Ebay highest bidder comes from abroad

ess0two

ironman1 wrote: »

You really do learn quite alot from the posters on this site. The majority seem to think they are right and no one can dare argue with them.

I always hold my hands up when I'm in the wrong. In this case my 'crime' is not blocking foreigners from buying my items on ebay. I honestly thought the 'UK Only' option would be enough. To be honest I'm still confused as to why ebay put it on there. There is no point at all. But why should the seller be expected to know this exactly?

At the end of the day it's all been blown out of proportion. It's a few quid but the principle is the Dutch fella should know better than to bid for something where it's clear the seller wants to post to the UK only. At least send a two second message offering extra postage costs or even just ask if it's possible to ship abroad. Whether it allows him to buy or not shouldn't be here nor there. Its just something I personally wouldn't do.

It's interesting that every time I ask the up themself posters on here if they would do this (bid for an item where it clearly states it's not available to sell to their country) they fail to answer a simple question.

That for me tells its own story and everything I need to know...

Tell the buyer you've posted it,but don't.In a weeks time when they get in contact,inform them it must be lost, and refund the buyer.

Savvybunny2009

ess0two wrote: »

Tell the buyer you've posted it,but don't.In a weeks time when they get in contact,inform them it must be lost, and refund the buyer.

That wont be any help, when asked for proof of posting he will be unable to produce it and the buyer will no doubt leave negative feedback. Dishonest sellers ruin ebay for us honest decent sellers who would just admit they made a mistake and move on.

For the sake of a few quid (if that) I would just send it. You made a mistake by not blocking international bidders but now you know you can correct this for future listings. If an international bidder is blocked and they wish to bid more often than not they will contact you asking if you could add them as an exception so they can bid.

theonlywayisup

ironman1 wrote: »

I always hold my hands up when I'm in the wrong.

I must have missed that.

ironman1 wrote: »

At the end of the day it's all been blown out of proportion.

Indeed. By you.

ironman1 wrote: »

It's interesting that every time I ask the up themself posters on here if they would do this (bid for an item where it clearly states it's not available to sell to their country) they fail to answer a simple question.

If it makes you happy. Yes I would bid if I wanted it. But I know that from experience sellers who put unenforceable carp in their listings don't follow through with their obligations. It is usually then a waste of my time to neg, leave low DSRs and claim back my money.......all because the seller is too thick to list correctly.

macfly

theonlywayisup wrote: »

I must have missed that.



Indeed. By you.


If it makes you happy. Yes I would bid if I wanted it. But I know that from experience sellers who put unenforceable carp in their listings don't follow through with their obligations. It is usually then a waste of my time to neg, leave low DSRs and claim back my money.......all because the seller is too thick to list correctly.

A bit strong? He has a good point in asking what the UK only option is there for if it doesn't also block foreign bidders. Many people will not know that, hence the number of OMG posts when sellers have this situation. Are they all thick? Or is it illogical to assume you have to use your preferences page as an extra step? Options to block specific bidders should be on the listing page. Everything else is.

ironman1

A bit strong is an understatement. Theonlywayisup comes across as someone who is very unhappy in life. I'm sure they couldn't get much lower, hence the username

theonlywayisup

I have no idea why Ebay force site preferences to be used. But as it has been explained to the OP he can either ignore it or amend it.

My statement may be strong, but it is he who has made this mountain out of a molehill. Instead of finding out the price, we have 3 pages of blaming everyone else except himself. Fact is, he is at fault. To then go on and call the buyer all sorts of names shows what sort of seller he is.

Bearing in mind a few of his posts have been removed due to their 'unsavoury' (to say the least) nature, I really don't give a dot what he thinks of me or anyone else with the same opinion. He has shown himself up for what he is. It really was a sledgehammer to crack a nut. I bet he still hasn't worked out how much it is to send.

macfly

I agree with most of your points. However, just because he expresses himself badly doesn't make him entirely wrong. The UK only thing is misleading. The buyer hasn't responded to his emails, so he knows what he has done. It's unlikely, as one response suggested, that the buyer has gone on holiday.

terra_ferma

Let's not forget that there is a well known glitch with iphones, where buyers cannot see the full listing, I've had to cancel a couple of transactions where the buyer (genuinely) could not read the whole description.

But we all know buyers don't read the listings in full, it's a fact of life, like it or not, that we have to live with.

Ebayking

I am an experienced seller (over 2700 feedback) and sell all over the world regularly. There are occasions when I will only advertise for posting to Europe (i.e. region 2 DVDs etc) and am well aware of which postage boxes to complete to ensure I don't attract buyers from elsewhere. I did however make a mistake this week and ended up getting a buyer from Israel winning an item and paying the European postage price advertised. It was my error so I am swallowing the loss to keep my customer happy and maintain my excellent feedback. Even if you lose a couple of pounds on the postage this time, it could easily outweigh the negative feedback you COULD receive if this buyer is unhappy with your response. These are faceless customers and 99.9% are nice, fair understanding people. But over the years I've had dealings with the 0.1% and with a swift click of the negative button and an unfair remark they can ruin your unblemished record for 12 months and there is no comeback! I'd say put it down to experience and just double check your listings in future.

chancesare_2

I never understand seller who won't ship out of UK but don't have their listings set up that way. But this seller says he does and he doesn't want to sell out of UK. Which is it?

I buy from ebay.de and whilst I am fluent in German, I may miss a bit in the listing which says 'ships to Germany only'. Even if I did see it, I would still bid. When you list something, if you don't remove the non shipped countries, it goes worldwide. They click buy it now and if a seller hasn't set postage or only set postage to the base country, that is what comes up in the invoice. If you are able to pay and do so, in theory it's a contract formed.

Whether the buyer knew this or not, in this case, it is irrelevant. Either the seller sells or he doesn't. But if he doesn't then he is breaking the rules. Quite easy and simple really.

But after all this moaning and blaming, as was pointed out earlier, it is the sellers fault. From what I read we are talking about a piece of clothing that costs £1.80 to post to the UK. Whilst I can only find first class up to 100g at £1.58 and second class up to 250g at £1.72, then taking the worse case scenario the postage to Holland (Netherlands actually) for 250g is only £2.49, so a whole 69p more than quoted.

Much ado about nothing.