Have you been treated unfairly by Ebay or Paypal?

nothingventured

After what I’ve read on this forum, I’d be surprised if nobody has raised the possibility of asking the Office of Fair Trading (OFT) to use its powers to persuade Ebay and Paypal to treat both buyers and sellers fairly, yet I can’t find any evidence of this.

It seems to me that the Unfair Terms in Consumer Contracts Regulations 1999 do apply to sellers who are not registered businesses because:

3.—(1) In these Regulations – … “consumer” means any natural person who, in contracts covered by these Regulations, is acting for purposes which are outside his trade, business or profession;

If I’m right, we could launch a campaign to ask the OFT to review Ebay’s terms and conditions and their business practices, so that Ebay can achieve its legitimate aims in ways that don’t treat buyers and particularly sellers unfairly. Same goes for Paypal.

Unless someone spots a flaw in my logic, I propose that evidence be gathered and a template letter be put together to enable forum members to submit individual complaints to the OFT, as this will be far more persuasive than a single complaint when they consider how to allocate their scarce resources.

Although these regulations don’t cover Business Sellers, Business Sellers can still provide evidence of unfair practices and it may also be possible to invoke competition law (also enforced by the OFT) as Ebay is the only real player in town. Chances are that by focussing Ebay’s mind on its failings, its terms and conditions will become fairer for all.

It would be really helpful for members of this forum to identify and quote a specific term or condition in Ebay’s legal agreement, say how it has been used unfairly against them and how it could be modified to become fair. For example, any term that allows closing the accounts of unrelated people because they happen to have been allocated the same dynamic IP address as a previous banned accountholder or closing or restricting the accounts of family members (collective punishment), could be changed so that only the individual themselves could be banned or restricted. The more terms and examples we find, the better.

I know there are a lot of sellers who pride themselves on their ability to keep Ebay happy as well as their customers. To you I say wouldn’t it be far better if you didn’t have to jump through hoops or live in fear of your account being taken away for life through no fault of your own?

So please don’t post thoughtless comments, or negative comments until you’ve read and understood what these regulations are about and the outcome of earlier OFT investigations from the Unfair Contract Terms section of the OFT website.

If Groupon can be forced to clean up its act, why can’t Ebay and Paypal?

Nothing Ventured

PS: Please search for the regulations and the Groupon story as new forum members can't post links.

custardy

what exactly do you want 'cleaned' up
how do they not treat buyers fairy?
eBay is heavily buyercentric

Brooker_Dave

nothingventured wrote: »

If Groupon can be forced to clean up its act, why can’t Ebay and Paypal?

Ebay and Paypal offshored to avoid UK legislation and taxation.

I agree that they should be blocked from doing any business in the UK due to the way they treat their customers.

RFW

nothingventured wrote: »

If Groupon can be forced to clean up its act, why can’t Ebay and Paypal?

As I understand the Groupon issue is regarding consumer issues with amongst other things people buying stuff and it not being available as demand was too high. As far as I know there are very few consumer complaints from Ebay buyers, all the moans come from sellers.

There are the odd issue that look unfair to sellers but when buyers are always the priority then I don't see what or how Ebay could react any differently. The issue of accounts being taken away is again an issue of safety and security for buyers. No one is too interested in the 'consumer' rights of someone selling second hand tat.

As for Ebay being the "only real player in town" that has been looked at and dismissed in the past, it isn't even an issue, there are lots of competition and alternatives, Ebay's only monopoly is of Ebay.

custardy

whats the betting the OP never returns

soolin

custardy wrote: »

whats the betting the OP never returns

If it is a journalist fishing for us to write a story he doesn't need to sign in again, he can just read the responses.

Brooker_Dave

RFW wrote: »

As far as I know there are very few consumer complaints from Ebay buyers

Ebay/Paypal scams are legendry.

HTH.

RFW

Brooker_Dave wrote: »

Ebay/Paypal scams are legendry.

HTH.

Legendary? Not sure what you are alluding to. What scams do Ebay/Paypal perpetrate?

My point was that the buyer rarely comes off badly any more as they can quite easily get a refund if they have paid by Paypal. I'm not fully certain of the Groupon problems but if, for example, a holiday was oversold and the buyer had already paid, they found it difficult to get their money back, with Ebay/Paypal this is unlikely to happen. Once again this is a thread claiming to enhance consumer rights, when the only rights of interest to the OP are those of the sellers.

Invalidation

Brooker_Dave wrote: »

Ebay and Paypal offshored to avoid UK legislation and taxation.

But as a UK Trading company, Ebay are forced to have an office in this country. They do have one as I sued them via that London office address.

Please get your facts straight. They cant avoid any UK legislation

Brooker_Dave

Invalidation wrote: »

But as a UK Trading company, Ebay are forced to have an office in this country. They do have one as I sued them via that London office address.

Before or after they offshored?

RFW

Invalidation wrote: »

But as a UK Trading company, Ebay are forced to have an office in this country. They do have one as I sued them via that London office address.

Please get your facts straight. They cant avoid any UK legislation

Don't worry he never likes to let facts get in the way of his argument:p