eBay now disclosing private seller addresses to all buyers?

rebelheart15

Hi,
I am a private eBay seller (low volume, under £1.5k a year)

As a buyer, I have noticed that in the last few weeks when I purchase from a seller, I receive an e-mail confirming my order which has the seller's username then full address underneath - these are definitely private sellers, not business sellers where I might expect this.

Concerned as a seller, I tested this earlier by asking a friend to buy a cheap item from me, and she confirmed that my full home address is disclosed in the order confirmation e-mail.

My address isn't displayed on the listing or publicly on eBay, it is only disclosed when someone purchases from me and receives the confirmation e-mail.

Has there been new legislation/updates that I am unaware of? I fled domestic abuse a few years ago and as a seller of quite niche items, it wouldn't be impossible for my ex to take a punt and work out where I live which is extremely worrying.

I have worked out it is disclosing the "personal information" address which I have had to use my true address to link up to my identity so I can receive payouts, I normally put any returns through my sister's address on the other side of the country and I changed my address to this, but was met with eBay's identity verification and it kept refusing until I used my old "actual" home address, but clearly I don't want that disclosed.

Does anyone know how to stop this?

soolin

I just checked my purchases and yes, several, but not all, from private sellers display a full geographic address . I hadn’t noticed that before but then I suppose I never really thought about selling online and staying anonymous as all my packages have my return address on anyway, so for me any buyer from my private account would have my address anyway.

I don’t know if this has always been the case or if it is new, as I don’t really look too hard at my confirmation emails when they come through so would not have noticed either way. 

Rantband

To answer the question, contact Ebay customer services and explain the situation to them as you have done so well here.