New to Facebook Marketplace. Just wondering...

JustAnotherSaver

I've never really used this before so it's all new to me. I enquired about buying something a couple week ago & that was my first dealings with it. It had already sold but even now the item is still listed :T

This week i've listed up a couple items myself for sale.

Pretty quickly one was marked as having interest & i had a message in my inbox which said...

"i'm interested in this item" with a photo of the item i'd posted that they were asking about.

So i immediately responded but only later on did i wonder if this is an auto-message or whether the person actually typed that out? What's the etiquette on FB-MP? On eBay you just 'watch' an item but the seller doesn't know who their watchers are. Is this interest the equivalent of eBay's 'watchers' but that FB auto-sends a message to the seller saying who's interested? And are you the seller then 'supposed' to contact the potential buyer or do you wait on them following it up with another message?



Is FB-MP generally just like a modern car boot sale as in, do people not really post anything off, it's all about coming to your door? I guess for the vast majority of sales there's no problem but for some sales, like one i'm selling right now, it's not really the sort of thing i can take anywhere to meet in a neutral location, so depending on the type of buyer like i said for 99.9% the time there'll be no problem, but that 0.1% you get a lunatic who knows where you live. That's just a thought in the back of the mind.

If anyone does post anything off then what sort of protection is there for the buyer/seller? I assume nothing which may answer my question as to whether anyone actually does post anything off.

Feedback welcome. Hopefully i've no further questions

soolin

Firstly, Facebook selling isn't currently regulated so it is all done at your own risk. Various groups and selling sites have different rules, as does marketplace themselves- so you need to be aware of scams and know how to protect yourself.

It used to be mostly face to face local sales but more and more now it is going to postal sales and as a buyer always protect yourself by paying with paypal and don't use friends and family. As a seller, assuming you have a paypal payment then the normal rules apply as with any paypal payment, so check out the sticky thread on this board about safety and postage.

Every group has its own etiquette, some say it goes to the first person who asks, others allow inbox sales. On marketplace it is a bit of a free for all. I rarely sell on facebook now, but it isn't unusual to get quite a lot of inbox messages saying they are interested- and then never to hear back. I suspect there is some sort of scam they are trying, perhaps trying to figure out which accounts are real or not, I might be paranoid but the format always seem to be the same, a photo of the item and a simple 'do you still have this' or 'I am interested' sentence.

There are occasionally issues reported with buyers turning up to buy something and being unpleasant, or trying to return something as they know where you live, just keep your wits about you. I have certainly had someone who tried to collect around midnight one night as he was passing after a boozy night out- but I suspect it is rare (and luckily I was still up and my OH told him to go away).

I rarely use Facebook selling anymore, for every successful collection or postal sale I probably had another half dozen time wasters. In the early days I was even foolish enough to drive something down to my local supermarket car aprk where I was going to meet the buyer- who never turned up and then blocked me on facebook, wasted a couple of hours on that idiot.

You might also want to look at Shpock , I'm currently doing very well on there with several collections or posted out items a week, but again there are time wasters, but not yet as many as on facebook.

JustAnotherSaver

Thanks very much.

To be honest i'm not bothered so much about time wasters. I'm not going to go out of my way for the sale. By that i mean i wont take a day off work to sell something or cancel plans to go somewhere. If it suits then it suits. For example someone is supposed to be turning up in a couple of hours. If they don't then they don't, i've not stopped in especially for them as i have nothing on today.

I also wouldn't go way out of my way driving miles here & there.

It does make me wonder about the types you get but i guess that depends on what you're selling also. My wife selling a dress you would expect would get a different type of character to me selling a set of tools for example, and i don't just mean male/female, i mean the type of character they are (this is without getting into the PC of women can buy tools too, yes i know they can).

I'll see what happens. Overall i would prefer to post. I'd rather people didn't know where i live and i can't be bothered with the haggling face-to-face. I'm not a hard haggler as it doesn't interest me.

But some of the things i need to shift i have no way of posting/packing so they will unfortunately have to be collect only.

Let's see what happens in a couple hours. If i don't post back you know i've been kidnapped & murdered or something lol

soolin

Let's see what happens in a couple hours. If i don't post back you know i've been kidnapped & murdered or something lol

I do hope not.......

I worry less about my safety as I think a lot of the scare stories are just that, designed to scare. For me it is purely the messing about and rubbish excuses (assuming they bother to apologise at all) that puts me off. Like you I much prefer to sell and post - and in fact I have a couple of small items going today from a Shpock sale, but the collection only items just frustrate me. I don't think I have ever come across an unluckier bunch of people, the number of times they have problems with their car or a sick child which means they don't turn up and don't bother emailing- is astounding.

JustAnotherSaver

soolin wrote: »

I do hope not.......

I worry less about my safety as I think a lot of the scare stories are just that, designed to scare. For me it is purely the messing about and rubbish excuses (assuming they bother to apologise at all) that puts me off. Like you I much prefer to sell and post - and in fact I have a couple of small items going today from a Shpock sale, but the collection only items just frustrate me. I don't think I have ever come across an unluckier bunch of people, the number of times they have problems with their car or a sick child which means they don't turn up and don't bother emailing- is astounding.

I can only imagine that you either sell a lot, so your chances of wasters are much greater or you're just incredibly unlucky.

I've not done many collections over the years. I don't know the exact number but let's go for 5-10. Not a single one has been a timewaster. Someone was coming to collect a tyre and did, paid up no problem. Another was a young lad who bought a mobile & wanted to collect as he was fairly local. It was my wife's phone & i told her i was going with her as they were meeting in a pub car park. Young lad in his rallycar with his mates but he paid up. Didn't even open the box.

For those where i've done the enquiring, actually i can only think of the one which was the other week that i mentioned where the person said they'd sold the car yet it's still listed on FB-MP. I thought that was odd. Just either pull the listing or mark it as sold, how hard is it? But he still replied i suppose.

JustAnotherSaver

Well it'll probably have some members here groaning but i'm still alive lol.
No sale though. They turned up but it ended up not being what they wanted. They were on time & nice enough so no complaints really.

pinkshoes

JustAnotherSaver wrote: »

Pretty quickly one was marked as having interest & i had a message in my inbox which said...

"i'm interested in this item" with a photo of the item i'd posted that they were asking about.

So i immediately responded but only later on did i wonder if this is an auto-message or whether the person actually typed that out?

When you look at an item on market place on a phone, a list of options come up of questions you can ask, and the above is one of them.

My friend tells me her toddler has frequently managed to hit this button and show interest in random items!

I sell quite a lot on Facebook and just reply politely to these saying that yes it is still available and would they like to come and see it.

All sales are collection only and cash.

PasturesNew

I've just used FB once to sell something I bought in error. I was disappointed with myself to the tune of £50 and finally decided I needed to sell it on "now" because just seeing it and remembering what a mistake it was to buy was dragging down my mental well being ... I'd had it lurking in the house for nearly 2 years at that point.

I listed it ..... at what I felt was a "bit bl00dy pricey" - and it went! Sold for £56.

Another item on FB I gave away, I said I'd deliver it and stated the rate. Somebody wanted it, so I delivered it and they gave me delivery money (8 miles; 16 miles return). It was something I'd been given, so I was glad to have the house room back.

I bought something on there the other week, for £4-5. A bedside cabinet sized single set of drawers. They said they were an Ikea line and named it; when I got there (half a mile away) it clearly WASN'T Ikea at all.... but at that price I thought I might as well have it anyway.... and, to be honest, I think I'll flog it back out again for the same price as it's really not what I wanted/expected.

So, it's hit and miss what sells and how things are described. You really have to just go in with your eyes open and expect the unexpected.

For "safety", what I sold was smallish - and I have an MPV with a big boot - so I put it in there and they collected it from my car boot, standing outside in my parking area; I didn't have any strangers in the house.

Browntoa

I've found it is possible to buy items cheap , clean them up and sell them on using Facebook

One item was listed as not working but after a quick clean up I tested it and it was working 100% . The woman basically admitted that if a thing packs up they just buy a new one , it was in quite a posh area .

I would only ever do cash face to face though.

I always reply quickly to messages and mark items as sold straight away (some people never do )

If I feel somethings overpriced but I'm interested in it I'll save it , if the price drops I get notified straight away and can jump in an buy it

I buy and sell bulky items that are expensive and awkward to post out anyway

You have to be prepared to wade through loads of Mlm selling scams , dodgy fake clothes and cigarettes and general tat . I do like to reply to the MLM selling ones with a "it's kleeneze /Avon /Ann summers " reply

JustAnotherSaver

pinkshoes wrote: »

When you look at an item on market place on a phone, a list of options come up of questions you can ask, and the above is one of them.

My friend tells me her toddler has frequently managed to hit this button and show interest in random items!

I sell quite a lot on Facebook and just reply politely to these saying that yes it is still available and would they like to come and see it.

All sales are collection only and cash.

Ahh that's what i wanted to know. Thanks. It just didn't seem like something someone would physically type out to me. Sounded like an auto-message and i didn't know whether i was supposed to reply to an auto-message or not, but i did anyway.

PasturesNew wrote: »

I listed it ..... at what I felt was a "bit bl00dy pricey" - and it went! Sold for £56.

People bother with the extra £1 in person? I'm a tight git & even i wouldn't. :rotfl:Maybe i'm not as tight as i thought, although family/friends/co-workers would like to argue against that.
I'd sell at £50, £55 or £60 in person but not £56. On an auction yes but not a set price.
But yeah i just kept the chap outside. There's no need to go in anyway.

Browntoa wrote: »

You have to be prepared to wade through loads of Mlm selling scams , dodgy fake clothes and cigarettes and general tat . I do like to reply to the MLM selling ones with a "it's kleeneze /Avon /Ann summers " reply

Whoa whoa easy now. MLM? I'm a newbie at this. You're talking foreign to me!

Browntoa

Multi layer marketing , you need to sign up loads of "mugs" underneath you to earn any real money . Adverts normally have headlines like "earn £300 a week" and "18 plus only"