My eBay pet peeves.......... lets keep this civil!!

[HerefordBullyun]

8 hours ago, dicker said:

 

”It’s listed for more than you are gonna get so I will offer you half - take it or leave it”

”Do you post to Ghana”.  I was selling a lawn mower…

”Can we do a deal off eBay - can send a cheque”

On a brand new MacBook Pro that was cellophane sealed “can u open it bruv wanna see its gen”

I think the question from the customer from Ghana 🇬🇭 was quite reasonable....😂😂😂

And I suspect the mac book potential buyer has bought boxes or flogged boxes of bricks in the past and I reckon your bruv does exports to Ghana also.... 😂😂😂😂

[SidS]

I'm surprised no one has put:

L@@K R@RE!!!!!

Quite often describing a 1971 2p coin with New Pence on the back.

My other pet hate is when they say the Queen is on the back of the coin.

[TeaTime]

Many years ago i bought a George IV half crown on Ebay. After i'd paid for it i received a message from some random user informing me that the seller had purchased the coin 2 weeks ago for half what i had paid..... I responded with 'that's nice'.

Many, many times i have won bids for items that were worth a lot more than i paid only to receive the 'sorry, i have lost the item / just noticed it's broken' message - normally after i've paid. Then comes the two week wait to get my money back. Even worse is when the seller pretends to send the item knowing that they are getting an interest free loan out of me whilst the 'item not received' process inches it's way to conclusion. 🙄 

[Orpster]

Everything that's been mentioned (especially sellers who wont post to Ghana) plus blurry pictures on coins, and when you ask for better pictures you are ghosted, or they send more blurry pictures, same thing with marks on coins and asking if they are on the coin or capsule

 

 

[DrDave]

46 minutes ago, Orpster said:

Everything that's been mentioned (especially sellers who wont post to Ghana) plus blurry pictures on coins, and when you ask for better pictures you are ghosted, or they send more blurry pictures, same thing with marks on coins and asking if they are on the coin or capsule

 

 

Theres no excuse for  sh!te pictures. Phones take more than adequate quality and sharpness 

[Scootermuppet]

One line descriptions...

Usually the 'autofill' from the process of setting up the auction / buy-it-now - how long does it take to put a few details in FFS ? 🤦

[GoldStatue]

Ebay taking their fees from P&P, it seems like ebay has lost their faith in humanity!

Ebay auctions that were cancelled showing up in sold listings.

People who win an auction and message you saying they'll have the money in a few days to pay for it, why bid on it in the first place?

 

[DrDave]

2 minutes ago, GoldStatue said:

Ebay taking their fees from P&P, it seems like ebay has lost their faith in humanity!

 

 

I bet the reasoning behind this is that some people jack up their postage to try to make their item look cheap in comparison, and also to try and sneak a bit of profit past ebay

[bluffer]

2 hours ago, GoldStatue said:

Ebay taking their fees from P&P, it seems like ebay has lost their faith in humanity!

 

 

amazon do exactly the same in taking fees from postage.  what is worse is they actually set the postage limit you get!  so for large / heavy books its either a virtual nil profit or you end up essentially paying the person to buy the book from you!

[GoldStatue]

Exactly amazon and ebay work out the P&P so they should be able to work out when someone is trying to dodge selling fees by inflating the P&P costs.

Another oddity I found when selling some larger ticket items on ebay was that people with zero feedback bought them.

At first I thought I was going to be scammed out of the sale and have to claim it back but the sales went through as normal.

Not 100% sure why they did the purchase like that but it is really heart in your mouth time when you are the seller.

[Scuzzle]

It's buyers not leaving feedback that's grinding my gears at the moment, I sold a few silver items recently that I was not particularly fussed about selling but did it purely to get recent feedback and hardly any of them left any.

[DrDave]

12 minutes ago, GoldStatue said:

Exactly amazon and ebay work out the P&P so they should be able to work out when someone is trying to dodge selling fees by inflating the P&P costs.

Another oddity I found when selling some larger ticket items on ebay was that people with zero feedback bought them.

At first I thought I was going to be scammed out of the sale and have to claim it back but the sales went through as normal.

Not 100% sure why they did the purchase like that but it is really heart in your mouth time when you are the seller.

Yes, obviously you can restrict buyers with no feedback from bidding/buying, but its likely that if you have an unusual or sought after item for sale, then your buyer may have come via a google search. And if ebay isn't their usual haunt they'd need to create an account to buy your item.

[arphethean]

There's a huge amount of eBay bashing on this forum, and I get it. There are unscrupulous sellers and frustrating buyers, but I just thought I'd offer my own experience to counter it a bit. I'm obviously selling as a profit-making business so might be a little different to others.

I now do 90% of my selling on eBay as though I prefer the peer-to-peer experience it has become harder and harder to sell at a price that pays the bills on social media - everyone wants a bargain. On eBay, the buyers are all suckers who overpay! 

I honestly hardly ever have issues with buyers or sellers.

My one peeve is people selling fake coins. I don't spot them often but when I do I politely message them to inform them it's a counterfeit before reporting and they never respond and I don't think the reporting is acted on by eBay either. I might just stop bothering to message first.

Another annoyance is just a really low standard of written communication. some examples from recently:

Quote

Got a offer of £93 and postage

Heh? Don't even know what that means, but assuming he wants to offer me £93 (this is for a £200+ gold item!)

 

Or this one from a very rude buyer who messed me about so much, making life difficult before the sale, then pulling out after anyway (thankfully extremely rare occurence)

Quote

hi, its another fake? can you take it out of card and give me photo from side?

 

I don't mind people not using capitals or spelling mistakes or whatever, but it's just the very cursory message with no common courtesy, no greeting, "thanks", "please", or a name. Looking back the past two weeks actually most buyers have been really pleasant in their comms.

 

On the topic of offers - as a seller I allow offers when I have a little more of a margin to play with and the item has a certain appeal or is an item where the market can decide its value, so I'll set an auto-decline at somewhere like 90% of BIN at a point where I am making enough of a margin. That is a high figure but in PMs the margins are usually tighter than that and most people understand that so it's fine. Of course I'll get silly offers of 50% and stuff but I don't even get notified of them - otherwise they'd frustrate me! I think if sellers wouldn't set auto-declines, buyers would still get frustrated as they'd still get a no, but additionally have to wait a few hours for a response before trying a higher offer.... At which point it might have sold...

[SidS]

I still use eBay a lot, simply because the coins I want are only available from dealers, who charge even more than eBay does.

Some dates and types are quite hard to find, but they do turn up on eBay every now and again and bargains or even just full book value can be got on there, whereas coin dealers always either slap a premium on the lower grades or only have top grade coins which are way, way beyond my budget. Yes BU coins are great, but I don't have the resources for BU Victoria young head half crowns at thousands each.

So eBay can be great.

I have also sold on there in the past - and if I was to start parting with parts of the stack, I'd sell on eBay again.

I'd never sell on the forum because I'd be well out of pocket having bought so much at eBay prices recently! Nothing against you chaps, who quite rightly all want fair prices.

[Paul]

if it wasn't for eBay, this forum wouldn't be such a great success for buying/selling !  

[DrDave]

27 minutes ago, arphethean said:

There's a huge amount of eBay bashing on this forum, and I get it. There are unscrupulous sellers and frustrating buyers, but I just thought I'd offer my own experience to counter it a bit. I'm obviously selling as a profit-making business so might be a little different to others.

I now do 90% of my selling on eBay as though I prefer the peer-to-peer experience it has become harder and harder to sell at a price that pays the bills on social media - everyone wants a bargain. On eBay, the buyers are all suckers who overpay! 

 

I agree. I didn't start this thread to have a pop at ebay and all buyers/sellers. 

I've been using ebay for years and most of my income is generated through it (not all coins however).  The vast majority of people i deal with are great. Instant payment, good feedback, returning customers etc, but some thing always make me roll my eyes when they happen again and again, such as the things in the OP.

I don't tend to allow offers. I'd rather just price up at the margin that i'm happy with. eBay fees need to be considered, and i have a page on the spreadsheet that will tell me the minimum i need to sell at to make £xx.

If a seller is inviting offers, i'll expect a deal to be cut, but like all good negotiations it'll start with a lowball. Some accept, one has got aggressive!! Most of the time they counter the offer, i'll counter and we'll meet somewhere in the middle.

The sellers that really wind me up are the chancers that offer a 2021 bullion britannia for £1750 and the ones that tell me that their coin ir rare/error/ etc with no explanation or foundation

But in reality, i love ebay !!

[Paul]

if i'm greedy and want the best possible price for something and don't mind how long it takes or flipping a new release i'll sell on eBay 

if i need to raise cash quick i'll sell here, priced sensibly, as most folk are tighter that an overly frugal Yorkshire/Scottish cross bred human waiting for pay day  🤪 

[Arganto]

I've not verified this but it popped up on the fediverse.

[Silverlocks]

Ebay is my preferred supplier.  I've bought just about all of my computer equipment through ebay since about 2001.  If I want to go shopping for something (not just computers) I'll often hunt around on ebay in the first instance, even before looking at regular online vendors like Amazon.

I've spent a lot more on computer equipment than I have on precious metals.  A lot more.

 

Edited August 31, 2022 by Silverlocks

[flyingveepixie]

I've had an item listed at £60 for a couple of months now.  It's piece of flue pipe for a log burner which is of a type that is impossible to get anywhere. £60 is a reasonable asking price considering it's rarity.  I'm not accepting offers on it.  I recently had a message from someone asking me what offers I would accept on it and what my best price might be.  I replied telling him £60.  He didn't get back to me.😬

Edited September 2, 2022 by flyingveepixie

[Robda1986]

Canceling and relisting an item with minutes to go because they didn't set a reserve and aren't willing to sell at the auction price 

[Charliemouse]

All of the above.  Plus...

Sellers holding feedback to ransom by not giving feedback when the buyer pays.  I pay quickly, usually within minutes.  Once I have paid, I consider my part in the transaction complete; I've done my bit.  Sellers should give feedback once someone has paid.  If they wait until the buyer gives their feedback, all they are doing is a) holding feedback to ransom and b) giving feedback for the feedback.  Instead of "Quick payer" they may as well type "Left me great feedback".

This devalues the entire feedback mechanism.

(This isn't just eBay.)

Edited September 4, 2022 by Charliemouse

[Paul]

Anyone flipping selling on eBay - and receive a lowball type of offer on your listed item

I use this copy & paste reply and i often get the sale at the original buy it at the list price without a moan from buyer

"Thanks for the message, hopefully this reply doesn't seem too odd/strange !
I'm still very much a precious metals stacker and don't really "need" the funds desperately from these silver sales
eBay allows me to list x1000 items a month as a 'private' seller for free at no cost. i only pay fees if an item sells.
If they sell at my list price I'm happy, I can score some small profits to reinvest back into my stack, although i now buy gold over silver these days
I did my eBay research prior to listing and my list prices are comparable/in line with past ebay sales for the same item 
If the silver doesn't sell now or straight away, or if I am sat on it for six months, or a few more years to come, it is no big problem for me. 
I will probably decrease the price by a 1% or 2% every month or so as time progresses, if you want to pop a watch on the item and wait
So sadly, i wouldn't be looking to do a discounted deal i''m afraid. But I greatly appreciate your message/offer and interest in my items
Best regards
Paul "

Edited September 4, 2022 by Paul

[modofantasma]

1 hour ago, Paul said:

If the silver doesn't sell now or straight away, or if I am sat on it for six months, or a few more years to come, it is no big problem for me. 
I will probably decrease the price by a 1% or 2% every month or so as time progresses, if you want to pop a watch on the item and wait
So sadly, i wouldn't be looking to do a discounted deal i''m afraid. But I greatly appreciate your message/offer and interest in my items
Best regards

Sounds great overall. If I were to tweak it maybe mention the price may also increase with spot or the market over time.

Eg

I will probably decrease the price by a 1% or 2% every month or so as time progresses, naturally I may also have to increase the prices inline with the market and or spot price but feel free to watch the item and see what happens.

 

Also would swap out words like sadly and afraid at the end for something more positive like thanks for eg

Thanks for taking the time to message me, I'm not looking to do a discounted deal but I really appreciate your interest in my items

Regards

[Paul]

8 minutes ago, modofantasma said:

Sounds great overall. If I were to tweak it maybe mention the price may also increase with spot or the market over time.

Eg

I will probably decrease the price by a 1% or 2% every month or so as time progresses, naturally I may also have to increase the prices inline with the market and or spot price but feel free to watch the item and see what happens.

 

Also would swap out words like sadly and afraid at the end for something more positive like thanks for eg

Thanks for taking the time to message me, I'm not looking to do a discounted deal but I really appreciate your interest in my items

Regards

yeah, true about spot possibly going up.  Doesn't happen that often for me in my silver stacking journey though lol 

Thanks for the input