problems with ebay

funkyBase

Hi all,

I've had quite a few problems with ebay so here's my rant and my main issue. Feel free to join in.

Basically, I am very careful about their rules. I don't break any rules in the slightest. I see many sellers break the rules on purpose or by accident.

I have signed up to ebay and I know if I want to sell on ebay I will obey their rules. Not a problem. My opinion if I don't like it, I don't have to use it.

My problem is, well a rival seller (a company with actual employees rather than my one man band) was targeting my auctions. They basically were emailing ebay telling ebay I was breaking all kinds of rules from telling them I was not in the UK (I am), to saying I was offering items in the wrong category. All kinds of crazy things that couldn't possibly be true. All you had to do was take one look at my auctions to realise it was complete rubbish. Some of the things just didn't even make sense.

What happened was ebay would remove my items (but without explanation, they would list why the items were reported), I complain, a week later they would apologise and say I could sell again and then a few days later, my items would go and the cycle would start again. I had to threaten action against ebay before they remotely took me seriously and said they would deal with the person responsible. They said due to the high turnover of staff they couldnt train the staff to realise someone was reporting my items falsely. My problem was that too many reports and you are suspended. I got all my false reports taken off my file but my paranoia was that it was taking 3-10 days to do that so in that time enough reports and I was off and if you get removed falsely it's a month to get back on no matter what. So I had to keep listing small numbers of items, then removing when items got reported, complain to ebay and each time ebay promising it was the last. It took about 3 months to clear up to a level I have been dealing with. It still happens.

Crazy thing is I knew who was doing this and this person was breaking lots of rules and when I reported this person nothing happened. I suspect because they were giving ebay £1000s of fees a month

I got a bit annoyed to say the least.

Any other crappy ebay stories?

Sugar_Coated_Owl

I really feel for you being in that situation. I'm surprised that it didn't make you quit eBay all together. Have they stopped doing it to you now?

I've had no eBay stories to tell so I guess that's good

dippy-dora_2

Hi, ebay are a faceless corporation who'll just take the fees and sod their customers. It's no skin off their nose if you quit selling, unfortunately this is the type of business you're dealing with.

I wish I could give you advice of what to do but you've done all you can by complaining to them - just keep trying and become an email pest to them if you have to.

And keep reporting the other seller for breaking the rules, everyday if you have to, just watch for false bids, as unfortunately other sellers aren't beyond doing this to ruin you if they think you've ruined them.

funkyBase

Hey, thanks for your reply. It's mostly calmed down now. It does still happen but not as regularly. I would love to give up ebay (or sell very little on it) and get my website selling my items.

What I've found is ebay seems OK if you do not step on any toes of anyone else. I took it as a compliment that this bigger company saw me as a threat but it's harsh environment for a small seller like me.

I still like the concept of ebay just think their customer service sucks and policing of the site sucks.

Without it I wouldn't be selling at the minute so I give it that. It's getting my items to the masses and keeping my prices low without the overhead of the shop (though with their fees, I sometimes think I should have a real shop :rotfl: )

Base

dippy-dora_2

Nothing stopping you setting up on a website. if you go through 1 and 1 it's less than 5 pound for 2 years for the .co.uk
You could also use a free webhost and get a shopping cart.
Unfortunately you can't link to it from ebay at all.
But set up your meta key words good and before you know it you could set up there completely.

With ebay it seems the big bad guys have more clout than the little sellers, it's all petty really as well, there's room for everyone.

funkyBase

Hey thanks,

I have a website, all fully eccommerce (it's being fixed at the minute). I come from a tech background, it just takes a while getting it up there. Ebay is a sure fire way of getting your items to the masses quickly and easily. Even if the website takes off I will still have a little ebay presence but I just don't want it to have most of the sale at the minute.


Thanks for the advice.

dippy-dora_2

Nothing stopping you putting your website address in with the parcels you send out :j
all advertising and for free

funkyBase

Hey dippy-dora. Good idea, which I do as well.

I have my site optimised for seach engines, I inlcude webaddress on everything I send out and I have promo materials advertising as well. I'm doing as much as I can but it takes a while to get your site up there. The site is being revamped at the mo so it should help matters.

Thanks for your advice.

Anything else I can do ro advertise my site?

HugoSP

If you are worried with the problems that e bay have given you re occuring, you may want to consider writing them a note in your listing. For example:

"Note to Ebay. Ebay has acknowledged that a number of my listings have been wrongly cancelled due to malicious complaints from another seller. I would ask that e bay consider the facts carefully next time a complaint is received, as such a complaint may well be of an anti competitive nature.

I have gone to great lengths to ensure that my listings are an accurate description of the product and comply with e bay's rules. Should any member have any issues with this or any other listing under my username, please feel free to contact me directly by phoning....."

This will help people see that you're doing the right thing, and may stop malicious action in its tracks, just like my listing non paying bidders at the bottom of every listing stopped non paying bidders from coming near my items!

I had three in quick succession. They bid but never stumped up the cash. I simply pasted links to their profiles explaining the problems I had with them but also explaining that I would accomodate genuine bidders who cannot complete for genuine reasons. I had no more problems with non payers after that.

I actually got people writing to me congratulating me for original thinking!

H

funkyBase

Hey Hugo, Good idea. I did start putting information like that in my listings. Basically all the rules people thought I had broken and why it was complete rubbish. Sort of like a note to ebay. I stopped when it calmed down a bit as I have seen people do that before and it's normally scammers selling copied stuff so I didn't want people thinking I'm dodgy.

I had some problem buyers and I put on my about me page, warnings to NPB and people who try and scam and highlighted someone who had done this. I removed it after a while as I wasn't sure you would do that. I thought if someone entered into a transaction with you, you can write about it on your about me page as long as it's factual. I'm not sure. Any ideas?