completely disregard my rights as a seller, indicates a low level of professionalism.

It is inconceivable to me that eBay would refund money to Mr. ** without closely examining the details of the case, and without first ensuring that my amp was returned to me. This is a clear of case of a buyer changing his mind after an auction. eBay's actions indicate that they are willing to side with fickle buyers, and unwilling to support their sellers. The eBay commitment to good service should not be one sided. I want my merchandise returned to me in the condition in which it was shipped, and the amount of $65.08 credited to my PayPal account.

I had never used eBay before, but having been laid off work I decided to sell a whole bunch of unwanted items to raise some extra cash. EBay seemed an easy option. All I had to do was list the items, sit back and wait for the money to roll in, right? Well, not quite. Setting up the account took a reasonable amount of time and listing the items was fine, if a little long winded. Some items sold, some didn't. I received 100% positive feedback on all my sales, having made an effort to be honest about condition and to post the next working day when payment was made. So far, so good.

Suddenly eBay decide I must be a business seller (no explanation was ever offered, just links to a page about business sellers). The set my account as such, and I couldn't change it back. I couldn't list anything else without incurring business charges. I was expected to fill out reams of details on my VAT number etc. (none of which exist, I'm just a bloke with an attic full of junk).

I contacted eBay via their customer support chat system. Even getting to that stage was a long winded affair. Their filtering system to try to categorize what your problem is before you speak to an advisor was frustrating, and it took a lot of trial and error to word my problem in a way it would allow.

Finally I got to speak to a customer service representative. After several minutes of them reading through my problem they said they were forwarding the issue to the appropriate department. I was told it would be dealt with within 48 hours. Several days, and several chat sessions later and it was still not dealt with. Eventually I spoke to an advisor who seemed to grasp the problem, and they once again promised I would be contacted by the appropriate department.

To my surprise, this time I received an email. They stated that they agreed it was an error to class me as a business seller, and they would rectify the problem. They also stated it would take up to 72 hours. This seemed a ridiculously long time to change one piece of information on a customer's account, but I replied thanking them. That was on 1/5/2010. It is now 06/05/2010 and the account is still showing as a business account.

I spoke one last time to a customer service advisor (online chat again), who was polite and sympathetic (as all but one of the staff had been), but ultimately unable to deal with the issue and was only able to "escalate it to a higher level". I pointed out that "oops sorry" from the boss of a company is no more useful to me than a advisor saying it and signed off. Goodbye eBay, and thanks for a astonishingly frustrating and disappointing experience.
P.S. I still have all emails exchanged, and will add them to this review if necessary.

I have found out about the new insurance policy the hard way (to the tune of over $400) which is the seller of the item is responsible for paying to insure items, not the buyer as in the past. I sold an item (as I had for the past 7 years of selling on eBay), and offered the customer the option to insure the package. I assumed (as in all type of auction purchases) that the buyer has an inherent risk because of the opportunity to purchase an item for much less than the retail value.

The overnight package was lost by UPS. The buyer requested a refund. As the tracking number I provided them stated the package was LOST by UPS, they received a full refund as mandated by eBay from ME. My understanding of eBay as a member (potentially ex-member) is that the reason a Feedback score was invented and created was to separate minor risk from major risk as a buyer. (Otherwise, WHY WOULD A SCORE BE CREATED?)

So, food for thought: eBay has effectively REMOVED liability to the buyer. That feedback score that all of us have put so much work into over the year is MEANINGLESS. Why would I care if I was purchasing an item from a seller that only has 4 total feedbacks and 2 of them are negative? If the seller doesn't send the item, I get my money back if they can't prove it was delivered (even if the shipping company lost it and it was not the sellers fault). If they do send it...AWESOME, you usually get a huge discount for sellers with poor feedback or very little feedback.

I wonder if eBay actually thought about the ramifications of what they have done with this policy change!?! Food for thought: As a seller, I am responsible to pay for the time cost involved with creating a listing, listing fees, upgrade fees, final valuation fees (both eBay & PayPal), shipping insurance fee and the time to package and ship an item. I am at FULL risk, so I must now have tracking on EVERYTHING I sell, regardless of the price of the item, as that is my only recourse to prove the customer received their item. The auction winner either receives the item or their money back. Here are the predictions I see arising from this new insurance policy:

1. Your feedback score as a seller now means nothing. Why? Because as a buyer, you either receive the item or you request your money back regardless of the sellers score.

2. Ebay will become the largest marketplace for moving stolen goods. Before, I would never bid on an expensive item from a seller that has 0 feedback, but now I couldn't care less. A thief has a zero out of pocket cost for an item, so what do they care if a $3,000 item sells for $400? It's pure profit. Meanwhile, the quality businesses that sell the same item that have great feedback scores can't compete.

3. Auction-style listings will dry up or disappear (or the original asking price listed will be the exact minimum price the seller can still make money with). Soon the risk to reward aspect will become too great. Buy it now will be the only type of listing, which means that eBay will effectively become an online shopping mall that will attempt to compete with Amazon (and fail) for retail business, and Craigslist will take over the used item for sale.

SEQUIM, WASHINGTON -- I have sold on eBay since early 2006 with 100% feedback on all sold and purchased items. Recently, I experienced with what would be my last transaction on eBay. I closed my account after this, because of a person who was very deceptive, hard to deal with, and in the end, ripped me off over $400 plus the item, and WITH the help of eBay and PayPal (two of the same, one owned by the other). As all other sales in the past, this item which was a fragile figurine, one of three I sold and mailed, the other two arriving fine and with positive feedback left, that sold for a little over $400.

The person was complaining about things from the second she won the item, a sure sign she would be trouble. Well sure enough, she received the item, immediately put a claim in with PayPal, then emailed me it arrived broken "after" filing the claim.

PayPal informed the buyer they were to send them a tracking number showing the "item" had been sent back to me (the item having insurance required so I needed it for the postal claim), which they did in the time frame that PayPal gave them, which was March 3rd. I received a delivery notification from the post office that a "letter" was needing to be picked up and signed for. Once I got to the post office, I found that the "letter" was from the buyer who was supposed to be sending the "item" back. I refused the "letter" and called PayPal, where I am now in appeals with them to retrieve my money beings they did not uphold their end of the request.

Of course in PayPal's warped sense of doing things, they automatically gave them their refund of over $400, the minute I called them and told them what had happened. This made no sense to me beings I just told them that they sent a "letter", NOT the item, but that's PayPal's rules they said. After they released the money back to the buyer, who now had my figurine still, which was probably in fine condition & was pristine when shipped out, they now also have their money back.

So I now wait in the appeals process, having faxed them copies of the notice from the post office showing that it was indeed a "letter" not a "package with a broken figurine in it", the receipt showing I refused it (I figured logically that as long as it showed not received, they would not refund the money until I had the time to call them, Wrong!), as well as the receipt showing that this person signed for the returned letter which matched the tracking numbers off of my evidence I faxed them.

Now again, logic would tell one that I should get my money, we will see on that score. After dealing with them for over a month, I know now that anything can happen with them. I closed my eBay account not wanting anything to do with them after this, especially after they made the illogical decision of not allowing sellers to leave negative feedback for buyers, guess they "all" wear halos, and when checking for messages, there I see a big fat negative feedback left for me from this person.

I called eBay and explained that these people still had my item, got their money back, I had shipped it immediately, packaged it VERY carefully, (pictures kept of packaged item in stages), shipped it immediately, and yet, eBay's rules say that they cannot remove negative feedback unless one of two things happens. One, they used profanity in their feedback, which they did not, or, they leave it for the wrong person. Well, as you can see, neither of those fit my reason for wanting this final blemish removed from my 100% feedback site, this one being the last I would receive, so according to eBay, it will remain.

eBay has made it so that ALL the rules apply to and protect the buyer, as has PayPal. I also have purchased off of eBay, so I am a buyer as well, but it needs to go both ways. There are those out there without halo's on both ends of the spectrum. The weird thing is, and that really makes no sense, is that it is us, the sellers, that they make their millions on, not the buyers, so why would they make it harder for the sellers, and easier for the buyers to steal, knowing there is nothing that can be done in the feedback forum.

And, if you think when you post an item to sell on eBay, that the rules you put in place in your listing have to be followed, they WILL BE over ruled by PayPal once paid for, those rules will be null and void, and will not mean a thing, you should just leave them out, because they mean nothing to PayPal. Another thing, eBay made it so that the only way a buyer can pay is through PayPal, no more checks or money orders.

Could this be because eBay owns PayPal, and they were counting all the fees they were missing through PayPal when paid for with a check or money order? I think so, and, then once in the web of PayPal, sellers beware, the buyer WILL ALWAYS WIN! I asked one of eBay's workers in their so called "Resolution Center" today, and asked her why on earth did they make changes to their feedback rules, and her words were "I can't divulge that".

What's that mean? Both eBay and PayPal need to be put out of business. They are being allowed to systematically run a company that no one oversees, and allows people to rip each other off, is FILLED with loop holes to suit their rules, and makes a fortune off of "our" merchandise. They need to be governed if not closed down, and watched by an outsider, not from within their companies. Won't work to have the vampire in charge of the blood bank! The thousands on the internet that say eBay sucks, is right on!

AN UPDATE: Well idiot me. PayPal sent the buyer another email giving them ANOTHER three days to send them a tracking number returning the item to me, this being sent to the buyer, and a copy of the email to me as well on the 12th, the day sent being counted as day zero by PayPal. So they had until this Monday the 16th of March to have that tracking number to PayPal. I was totally amazed that they were giving them another chance beings it had gone into appeals beings they had not followed the request originally, but again, that's PayPal for you.

On the 13th, one day later, I receive an email from PayPal that only states that the claim has been closed, and that no further action would need to be taken. That's all it said, and when I went into my account, all of the claim information had been removed, so I had nothing to go back on, so email on the 12th requesting this, and then closed on the 13th with no explanation. PayPal just closed the claim.

The people have my Royal Dalton figurine, their $401 dollars back, left me a nasty negative feedback, the only one out of over 1500 items sold, and of course eBay won't remove it because the buyer did not do one of two things, use profanity, or leave it for the wrong person, no Grey areas with eBay either, they suck too. I closed my account with that devil as well.

So now I sit here without the figurine, my money, wasted my time, and, an insurance slip that is worth nothing now, because without the so called "damaged" figurine (which is probably sitting on their piano right now in the same perfect condition it was when shipped), I cannot make a claim on the insurance through the post office, because they need the damaged item which they keep, to pay out the insurance. PayPal bent me over again!