Guide To Being A Safe Buyer On Ebay

youngmoney_2

I have been using ebay for around 3 years now as a buyer and a seller and I have seen almost every scam you can imagine. Below is a list of key points that everybody should follow if they are worried about a particular purchase on ebay. The first tips are the obvious ones, the last are the ones you may not know.

1) YOU CAN NEVER BE TOO CAREFULL or GO WITH YOUR GUT 1
If you think something is a scam, it probably is. Many people get fooled after they read page after page of "this product is amazing", "it has changed my life" etc. Something telling you that you will make money over night is usually rubbish, if it was true, it would be plastered over the internet, newspapers and certainly on this message board! If you are not sure about a product, dont purchase it!

2) MY EBAY EMAIL DOESNT WORK, PLEASE EMAIL ME DIRECT, DO NOT BID
This is a classic hack. The brief scenario is that some idiot will break into another ebayers account who has good feedback, take over it and then when you email them, they will ask you to pay first, which of course you do and then they leg it with your money. Avoid buying items through email addresses on ebay (it is also against their policies).

3) HIGH PRICED ITEMS and FEEDBACK 1
Especially for those of you with a bit more money in your pocket, be wary of high priced electronics and any other goods for that matter. A members' feedback is largely a good way of telling how likely their product is to be the real deal, but don't neccesarilly take it at face value.
A lot of scammers will build up good feedback by selling very cheap ebooks, beads, 99p items etc. After they have got genuine good feedback they will go on to list an electronics item that's £500+. Of course once again you will pay, and then they will leg it.
A good way of getting to know your seller is by clicking on the item numbers in their feedback. If you find that all of their sold items are very small purchases, then my advice is to steer clear.

4) FEEDBACK 2 and GO WITH YOUR GUT 2
Going back to one of the first points, if it seems too good to be true, then it probably is. Worrying as it is, there have been reports of some people 'buying feedback', a process that is 100% against ebay rules. John Smith will 'purchase' feedback from an annonymous source and it will look as though he has good feedback from a lot of items. Most of the time good feedback means good seller, but if you really are worried then contact the people that bought items in the past from the seller via their own page (by clicking on their username in the sellers feedback). Most of the time you will get a response from people saying yes its fine, use this buyer etc, however on one occasion I had I emailed 5 people and got no response (a good sign of fake feedback). Unsuprisingly 2 days later the seller was kicked off ebay and there was a online article the next day about him conning thousands from people.

GENERAL TIPS
If you really have ebayphobia, use the ebay shops. These are business who sell through ebay and are strictly monitored by ebay as is their trading.
To be safe, don't buy a high priced item from somebody who has no feedback at all.
Be carefull to distinguish between sellers feedback and buyers feedback. The seller may have bought many items but may never have sold anything.


I hope this has been helpful, if anyone else has any tips feel free to add them, maybe we can make this a sticky. Next week i'll come back with tips for new sellers and also how to get the best bargains out of ebay using 'snipers' and other methods.

soolin

youngmoney wrote:

GENERAL TIPS
If you really have ebayphobia, use the ebay shops. These are business who sell through ebay and are strictly monitored by ebay as is their trading.
.

This is not quite correct, ebay shops are not necessarily traders as we would understand them, any casual user can open a shop as a store front for their stock. They are no more policed by ebay than any other auction.

The lady in my office has a shop as she is just a 'bit' seller who wanted to clear all her duplicate items once and for all.

Soo

youngmoney_2

soolin wrote:

This is not quite correct, ebay shops are not necessarily traders as we would understand them, any casual user can open a shop as a store front for their stock. They are no more policed by ebay than any other auction.

The lady in my office has a shop as she is just a 'bit' seller who wanted to clear all her duplicate items once and for all.

Soo

Very true apologies, but I should point out that over the past 2-2 1/2 years, there have been literally hundreds of scams on ebay, but only two reported on ebay shops

soolin

youngmoney wrote:

Very true apologies, but I should point out that over the past 2-2 1/2 years, there have been literally hundreds of scams on ebay, but only two reported on ebay shops

Only two? Is this information freely available only I know someone who lost money on a seller with a photgraphic shop and it is a bit frightening to think that there is only one other person affected by shops in the whole world apart from her. If it was me I would start to feel a bit paranoid.

Soo