eBay Begins A Change

ctwxman writes "If I hadn't double checked the routing, I wouldn't have believed the email I just received from ebay was real. After all, who is 'spoofed' more than ebay? But it looks like they're making some major structural changes in the way they deal with their customers. This includes, "giving our CS reps the flexibility and tools they need to really take care of you. So, to start, within the next 90 days, we'll shut down most of our automated email responses. Our users will get a "real" e-mail response to their questions - you'll hear from a human being who will try to help you with your problem or question right off the bat. We will only use auto responses to acknowledge receipt of spam or policy violation reports." Wow. However, don't read everything at its simplistic face value. When they say, "We also think the time has come to expand phone support," it's only for sellers. Still, this seems to be movement in the right direction. Now all they have to do is take a little more responsibility with fraud protection." The message is online; granted, this isn't the most exciting news ever, but it will end affecting a lot of people.

Comments

Paypal

[Isosonys]

We bitch more about PayPal then Ebay. How about you fix Paypal first.

Re:Paypal

[Anonymous Coward]

The majority of paypal's problems have been resolved in the last 12 months. No dragging up old FUD.

Re:Paypal

[Anonymous Coward]

PayPals problems will only be solved once they are registered and regulated as a bank, in every country they operate in. Until that happens, PayPal are unstrustworthy and can operate in any number of shady ways, none of which you can anything about.

Re:Paypal

[Jeff DeMaagd]

I wonder how much of a problem Paypal really is. Problems affecting only 0.1% of customers can be a real big deal on the Internet.

Re:Paypal

[karmatic]

But they aren't a bank. They are a money transfer service, and that is why they can offer a lot of the services they do.

If they were regulated as a bank, they would have to behave like a bank. Personally, I'd rather have a little more risk, for better functionality. If you don't want to make that tradeoff, use a bank.

Re:Paypal

[Anonymous Coward]

Question about paypal, hopefully someone here will know the answer.

What happens if I close my paypal account? Its not limited access or anything, but it has access to my real checking account.

So, I would like to know if I can remove access from my checking account somehow, I doubt I can do this without closing my paypal account. But if I close my paypal account they will still have that info stored somewhere, and possibly in the future exercise their "right" to take money from it. Will I be safe by closing my paypal account? or should I cancel my credit card & checking accounts at my bank also?

Re:Paypal

[Anonymous Coward]

Vast more people have larger problems with banks like Fifth Third or citibank than paypal.

until you fix the problems with banking institutions to begin with, you will never fix paypal.

Re:Paypal

[Anonymous Coward]

paypalsucks.com .. Total number of forum registered users: 8032

Not many really considering how many they serve, but that's just the people who know how to find the site and register on a forum so it's gonna be a lot higher. I think that "even" 8,000 unhappy people is just far too much.

Re:Paypal

[the unbeliever]

They offer debit cards to access your paypal account via atm's and credit card purchases. They are acting as a bank, therefore need to be regulated as one.

Re:Paypal

[b0r0din]

They are a money transfer service

What do you think a bank is? Banks transfer money constantly. That's their job, among a slew of other things. They also 'store' money but a lot of it is transferring balances from different accounts.

Paypal offers debit cards and other money services, including a basic savings account. They do store money, as much as others would believe they don't. What do you think a paypal balance is?

They are a bank, they should be regulated as such. End of Story.

Re:Paypal

[RedBear]

I wonder how much of a problem Paypal really is. Problems affecting only 0.1% of customers can be a real big deal on the Internet.

More important than the percentage is how bad the problems are. If one out of every 10,000 people loses his $500 account to fraud and can't get his money back, that's much worse than if one out of every 100 people lost $500 but could get it back within a few days with a quick phone call. Each and every person who has a problem is important.

Case in point: Macs have very few problems compared to Windows machines. Yet when they do have a problem it is often very, very bad. I have personally witnessed two different Macs in the last year with a phenomenon where the internal hard drive disappeared and the CD drive would no longer boot any bootable CD, AND my Firewire backups were useless because the Firewire port stopped working properly. Apple tech support had no answer besides sending the unit in for service to replace the hard drive, thus losing all the information contained therein. It was simply not a user-fixable issue, no matter how much of a Mac guru you were. Two computers turned into paperweights for no apparent reason. I don't find that particularly acceptable.

In 15 years of working with Intel based computers I have never seen anything to compare. At the very least I could always reformat a Wintel machine and start over. I've never had to send a Wintel machine in for service. All parts are replaceable. So even though there is a much higher percentage of small problems with Wintel machines than with Macs, I am now leery of buying a new Mac or recommending them to my clients, simply because the problems tend to be much worse, leaving people with lost information and requiring expensive servicing. I love my Mac but Apple needs to pull their head out of their anal opening with regards to quality control and fault-tolerance. The number of people posting in the Apple discussion forums about sending their computer in multiple times for replacement of the "logic board" (motherboard) is absolutely astounding.

To reiterate: The percentage is totally irrelavent compared to the extent of each individual issue.

Re:Paypal

[Dizzy49]

Actually, the number of eBay buyers who used PayPal are more like 80-90% I am a big seller on eBay, and I know that over 95% of my customers pay via PayPal.

PayPal can easily screw over buyers as much as sellers. More buyers may take hits, but sellers take the BIG hits. I know several buyers who have been scammed for $20-$50. They learn from it, and know how to avoid it next time. As a seller, there is little I can do to avoid the types of fraud I have to deal with. Last year, I lost over $2000 to PayPal for their BS policies.

eBay owns PayPal, and yet many of their policies directly conflict. For instance. eBay allows you to sell items you do not have (ie Pre-Orders for Games, Videos, and the like). PayPal states that the item must be in hand to sell. To further urge this, for a seller to be covered by their seller protection they have to ship the item within 7 days (originally was "within a reasonable time", which I won a judegement against them on a pre-order issue when the judge decided that since I shipped it the DAY it was released it qualified for their "reasonable time" policy. It shortly there-after changed to 10 days, and now 7 days). Many times I have shipped an item a day or two before it's release only to have the person file a complaint while it's in transit. Since it was shipped after the 7-day window, PayPal will give them their money back, regardless if it arrives or not.

I have one lady who I just filed suite against because she received the item, then decided that it took too long and filed a complaint for non-received goods. I replied and showed delivery confirmation. Since it was shipped after the 7 day window she got her money back. She contact me and said she's pay for the item ONLY, but refused to pay shipping. I reminded her that purchasing on eBay is a legallying binding contract and she agreed to pay for the item AND shipping. She told me to f-off. Since she lives in my town, I filed suite against her.

The problem with these things is that to file suite , even in small claims court, it's another $30-$50 just to file (which you are allowed to add to the amount to collect), and if they do not live in your area, it costs quite a bit more to have it moved to their jurisdiction and things. It will cost me an average of $100 EACH ($35 file fee, and $65 xfer fee) PLUS any attorney fees to try to recover the funds. Key of course is TRY.

THEN... Then you get the "you have been the recipient of potentially fraudulant funds". That's PayPal's scam to essentially STEAL your money. They REFUSE to answer ANY questions regarding HOW or WHY the funds were potentially fraudulant. They refuse to tell you what happened to the funds, or give you any chance to recover them. More often than not, they are outside any window for recovery at all. I had one yesterday actually. PayPal took $382 from my account and said it was potentially fraudulant. The transaction was from Oct 2004. Ironically enough, it was my father sending me money for my mother's Xmas gifts. So I KNOW the owner, I know the account. The funds came from his balance, not from a bank xfer that may not have gone through. Not from a credit card that might have been charged back. The money had been in his account for months before sending to me. He was not notified in any way/shape or form about it. They refused to speak to him, and I have reiceved no communication from my account manager. Sometimes if I bitch enough I will get a "courtesy refund". The sound of which makes me want to strangle the guy. "Courtesy" ?!?! They make is sound as if they are doing me a HUGE favor. THEN they hold it against you in the future, "You're received several courtesty refunds already, we cannot issue any further."

I am part of 5 seperate class action lawsuits against PayPal. If you check various complaint sites available on the web, including BBB they have well over a million complaints (vs eBay's less than half that yet 2-3 times the user base). eBay has it's issues, but they do not nearly directly impact, and so closely resemble blantent theft and deception as PayPal.

Re:Paypal

[karmatic]

A bank is an institution that loans out money, collects, and pays interest.

You can have a balance with Western Union, that doesn't make them a bank.

The debit cards are issued by a bank. The bank that issues it is (properly) regulated as a bank. The money transfer portion is not regulated as a bank. The interest paid is due to the use money markets; those are regulated like any other money market.

And this is relevant how?

[Anonymous Coward]

Ohh... a crappy customer service becomes a not-so-crappy customer service. How exciting.

Re:And this is relevant how?

[Eric Giguere]

It is funny how they're making a big deal of this. Good customer service is just Marketing 101 -- check any marketing textbook.

Contrast eBay with Google, whose customer service has always been exemplary. Whenever I have an AdSense question, I just shoot them an email. I get back an automated response saying they've gotten my email and then later -- a couple of days at most -- I get back a response from a human. If I'm not satisfied I just mail back to the person who sent my response... haven't had any problems I couldn't deal with that way. That's the way it should be.

Eric
See what I mean here: AdSense tips

Re:And this is relevant how?

[nuggetboy]

Indeed. It reminds me of the Chris Rock bit, "What do you want, a cookie?". It's what you're SUPPOSED to do.

Walmart

[RicJohnson]

The ONLY reason eBay is alive is because they the Walmart of auctions - they have the biggestest marketplace, so everyone else has go to them to sell.
It is not because they have any clue about what customer service is.
I have had quite a few friends loose money on ebay. When they filed a report - what did they get? A FORM LETTER saying "we can not help you...". Any yet ebay/paypal still collected THEIR fees.
There are a few good aution helpers, where they list, sell, and package your goods for you but they charge 40%!!!
EBay will be around for a while, but this move is an attempt to keeping growing in a market that is starting to die. Auctions used to be fun, but until somebody can offer a guarantee to protect the little guy, more people will just as soon buy at Walmart. And that is not a good thing.

Re:Walmart

[gowen]

It is not because they have any clue about what customer service is.

I think they're also helped by the fact that the vast majority of their customers never need the customer service. Feedback makes it relatively straightforward to identify reputable sellers, and if you're prepaid to pay a little more to deal exclusively with them, it usually just works. (Failings of the USPS notwithstanding.)

Making listings of your own is relatively tricky (although still not actually terribly difficult), but the vast majority of ebay users never do that.

Re:Walmart

[ScentCone]

but until somebody can offer a guarantee to protect the little guy

I'll expect that of every eBay transaction when I can expect it of every flea market, newspaper classified-based transaction, etc. It's an information engine, not personal behavior regulator. Of course, that's what their (rather substantial) reputation database is all about. Like with phishing and everything else along these lines, it's the not-very-tuned-in people that tend to have the most trouble.

Re:Walmart

[mbaciarello]

but until somebody can offer a guarantee to protect the little guy

They did protect me though, and finely so. I filed for PayPal Buyer Protection as I had not received an item (worth ~$100) for a whole month after the successful bid.

I filled all the required information, the seller did not reply to PayPal enquiries, and I had my money back in 8 days - 2 days sooner than what they specify in the FAQ.

Actually, they were so efficient, and the seller so stupid, that a couple of weeks later I even received the package. I never knew if it was a second shipment, or a very late first shipment.

I contacted the seller and paid him again, more out of fear that I might be considered a PayPal fraudster/exploiter than out of respect for him.

Re:Walmart

[magarity]

I have had quite a few friends loose money on ebay

This is why the customer service phone support is only for sellers.

News Flash: The sellers on eBay are the only customers of eBay.

Buyers are customers of the SELLERS. People don't lose money to eBay, they lose it to someone who placed an ad on eBay. Wanting eBay to reimburse a bad sale is like wanting the newspaper to give your money back on something you bought via a classified ad. Do you think the newspapers give refunds to people who list bogus classified ads?

Re:Walmart

[Anonymous Coward]

Uh, the level of fraud with the feedback system is enormous.

Besides astroturfing, I've had several sellers leave negative feedback, and offer to retract the feedback if I rescind my fraud charges. Because of the enormous volume they do, the can take a hit on a few negative feeckbacks and still keep a relatively high percentage of positive feedback. Or simply open new accounts and have a few friends by things in order to establish credibility.

Ebay has been unresponsive to this, and as Ebay collects revenue primarily from sellers; this isn't likely to change.

Re:Walmart

[Durzel]

Hit the nail on the head.

eBay is so pervasive in the auction sector, what with its continual name-dropping in feature films, music videos and so forth that it can pretty much charge what it likes and know it'll still be regarded as the de facto auction site.

Recently they made a stand about sellers enforcing a percentage rise for whenever a buyer paid using Paypal. Justifable really, since the seller loses out to the tune of ~3% otherwise.

Also, the concept of a Final Value Fee has no justification in my eyes. I can understand eBay charging a variable listing fee (depending on the item visibility & features), but to charge someone a variable percentage of whatever they sell their item for is absurd. Imagine selling a car via a local newspaper, and finding a representative at your door demanding a cut in addition to whatever they charged you to list the item in the first place!.. oh, and then finding your bank asking for their cut too for processing the money.

It wouldn't be so bad if they were a shining light in the customer service stakes, but their track record is atrocious. Not only are they notoriously slow at answering dispute resolution correspondance, but invariably they wash their hands of all but the most legally threatening (to them) issues. Feedback arbitration is practically non-existant, with malicious negative feedback being effectively permanent (even from members no longer registered and/or banned!).

As others have remarked - they will find some way to pass whatever costs they have to bear as a result of this CS initiative, whether it be to the buyer or seller (or both).

Re:Walmart

[Anonymous Coward]

Because of the enormous volume they do, the can take a hit on a few negative feeckbacks and still keep a relatively high percentage of positive feedback.

If they're fraudsters, who's leaving all the positive feedback?

Re:Walmart

[brauwerman]

Half.com, an eBay service, guarantees purchases gives refunds to scammed customers. Many people, like me, use Half.com, and not eBay.com, for this reason.

Re:Walmart

[brauwerman]

eBay charges a listing fee of THIRTY CENTS to stop spam, then charges a commission so that they can afford to provide the service to people selling their used toiler paper for 99cents, and so that the customer pays a fee in direct commensuration with the value eBay provides.

You know who else charges a commission? Salesmen, charge card companies, retailers, stockbrokers, and almost everyone else in the world involved in a financial transaction.

Re:Walmart

[GoRK]

Their surcharge policy is incredibly hypocritical. They allow a merchant to pass along credit card processing fees -- well, except when paypal processes the credit card. If they wanted to make that worthwhile, they should actually stand up and perform all those paypal services they advertise such as insuring the purchase.

Re:Walmart

[Threni]

> The ONLY reason eBay is alive is because they the Walmart of auctions - they
> have the biggestest marketplace, so everyone else has go to them to sell.
> It is not because they have any clue about what customer service is.

And how did eBay become this popular? No-one forces me to use it. I've looked at the alternatives - qxl, qed, yahoo, amazon marketplace - and they suck. So it's the lack of something better which makes me stick with eBay, not the lack of any alternative.

Re:Walmart

[magarity]

Also, the concept of a Final Value Fee has no justification in my eyes

Welcome to the world of auctions. This is not some new way to cheat you thought up by eBay; from an estate auction to a livestock auction to classical art at Christie's, all auctioneers charge a percentage cut as well as a base fee.

Re:Walmart

[stpitner]

What do they do when the buyer base starts dropping out because of the lack of support? The sellers then start getting upset and stop selling as much because of the lack of buyers. Would eBay be able to keep the seller's long enough with whatever support they give if the people stop buying?

Sure that might take a while to happen, but with as many disgruntled people with eBay as there already is, it has a very good chance of happening.

Although personally, those eBay commercials that I've seen recently might scare me away faster than anything else from continuing to buy and sell! :)

Re:Walmart

[drinkypoo]

I'm currently dealing with a problem with an ebay seller, "rpd_us". They have 100% positive feedback. They posted a fraudulent listing, to which I responded; They said an item was new, and it came to me missing parts and with a scratch on it. The entry on their mailing sticker identifies them as RAPID DISTRIBUTION, and the credit card charge is from "MICKLOS DISTRIBUTION". I had to threaten them with the ebay fraud process to even get them to agree to refund my purchase price, which they said they did already - and they haven't. I used a debit card, and I've already checked my account information to see if there is a credit, which of course there is not. As it is, they are only agreeing to refund my purchase and original shipping, but not the cost of shipping this crap back to them. Naturally, I will be trying to go through the fraud process if this don't agree to pay that. It's already cost me more in time than I paid for the stupid item.

Everyone should do themselves a favor and buy only from sellers who are either just some guy with something they want, or from retailers with assloads of positive feedback. Those people have an interest in protecting their feedback ratings, because just opening a new account would make them lose the huge number next to their nickname.

Out of the ten or so auctions I've won (all for small stuff) only five of the sellers were actually responsive and sent me stuff on time. One of them even forgot to send me some parts, I emailed them to ask them to send them, they asked me where I wanted them sent (uh hello, I gave you the item numbers bozo) and I still don't have the items. That reminds me, I should go email that guy again.

If you see auctions for cellphone stuff from the guy listed at the top of this comment, don't buy from them. They list used stuff as new. They are a pain in the ass to deal with. They actually tried to make excuses originally saying that it was new because it had never been used, and that it had been hanging around their warehouse for a long time, which is why it was scratched. As if I care! I ordered new, I want new. This is awfully reminiscent of BZBOYZ.COM (see my journal) listing "retail" items on pricewatch, then informing you that they are OEM after you place your order, and trying to upsell you to the retail box. Isn't advertising fraud, like, illegal?

Re:Walmart

[hackstraw]

News Flash: The sellers on eBay are the only customers of eBay.

Funny, if there were no buyers, then there would be no sellers.

I refuse to do any business on eBay. I tried once about 5 years ago or so, and got ripped off by some guy in China. I don't trust eBay nor do I trust PayPal.

The idea seems nice, but the whole thing seems so shady that I can't tell who to trust, so I just don't bother. All of the feedback can be rigged. Buyers can be scammed out of a purchase. Sellers can be scammed out of a purchase. PayPal can simply hold your funds. And neither eBay nor PayPal take any responsibility for the actions of the buyers or sellers. What good is any of this?

I personally don't understand why anyone does business with either eBay or PayPal. I've emailed shareware authors trying to give them money for software because the only method of payment was PayPal. I found it interesting that when I contacted them telling them I wanted to give them money they would not take a check from me.

Personally, I would like to do business with a responsible company that provides a service like eBay, but it seems as though I'm in the minority.

Re:Walmart

[MerlinTheWizard]

Well, offer people a worldwide, general purpose online service, like eBay is, and they will end up wrecking it, no matter what it is. This is what is slowly happening with eBay.
The biggest problem with eBay is that no one (buyers and sellers alike) is really legally liable for anything. The legal part is just a joke, for now. Until it improves, things will stay where they are.

Re:Walmart

[HeghmoH]

I used a debit card, and I've already checked my account information to see if there is a credit, which of course there is not. As it is, they are only agreeing to refund my purchase and original shipping, but not the cost of shipping this crap back to them. Naturally, I will be trying to go through the fraud process if this don't agree to pay that. It's already cost me more in time than I paid for the stupid item.

What are you waiting for? They obviously ripped you off, and now they're stalling. Report them. If that doesn't go anywhere (and don't give it too much time), call your bank and tell them that somebody ripped you off. All purchases made through the credit card system, debit cards included, have 100% purchase protection for all transactions without a physical signature. Tell them what happened, and they'll take it from there.

And in the future, make all of your online purchases with a real bona-fide credit card, not a debit card. While they both have the same protections in theory, the fact that the credit card doesn't get your money until after you're satisfied with the purchase puts you in a much more advantageous position.

Re:Walmart

[robertjw]

...attempt to keeping growing in a market that is starting to die.

Where do you get this information? From everything I can tell the market is going gangbusters. Everybody is selling everything on Ebay. Eventually it may reach a saturation point where everyone has sold all of the crap out of their basement, but until then I see no end in sight.

I have bought quite a few things on ebay - ranging across the spectrum. I have NEVER failed to recieve anything I purchased. Some things have taken longer than anticipated, and some things have cost more to ship than I had hoped, but I have not had a seller lie to me or commit fraud. I know some do, but many of those are easily spotted.

Ebay provides a fantastic service. Are there things I don't like? Sure. Do people lose money from fraud and bad buyers? Sure. Every business ever run has lost money due to fraud and poor customers. It's just a risk you take when dealing with other people - some of them are dishonest. Do you think the average store doesn't have shoplifters? Nothing is ever 100%, but Ebay protects buyers and sellers the best it can without limiting functionality and making the system difficult to use.

Re:Walmart

[bbuR_bbuB]

Report to whom? Poster's mommy and daddy? Get real.

Re:Walmart

[Monkelectric]

Yes the fraud system is broken.

I bought an XBOX from someone and it was fucked up -- some of the controllers didnt work, the thing was filled with smoke, and they didn't include some of the accessories they said they would.

I left the fucker negative feedback and received this email:

"Hello I wish you had try to contact me right after you had recieve this product before leaving negative feed back. I work with people all the time with them all the time if they cannot pay with in the timely mannor or if any other personal issue come up. You did not try to even contact me before leaving negative feed back. Thank You Tbrisbois@msn.com"

To which I replied: "Do a better job next time and you wont have any issues :)"

To which she replied: "There are other ways of taking care of things you have had the item for how long I am sure we could have worked this out I could of so maybe you should have thought about tha.t I have and I know what to do in the right way for this issue."

If you read between the lines -- shes mad becuase I gave her negative feedback for basically shipping a misleading item. When I leave her bad feedback, she says she has always worked out things with people before. Well WTF? I've sold maybe 10 items on ebay and nobody has ever needed to work out anything with me because I've always been honest. If one of her other customers had the balls to give her bad feedback, I;m sure I wouldn't have bought this item from her.

Re:Walmart

[jez9999]

Yeup. eBay's stranglehold on online auctions needs to be broken. Pretty tough job, though, Walmart doesn't seem to be going away any time soon. :-(

However try to show your support for other, better auction sites, whose only problem is that they need more users. Here's one I like:

eBid US
eBid UK

Better customer service and, more importantly, no greedy-ass listing fees.

Re:Walmart

[operagost]

99 cents for used TP? You got ripped. I paid only 51 cents for mine. Would have been 25 cents if not for the damn reserve.

Re:Walmart

[HeghmoH]

Report it to eBay and/or PayPal (assuming the transaction was with them). If they don't work out, and I don't harbor any illusions about that, report it to the credit card company. Unlike eBay, credit card companies take fraud seriously and will take care of you in a rapid manner.

Re:Walmart

[jez9999]

Also, the concept of a Final Value Fee has no justification in my eyes. I can understand eBay charging a variable listing fee (depending on the item visibility & features)

I'm surprised you say that, and feel the opposite.

A well-established online auction site's costs rise very close to zero when they post somebody's auction, a listing fee is ludicrous and they're garnishing money. Want to stop spam? Hire some fecking staff to kick out spammer accounts!

Whilst eBay's final value fees are unsusprisingly high, at least the concept is sound. You get charged when you *sell* the item - the online auction site has done its job, so that's fair enough. Why shouldn't it be variable? If you've sold a $10,000 car, the site should probably be entitled to a bit more of a fee than if you've sold a $10 watch.

Re:Walmart

[magarity]

The idea seems nice, but the whole thing seems so shady that I can't tell who to trust...
...Personally, I would like to do business with a responsible company that provides a service like eBay

OK, then what's your proposed solution? And from eBay's point of view trying to be fair to everyone, not from your point of view as someone who tried it once and got burned. Can you realistically expect eBay to say 'every buyer who complains will get refunded' or expect them to have thousands of private investigators in dozens of countries check everyone's stories?

A friend of mine got scammed by someone on a big electronics purchase. Since he paid by post office money order, the postal inspector chased the guy down and got his money back. But can you expect eBay to be the police everywhere there's either a buyer or seller with an internet connection? Can you expect someone from eBay to go to China and hunt down the guy who stole your money? Or to cover your loss because while you know you didn't get it, your claim is just heresay to them?

Re:Walmart

[Wiseleo]

I am supporting an ebay store stores.ebay.com/daretowear

I also have prior experience at handling collections. When a customer initiates a fraudulent transaction or refuses to pay, I go after them. I've found that using the SquareTrade service is not too difficult. While it does have its faults, is a reasonable way to get fraudulent negative feedback removed, provided that you are a reputable party to the transaction.

I personally can't wait until SquareTrade implements binding arbitration. Binding arbitration takes ST from being a virtual counseling session to a virtual courtroom with legally binding decisions.

Never rescind fraud accusations, and pursue the sellers. Small claims court is probably your best bet. I haven't had to resort to that measure yet, since we are pretty effective at getting paid, but that's always an option in the event of such abuse. Mentioning to the seller that they could be suspected as guilty of interstate mail and/or wire fraud, which is a very serious federal offense, may also enable you to get the matters resolved. After all, eBay will retract unjust feedback if told to do so by law enforcement.

Good luck!

Re:Walmart

[timmyf2371]

I had an experience once when I bought a cellphone which worked perfectly apart from the display. Having taken the cellphone to my local store they were kind enough to fix it free of charge, however I still left negative feedback for the seller and he responded with something like "it was fixed free in the end so I don't see the problem".

Re:Walmart

[hackstraw]

OK, then what's your proposed solution?

Some kind of accountability on eBay's (or whoever's) part.

An escrow service or something like it would be nice. For example, I buy something, lets say a used phonebook from somebody. I buy it for $300. I send $300 to eBay. eBay notifies the seller that they have received the cash, and that the seller should ship the item. I get my beautiful used phonebook and it looks OK, so I tell eBay to send the cash to the seller.

If my phonebook is defective or not what I expected, I send it back to the seller via some kind of registered mail so that they sign for it upon receipt. I get back $300 minus some kind of retainer fee or whatever.

How hard is that?

I mean what the hell are the fees for at eBay? A website and advertising all over the place? Everybody and their mother has a website. If eBay wants my business, I expect some kind of accountability from them.

Re:Walmart

[John Miles]

People make mistakes on occasion... big surprise. Leaving the seller negative feedback without even bothering to email first and give them a chance to make good on their mistake was lame as hell, just IMHO.

Re:Walmart

[John Miles]

That's exactly what escrow.com does. They aren't owned by eBay, but they've been around almost as long.

I mean what the hell are the fees for at eBay? A website and advertising all over the place? Everybody and their mother has a website

Not one that gets forty gazillion hits per day. When you're paying eBay's fees, you're paying for buyer eyeballs... the same thing you pay for when you place a classified in your local newspaper. Nothing new under the sun.

Re:Walmart

[drinkypoo]

I will be reporting them if their latest response to my email does not include an agreement that they will pay me the full amount I require plus the shipping fee. I'd rather they just make it good. We'll see what happens very soon now. It wasn't even long enough past the auction close date to report them until yesterday, because ebay apparently believes that it takes ten days to defraud someone. Oh yeah, and, I don't HAVE a real credit card, so I'm using the only thing I can use.

Re:Walmart

[HeghmoH]

I guess you haven't been at it as long as I thought, so you aren't totally in "I'm screwed" territory yet. Do keep the credit-card fraud option in mind, though; they are very powerful and buyer-friendly.

Oh yeah, and, I don't HAVE a real credit card, so I'm using the only thing I can use.

I really suggest you get one, they aren't that hard to obtain, especially if you don't need a high credit limit. If you exercise self control and always pay the bill on time, they can be totally free, too.

Re:Walmart

[fatcatman]

Yep, eBay doesn't give a shit.

I once bought an item from a seller. Paid $20 for it, shipping should have been about $12 (I knew the weight of the items). Seller came back with a $20 shipping fee + $15 "handling fee". He was just pissed that his auction didn't sell for as much as he wanted, so he tacked on a bunch of fees. BTW, his auction said NOTHING about these fees. Only "Buyer pays shipping", which to any reasonable person means "I'm paying whatever it costs UPS to get the package to me, give or take a buck."

eBay also has a policy against this, requiring sellers to list any handling fees in their auction.

So I refused to pay and emailed eBay. They responded and threatened ME! Flat out told me I was responsible for all charges from the seller and that if I didn't pay, MY account would face suspension! I said, "So what, the guy could come back and demand $500 in fees even though his auction says nothing about it, and if I didn't pay it would be me who got into trouble?" They said, "That's right."

Fuckers. Why even bother having rules, then? They don't enforce them for shit.

Re:Walmart

[CodeBuster]

Yes, but the percentage cut is generally fixed. For example, when Barrett-Jackson auctions collectible automobiles the fixed rate is purchase price * 8%. However, it appears from what has been said here that eBay will employ a sliding scale percentage cut based upon the final auction value. I didn't independently check this policy so I could be mistaken, but if it is true then it is most decidedly unfair to the seller.

Re:Walmart

[Neoncow]

Found: Fees Information Page

You are right. They use a sliding scale percentage.

The percentage goes down as the sale price goes up.

Re:Walmart

[magarity]

The percentage goes down as the sale price goes up.

Drat those bastards! How dare they charge less to people who can afford more! Obviously they aren't liberals.

Re:Walmart

[vacuum_tuber]

I agree entirely with HeghmoH. I once bought a physically heavy item from cpu77 on eBay. It arrived in a lightweight carton, damaged, but it also had deep gouges in the steel housing with no corresponding holes in the carton -- damage that existed prior to shipping. I learned several things from the experience.

First was that the only thing that had any effect on the seller was my filing of a fraud affidavit with my bank. The instant the bank contacted cpu77 my money was credited back, but before that they had stonewalled me and steadfastly refused to do anything. So that's the real answer... pay direct by credit card, even by credit-enhanced "banking card", which gives you recourse through your cc company or bank, and the seller will pay attention.

But I learned some other interesting things before getting to that point:

• The seller, cpu77, appeared to be in the business of acquiring large quantities of unwanted technical gear and disposing of everything piece by piece on eBay without regard to condition. Some people got extraordinary bargains while others received useless, broken junk. cpu77 used the "untested" or "as is" disclaimers as escapes, although anyone who pauses to think about it will realize that when the seller has the item in his hands and the buyer can't see or inspect it, "as is" is largely meaningless, and "untested" is similarly pregnant with abuse. If a seller is unscrupulous, every good item will be tested and claimed to be good to fetch a higher price and every bad item will be "untested" or "as is." The odd thing was that cpu77 didn't appear to discriminate -- they didn't care if one buyer got a real $10,000 item for $100 asd long as they could move everything out, including the complete junk.
• I concluded that the cpu77 disposes of *everything*, good, indifferent or broken, and at least in my case boxed the pre-damaged item inadequately in order to make it look like shipping damage.
• After cpu77 tried to tell me that it was my responsibility to "file a claim with UPS," I read the UPS fine print. While a recipient can report receiving a damaged item, only the shipper can actually file a claim.
• Inadequate packing disqualifies a damaged item for insurance reimbursement. The UPS rule seems to be that if it was actually damaged in transit, the packing was inadequate. Barring UPS running the package over with a truck or spearing it with a forklift, etc., they are essentially right.
• In the worst case you call UPS to report a damaged item, they come out and pick it up, they send it to an inspection location, and eventually return it to the shipper. If the shipper is a scammer he now has your money and the item, and can repeat the process, selling the pre-damaged item to someone else, having it reported, picked up, shipped back, selling it again, etc. ad infinitum.
• UPS told me that cpu77 was shipping about 5,000 parcels per week and had almost no insurance claims. That told me that cpu77 had been successfully stonewalling buyers and even when merchandise was returned to them never followed through with claims. I concluded that they never followed through because they already knew that the claims would be denied for inadequate packing, and that that had been intentional in the case of my item to try to misdirect responsibility to UPS so they could stonewall me. If they actually filed claims in such cases UPS would deny them and also be onto them. With no claims, UPS didn't care and regarded them as a great customer.
• I did the math and determined that cpu77 didn't need repeat business, that the birth rate in the U.S. was sufficient to allow them to alienate all 5,000 customers per week and never run out of new suck^H^H^H^Hcustomers. As long as they can successfully stonewall unhappy buyers most of the time and keep the money, they have little incentive to care whether their customers are pleased or pissed off.
• The experience reminded me not to take c

Re:Walmart

[vacuum_tuber]

News Flash: The sellers on eBay are the only customers of eBay.

Exactly right. It's a flawed model for the universe of participants because eBay has no incentive to kick fraudulent sellers off. As long as they can remain at a distance, they stand to earn fees from all sellers, honest and dishonest. eBay is an equal opportunity facilitator.

Re:Walmart

[vacuum_tuber]

eBay is so pervasive in the auction sector, what with its continual name-dropping in feature films, music videos and so forth that it can pretty much charge what it likes and know it'll still be regarded as the de facto auction site.

No, eBay has the auction market because it is. There are certain markets that naturally tend to establish in only one place. Most big-city job markets have only ever had one newspaper where all the significant job ads appear. This is because once the marketplace has become established, only a moron would try to buy or sell in any lesser market.

Recently they made a stand [ebay.co.uk] about sellers enforcing a percentage rise for whenever a buyer paid using Paypal. Justifable really, since the seller loses out to the tune of ~3% otherwise.

I disagree. The closing price of an item often bears little or no relationship to the opening price or the seller's wished-for price. The closing price is, therefore, essentially an arbitrary as opposed to something determined in any predictable way by the seller. Therefore the seller loses nothing, since the auction could just as easily have closed 10 or 50 percent lower, or 100 percent higher, depending on the phase of the moon, the evening's sitcom or football schedule and any of thousands of other factors.

Further, any additional charge that is known to buyers tends to be discounted, often more than offsetting the charge. For example, sellers who have higher than normal S&H often get no bids or a much lower closing price than sellers who have customary S&H for the type of item being sold. When I want an item badly enough to consider bidding in an auction that has unreasonably high S&H I figure the max I'd normally be willing to pay then subtract the excess S&H and that's my actual max bid.

Re:Walmart

[vacuum_tuber]

That's right. That happened to me, too. It's right there in their policy that sellers have to list S&H and can't invent new and non-customary charges after the close of the auction. But eBay ignores its own policy and sides with the sellers because the sellers pay the bills at eBay.

If eBay exercised more common sense they wouldn't piss so many people off. This last astounding email about improved customer relations landed in my mailbox, too, and I laughed when I read it. It's entirely PR. The purpose of Customer Disservice in many of today's numbers-driven organizations run by clueless suits who bring no redeeming skills to their positions is simply to make complaining customers shut up and go away. There is usually no way for real customer issues to ever feed back up to management because management never has any intention of paying attention to customer issues, and certainly not from Customer Disservice. In today's organizations management exists in a vacuum, setting policy and sending orders downward, convinced that nothing below them has anything to contribute that they don't already know. It's the theatre of the Conceit of the Clueless MBAs.

In the larger picture, though, I don't even think eBay is in business to run auctions. If they were, they would attend better to business, would do a much better job of keeping their "venue" clean of fraudsters, and would have competent IT instead of continually tinkering with and breaking things. The Auction Guild, which used to chronicle eBay outages and feature failures before its operator became very busy in her military duties, regularly published hair-raising reports of multiple daily problems in the eBay system, many of which were crippling to volume sellers. I subscribe to the belief that eBay does nothing more than it has to to keep the value of the insiders' stock options rising so they can cash out. Their auction system just has to function well enough to be plausible, not well enough to satisfy the participants. Once it became the visible online auction marketplace there was no possibility that anyone else could effectively compete. That's the nature of certain types of marketplaces -- once they exist, that's where everyone goes because only a moron would place his wares in a lesser marketplace.

Re:Walmart

[Dizzy49]

Agreed, the amount of "crap" I've had to deal with regarding eBay's horrible feedback system is a joke. I am a seller on eBay and I'm quickly approaching 5000 feedback and 97% rating. I received an email last week from a guy who said:
"your feeback is horrible, why don't you do ebay and everyone a favor and leave"

Now, when *I* was in school a 97% was still an A, and a fairly high A at that. Yes, I have about 130 negs, but the fact I have over 5000 positives means nothing. eBay touts their feedback system as THE measurement to rate buyers and sellers. BUT, they offer no policing of their system. Since they claim it is a "public forum" they refuse to remove it unless it's vulgar. I contacted my attorney because I have several negs that are just blatant lies. Bottom line, I can't sue them for loss of business because I have to PROVE I lost business (and emails from people saying that they didn't buy because of my feedback is not considered proof). It has to be a measured amount. I can *TRY* to sue for loss of reputation and defamation. Again, it has to be done in their jurisdiction (which I think is total BS), and it will cost me about $1000 EACH to every TRY. Because of the BS feedback (many retalitory because they didn't complete the transaction or whatnot), I lost my powerseller status, so I lost ANY support, and I lost the cash back bonuses I got with being a powerseller, and any of the contests I might have won (I won the Grow Your Business contest for 2003)

Re:Walmart

[Dizzy49]

Actually, eBay will only remove feedback by a court order (unless it fits into one of their special circumstances, ie, vulgar, or gives personal information).

I think SquareTrade should also have the ability to charge the other party for the mediation. Why should *I* have to pay to try to mediate an issue because the other person was a jerk and exploited the feedback system?

eBay should be held accountable for some of this crap. It's against policy to exploit the feedback system, or use feedback extortion. Yet any report of it gets you a form email stating they will look into it, and you will never know the result, so don't ask. The feedback stands, and nothing changes. Nice policy, how about some ENFOREMENT!

Higher Ebay Costs = Higher Ebay Fees

[bigtallmofo]

Before you get all excited about having EBay offering all this great customer service, realize that it comes at a cost. A cost that will be passed on to you - the people that use EBay, both buyers and sellers.

Re:Higher Ebay Costs = Higher Ebay Fees

[matthewcraig]

CNN reported today Ebay was lowering their prices for posting items.

Re:Higher Ebay Costs = Higher Ebay Fees

[shadowkoder]

I don't have a link right off hand, but I read this story yesterday off Goggle News and part of the announcement is that they are removing whatever fee increase that happened recently. I beleive it had something to do with a seller fee that was actually causing some auctions to COST money. So while what you say might be true (they could easily distribute that cost elsewhere) that is at least one area I do not think they will touch for awhile.

Re:Higher Ebay Costs = Higher Ebay Fees

[dj245]

Before you get all excited about having EBay offering all this great customer service, realize that it comes at a cost. A cost that will be passed on to you - the people that use EBay, both buyers and sellers.

Actually, they are reversing some earlier fee hikes. But I'm sure they will screw us over with Paypal.

Re:Higher Ebay Costs = Higher Ebay Fees

[korbin_dallas]

Thats correct.

First ebay send out a e-mail saying that ALL the fees were going up on Feb 19. Not just up, but DOUBLE the current rates.

So I think about this for a few minutes, thinking crap, I'll just close the stupid account. But I put it off til later.

Second, after a day or two, is this second email clarifying that the double fees ONLY apply to ebay 'stores'.

Then the next day, is this email from the President, about sevice and other crap.

That says to me that the fee hike isn't flying, and this presidents message is there to assage the feelings of the storefront owners. I beleive the idea is to reduce the listing(fixed) cost while doubling the sell percentage from 4% to 8% of the final sell price. This would rake in 2x as much money as before. Gee, I was hardly making any money before.

Wonder how the shareholders will feel when traffic takes a hit?

Re:Higher Ebay Costs = Higher Ebay Fees

[khallow]

Before you get all excited about having EBay offering all this great customer service, realize that it comes at a cost. A cost that will be passed on to you - the people that use EBay, both buyers and sellers.

I'm not clear on what is the problem here. Improved service usually results in higher costs that often get passed on to customers.

Re:Higher Ebay Costs = Higher Ebay Fees

[mikesmind]

They only lowered the price they raised. And, that is only for the basic listing fee. I'm glad that they did it, but it was done for the purpose of spin and damage control.

Re:Higher Ebay Costs = Higher Ebay Fees

[Threni]

> A cost that will be passed on to you - the people that use EBay, both buyers
> and sellers.

Good. I can't think of a better group of people to pay for such a change. Perhaps you're suggesting taxpayers support it? Or maybe you're suggesting it should be done for free?

I've had problems with eBay, and only last week I got a `how did we deal with your complaint` survey to fill in. I told them that the response I'd previously received - that the auction had ended so there was nothing that could be done - was inadequate, what with, amongst other things, the fact that the auction hadn't ended and therefore plenty could be done, including terminating the auction (the seller had stated that he would not be selling the item if it didn't go for as much as he desired, although he refused to set a reserve as that would presumably cost him more).

Maybe if a real human had dealt with the email something would have been done about it. If that person needs paying then sure, go for it.

Re:Higher Ebay Costs = Higher Ebay Fees

[Anonymous Coward]

What is this Goggle News you speak of?

Re:Higher Ebay Costs = Higher Ebay Fees

[SophtwareSlump]

And to stop the bleeding on their stock price.

Re:Higher Ebay Costs = Higher Ebay Fees

[Monkelectric]

Here's the issue. ebay's P/E ratio is *insane*. Ebay is down from a high of about 120$ to currently around 78$ and their P/E is currently 66 (traditional wisdom says a P/E should be about 10, so a P/E of 66 means their revenues need to grow 6.6x to have a normal P/E). They *needed* those extra fees to bring their P/E down to justify their incredible stock price.

However, ebay is bullshit and everyone knows it. Their fee's were *ALREADY* outrageous. The quality of their listings is rotten, I would only buy something I couldn't get *anywhere* else on ebay. Have a look around, sellers are charging 30$ shipping for small items like mp3 players (30$ will ship 70lbs via UPS). Things get bid up past the price you could get them new at best buy -- most of the time I suspect through shilling. And they really are no deals to be had anymore. Thats the crux of the matter, THERE ARE NO DEALS on ebay anymore. Paying 20$ less then retail and then 30$ for shipping is not a deal.

So, what ebay NEEDED to do was cut their prices to reattract sellers and allow current sellers to list things at lower prices so there are deals again.

What they did was raise their prices because they are greedy and they think they deserve their crazy P/E ratio. And now theyve found out their real value. They've lost almost 130,000 store subscriptions since november. I for one think this was a long time coming.

Re:Higher Ebay Costs = Higher Ebay Fees

[korbin_dallas]

True words. But you failed to mention the reason shipping is so high on ebay...ebay doesn't count it as part of the 'sell' price. So the sellers (including me) markup the shipping price to pad out the (usually) low sale price. So ebay only get 4% of a low sale, I get to keep the extra shipping.

Re:Higher Ebay Costs = Higher Ebay Fees

[Monkelectric]

You're right of course though. But dont you feel that contributes to the huckster atmosphere of the whole place? Every time I find something I want the shipping charge is a joke.

Re:Higher Ebay Costs = Higher Ebay Fees

[vacuum_tuber]

And if I'm considering bidding in your hign S&H auction I discount my max bid by your excess S&H. And in my experience the high S&H auctions get far less bidding activity than the ones with more reasonable S&H and often close lower than the others or get no bids at all. So not only am I not affected by your policy of shifting part of the total away from the closing price, I often win such auctions at unusually low closing prices as a result of the reduced bidding competition. But, like many other bidders, I also often just skip on past the auctions that have something out of kilter like an excessively high S&H. I use a sniff test... if something smells "off" in an auction listing I generally don't consider bidding. That could be excessive S&H, absence of obviously crucial data on the item (model, part number, voltage, etc.), 10 times more text about terms and conditions than about the item being sold, strange terms, etc.

Re:Higher Ebay Costs = Higher Ebay Fees

[Yer Mom]

The thinking seems to be this:

We want to put the fees up by n. The punters will hate this. So, let's announce an increase of n+m, wait a few days, then grovel and reduce by m. Punters will then think "they are listening to us after all. They do care!" and carry on lining our pockets.

Or am I just being excessively cynical this morning?

Re:Higher Ebay Costs = Higher Ebay Fees

[mickyjo]

They are passing along the cost on Feb 17th with increases to the basic store fee and increases in insertion fees. It's increasing my ebay payments per item from 6%-8% to 12%-15%. There goes the profits for the little guy. I'm out feb 16th.

About time?

[hsmith]

The most god-awful thing about ebay is: there is no way to get in touch with a real person there. There is no way to find a 1-800 number to talk to flesh and blood to solve a problem. I have had issues come up a number of times that automated emails and "faq's" wouldn't solve.

about time they are moving to a more "customer friendly" system...

Re:About time?

[odano]

Yeah, PayPal is infamous for this.

Until of course <URL:http://www.paypalsucks.com> came about to show us the way to paypal customer service.

Re:About time?

[veganMalcontent]

Dude, look here (scroll down past the pictures of my cats). At one point I tracked down their phone number and put it on my website for the convenience of all. I also put Amazon's number there. There's an easy trick to finding any public company's phone number, which is to look at their SEC filings.

Re:About time?

[Anonymous Coward]

Think this is bad? Try escaping the clutches of AT&T long distance service. There is NO method available to cancel on the web site. NO phone number to this end. You call their generic 800 number, do the dance until you get a unempowered foreigner, and nothing.

I fucking dare anyone to successfully cancel with AT&T long distance. In my case, I had to rid myself of my land line to abate the $9/month AT&T was charging me despite the fact I never used them.

Stupid.

Re:About time?

[Bodhammer]

PayPal phone number: 1-888-221-1161

Re:About time?

[quarkscat]

About time for what, exactly? eBay states that
they will be making greater efforts to support
their "sellers", not their "customers".

Having been ripped off by eBay "sellers" enough
times to just stay away, I can tell you that
until eBay tightens up accountability from
their "sellers", it will always be a viper pit.

The relationship between eBay and their "sellers"
is not unlike the relationship between the FDA
and the pharacutical companies, or between
politicians and their lobbyists -- incestuous
and corrupt. The average citizen (or eBay
purchaser) has little or no clout with the
organization, because the organization takes
its orders from those that pay the most.

eBay does not have a level playing field when
it comes to protecting both the "seller" AND
the "buyer" uniformly. The money that talks
the loudest to eBay is from their "sellers".

Napoleon

[Anonymous Coward]

Now if I could only get the crystals for that time machine I bought off of ebay.

Re:Napoleon

[Anonymous Coward]

I realize your Dynamite reference, but I'd hesitate before purchasing any "crystal" substance from an online marketplace.

Good news

[wintaki]

Well, this is good news. It was certainly frustrating in the past dealing only with autoresponders. It will be good to be able to actually speak with someone, which is becoming more and more a problem with all these web-based businesses.

Spoofed emails

[Patik]

After all, who is 'spoofed' more than ebay?

Uh, how about PayPal?

Re:Spoofed emails

[Anonymous Coward]

actually Microsoft would be #1, with virus and trojan installers.

Re:Spoofed emails

[cjwl]

Considering eBay owns PayPal, what is the difference.

Re:Spoofed emails

[Anonymous Coward]

-1 Redundant cliched fuckface

Not necessarily

[brunes69]

You an offset higher costs in two ways - higher markups, or higher volumes.

Higher volumes usually accompany better customer service, s they might not necessarily mark up prices right away.

Then again, Ebay is a business, so you can't fault them if they do.

About time

[Anonymous Coward]

Perhaps this is in response to constant criticism that eBay has ignored complaints and refused to talk to users over serious problems? The UK consumer program Watchdog did a peice on eBay not long ago. Users had experienced fraudulant transactions and downright theft via. other eBay users but had been stonewalled when they tried to complain to eBay to get the problem resolved. Watchdog found it near impossible to contact and speak to a real human being at eBay. If a TV production crew couldn't speak to anyone, what hope do normal users have?

So it's about time. Lets just hope the "real humans" at the other end of that email address arn't constricted into responding like a robot from a pre-written script..

Re:About time

[thenextpresident]

Perhaps this is in response to constant criticism

Duh! No wonder you posted AC. Of course this is in response to the constant criticism. They say so in their message, though not using those words. Basically, they flat out say that they are doing this in response to what their customers want. Customers who have criticized the old way. So guess what? They change.

As far as a TV Show calling up and trying to talk to someone? Good for ebay for not talking to them. If I were a customer, and I saw that ebay was talking to a television crew out for ratings, I would be upset. Rather than talk to a crew, they should talk to their customers.

Re:About time

[bananasfalklands]

When I hear 'Ebay' - I run for the hills. They are useless. Far too many retards and fraudsters.

I refuse to use them to buy or to sell. If everybody did that then this would have happened a lot earlier.

Re:About time

[Anonymous Coward]

As far as a TV Show calling up and trying to talk to someone? Good for ebay for not talking to them. If I were a customer, and I saw that ebay was talking to a television crew out for ratings, I would be upset. Rather than talk to a crew, they should talk to their customers.

The thing that scares me the most about this is that you might actually believe what you just wrote.

Re:About time

[zebs]

The UK consumer program Watchdog did a peice on eBay not long ago. Users had experienced fraudulant transactions and downright theft via. other eBay users but had been stonewalled when they tried to complain to eBay to get the problem resolved. Watchdog found it near impossible to contact and speak to a real human being at eBay. If a TV production crew couldn't speak to anyone, what hope do normal users have?

Was that the one where they had the head/boss/spokesman for ebay uk on the show discussing some of the issues with the presenters? See here for details

Re:About time

[traffi]

eBay never reveals much data on the amount of fraud that goes on through their site, but according to an article an fraud protection at ebay on CNet, fraudulent transactions on eBay in 2002 amounted to millions of dollars.

It would have to suck being swindled for a car and getting a robotic email reply when trying to find out what went wrong...

Re:About time

[Anonymous Coward]

Its not really fair to judge the entirety of ebay. Most users are fair and honest. Now granted, if even 0.1% are bad, that's a lot of people and ebay are so bloody slow doing something if they do anything at all that they don't help. But even so, you can't judge the whole site by a few, a little background research into the seller will tell you if they're good or bad.

Re:About time

[Anonymous Coward]

Yup. Only after Watchdog had exhuasted every "normal" means of attempting to contact somebody in eBay "Customer Services". At one point they even visted eBay UK's physical offices, and still found no one. The only reason the spokesman from eBay turned up on the show is because Watchdog wrote to their registered address and eBay were smart enough to show up. It's not like a spokesman for eBay would have shown up at a normal users house after they had tried, and failed, to contact Customer Services.

Re:About time

[bananasfalklands]

Anon: The rating system is a waste of time - had a winning bidder with a very good rating who bought item - but had no funds, did ebay enforce this contract/agreement ? no

I consider that advance fee fraud. If ebay cannot keep it system free of stupids then I will not use it. I did what you said, I even gave the moron some slack - did not make any difference.

Re:About time

[vacuum_tuber]

When I hear 'Ebay' - I run for the hills. They are useless. Far too many retards and fraudsters.

Actually what you say only applies to consumer items. eBay is an excellent place to find exotic and niche technical gear and is probably the most active marketplace in the world for finding last year's serious non-consumer technology today for a fraction of its original price.

The fraudulent sellers concentrate on high-volume, easy to move consumer items, which are also often bought by clueless nitwits. The fraudulent buyers only want consumer stuff they can fence or resell easily. You won't find too many fraud artists buying or selling SCSI disk arrays or HD68-to-VHDCI SCSI cables.

Higher Ebay Costs = Higher Ebay Fees

[sp3c1alK]

This is very true (and I would think obvious). I guess the question is whether better customer service is worth the additional costs.

Buy it now?

[serith]

I'm surprised that they just haven't had auctions to talk to real live customer service reps ;) "But it now for $1/min!"

Re:Buy it now?

[vacuum_tuber]

Come to think of it I think they could make a ton of money and be a big hit by auctioning off the fraud artists for disposition by the winning bidder. "Bid now on Joey the credit card scammer and if you win you can torture him to death by the method of your choice!"

Here we go... eBay could auction off SPAMMERS... boy, oh boy, could they become overnight heros!

"Three day auction: Scott Richter, delivered bound and gagged to the undisclosed location of your choice by blind, deaf-mute delivery agents. S&H only $5,000."

Don't know about anyone else

[Prince Vegeta SSJ4]

but after all of the horror stories I've heard about paypal, and to a lesser extent Ebay, I don't know if I will ever use them. I have used Ebay once, and that was basically just to get in contact with the seller - who had the items available for pick up at a relatively close location. Then, even dealing with that seller, he wanted cash for the cisco routers I was buying, because he was *leaving town* to go back to Russia. Not to say anything was wrong, but definitely didn't feel like the most above board transaction.

Re:Don't know about anyone else

[thetroll123]

because he was *leaving town* to go back to Russia

Clearly a criminal then. Nobody would leave the US of A voluntarily! Sheesh...

Re:Don't know about anyone else

[Prince Vegeta SSJ4]

Did I not say "Not to say anything was wrong", sheesh. All I know is,

• CashOnly Transaction
• In a Hurry
• got to leave the country
• beat up looking physical location
• low price of equipment

caused me to have some suspiscions, excuse me for not living in perfect world, where I can leave any 'street sense' behind and everyone can trust everyone right off the bat.

Re:Don't know about anyone else

[thetroll123]

Your items 1,2,3,5 are all the same thing (he needs to finalise sale before leaving). Your item 4 was probably the underlying reason! The guy was selling up and leaving to pursue an opportunity of a better life elsewhere. Of course you shouldn't trust everyone, but you should also understand that the vast majority of people *are* broadly honest and in the absence of any evidence to the contrary, take them at face value.

It wasn't broken; why fix it?

[Anonymous Coward]

eBay is the most successful and popular online auction site, and now they're messing with the formula? The sad fact is that customers/consumers are at the mercy of the mainstream, and eBay has established itself as mainstream. They have no good reason to sacrifice revenue to improve customer relations; how is that profitable? eBay has no worry of competition, so why waste this money? I mean, as a customer I'm glad from my POV, but from eBay's POV (and its shareholders'), how is this a good move? More money and effort will be expended, but how will it result in greater profits?

Re:It wasn't broken; why fix it?

[duffbeer703]

It is broken. Ebay's fees and clunky user interfaces are a real drag.

I moved selling of newer electronics, books, cds and dvds to Amazon. Its less expensive, less hassle, and a much better selling experience overall.

Re:It wasn't broken; why fix it?

[Rakishi]

....Because companies don't just think about what will happen in the next 5 minutes. It's hard to make profit when all your customers are leaving for competitors that offer better service.

This is not some communists state with a single company per industry but a mostly capitalistic market with this amazing thing called "competition." Just like animal species corporations need to both expand and evolve to survive since anything static gets killed by something which isn't.

Do you remember AltaVista? They use to be the search engine to use, haven't heard of them in a while have we? Ebay doesn't want to end up like that because some new company made a better product and lured its customers away.

As for no worry about competition: there is tons of competition and saying it's too small to worry about is plain dumb. By the time it becomes big enough to cut into their profits it's too late because customers will be jumping ship and not looking back, and by the time they finally stop the flow there won't be much left.

I don't think its going to change a thing

[loose canons]

I am still going to get 3 emails a day asking me to correct the credit card numbers and other data for an e-Bay account I don't have and never have had. [and partly because of the e-mails, never will have]

Re:I don't think its going to change a thing

[PartialInfinity]

You do realize all those emails were from phishers and not from eBay, right?

Re:I don't think its going to change a thing

[vacuum_tuber]

No, it's apparent from the post that he/she thinks those phishing emails are actually coming from eBay.

Hmm

[ricotest]

Automated replies are often useful. If the human customer reps are going to just dole out the same answers over and over, they're no more useful than automatic replies, but a whole lot more expensive.

Re:Hmm

[Anonymous Coward]

Check the email headers of genuine emails from eBay & PayPal customer services... they use SRM software from KANA extensively.

What will happen in many cases is that their KANA Email Response system will classify the email, auto-suggest an appropriate answer in their KANA IQ knowledgebase, and auto-insert it into the email reply.

A CSR will view the outbound email, and tweak as necessary. This is still more expensive than a totally automated system, but not quite as bad as you'd think.

Re:Hmm

[Anonymous Coward]

Heh. KANA IQ. Yet another 'enterprise' use for JAVA.

At only $14,000 per seat per year! Christ almighty.

Re:Hmm

[CffnDwllr]

>>Automated replies are often useful.

RIGHT. Last year I posted NINE questions to E-Bay. E-Bay's automated responses NEVER had ANYthing to do with my query.

For example, when I asked a question about the Final Value Fee Refund that I hadn't received, E-Bay's automated response was to give me instructions on how to change the text color when constructing an auction and 3 paragraphs on E-bay's .net policy WRT logging in.

Another response, to a different question, was 15 some odd pages on what must have been 50 different topics.

Oh yeah, the automated response system was useful.......for laughs.

Great, they'll hire David Spade "No" Guys...

[Ancient_Hacker]

As a long-time eBay seller, I have mixed feelings. On the one hand, one suspects they'll just hire a bunch of David Spade "No" Guys... Many times I've reported obviously fake sellers. They write back that they won't do anything until 3 cases have been confirmed against the seller. I round up two other badly screwed buyers and submit the info... They reply that's still not good enough, case closed. --- On the plus side, I've received over 500 personal checks as payment from eBay buyers, and NOT ONE has bounced.

Re:Great, they'll hire David Spade "No" Guys...

[Zoop]

On the one hand, one suspects they'll just hire a bunch of David Spade "No" Guys...

Actually, given the cost, I suspect they'll hire Davi Singh "No. Thank you comeagain," guys and gals.

"Hello, this is 'Johnny Smith' from...Texas. How may I help you? Really? Well, no. Thankyoucomeagain."

Re:Great, they'll hire David Spade "No" Guys...

[dargon]

About two months ago, a small news article appeared on a local news website for the community I used to live in.

------
eBay Coming To Vernon?
As many as 400 people are expected to find jobs with a call centre in Vernon.

Officials are not exactly saying who the employer is but it is believed to be Internet Auction giant eBay.

A job fair for prospective employees of the call centre will be held at the OUC Kalamalka Campus next Thursday and Friday, starting at 11:00am.

About 100 employees will start a month of training as early as next weekend in preparation for the opening of the call centre.
--------

So, no, no outsourcing to India. Looks like they're going to Vernon BC Canada

Re:Great, they'll hire David Spade "No" Guys...

[Monkelectric]

Yea, have you seen the guys who put up a piece of electronics, and then tell you you're bidding on a PHOTO (in small print) of said electronics that would be delivered via e-mail?. I like to make fake accounts and bid astronomical ammounts on these and never pay -- to jack up their final value fees.

Re:Great, they'll hire David Spade "No" Guys...

[vacuum_tuber]

Maybe the next trend in outsourcing will be for India and other places to offer to act on our behalf in calling their brethren down the road, waiting on hold, etc.

1: (ring, ring) "(thick Indian accent) Hello. I am Bob. How may I hailp you?"

2: "(also thick Indian accent)Hello. I am (clickety-click...) Sandra Fleischmann. I have a problem with my (clickety-click...) eBay listing. I have been on hold for ... 27 minutes and 32 seconds. Where are you located, if I may ask?"

1: "I'm very sorry. We are all very sorry here at (clickety-click...) eBay. I am located in (clickety-click...) Virginia, Pennsylvania. The weather here is (clickety-click) 62 degrees and overcast, with a 40% chance of precipitation. How is the weather where you are?"

2: "It is (clickety-click...) 26 degrees and snowing here in (clickety-click) Las Vegas, Michigan."

1: "That's very nice. What is the nature of your problem?"

2: "(clickety-click) My new auction listing doesn't come up in the eBay Search."

1: "Have you tried rebooting your PC?"

More interesting is the 5 Cent Listing Fee Drop

[Cr0w T. Trollbot]

To my mind, the more significant change is the 5 cent drop in listing fees. Given that I've listed over 100 items (most SF/F/H paperbacks) in one week, such a small change quickly begins to add up. Of course, that only partially offsets other eBay nickle-and-dime-to-death fee hikes in recent years, including a hike announced just last month for Buy It Now fees.

But it still may not be sufficient. Sell-through rate in eBay has been steadily declining for the last 18 months. If I can't make money on eBay, I'll just stop listing there.

Re:More interesting is the 5 Cent Listing Fee Drop

[ultrasonik]

I too am excited by this. However, my excitement is countered by the hike in final value fees for store items. It's about time eBay fixed their support. I just hope they speak english.

Woot!

[Jinsaku]

I've been buying and selling on ebay for almost 7 years, and this is a sigh of relief. Ebay has, in the past, had the worst customer support this side of Paypal and Comcast. Basically, if you had a problem, you're screwed. It's nice to see them going in a positive support direction (hopefully it's not just smoke and mirrors).

Is it just me? [OT]

[chipster]

Or is anyone else wondering how secure a service is (such as Ebay) when "ISAPI" and "DLL" exist directly in the providers' URLs/servers?

https://scgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?UpdateAgree ment

Just a thought. Sorry for the OT pr0st.

Re:Is it just me? [OT]

[Anonymous Coward]

It doesn't strike me as being any worse than seeing ".php" in a URL.

Re:Is it just me? [OT]

[dossen]

Well, while I think most of us agree that such an URL is just plain fugly, there is nothing in the _URL_ to suggest that ebay does not validate the input, track suspicious behaviour etc. But I agree that putting a mod_rewrite or something in front makes it not only nicer but also a bit more difficult for a random surfer to construct "attack" URLs (As I implied, if they validate the input, properly, any CGI can be safe).

Re:Is it just me? [OT]

[Ozy311]

I work for eBay, and if you think that that is actually a V2 ISAPI dll serving content, then our strategy has worked well. That URL looks like that for backward compatibility for URL's when we were auction-web.

Ricardo

[mirko]

I guess they lost too many customers to Ricardo as most people I know associate "selling" with ricardo and "scamming" with eBay.

Substantial Database?

[duffbeer703]

A+++++++++ Awesam comment! Great point! Asset to Slashdot!! A_++++ super!

Fraudulent sellers spend a couple of weeks trading $0.25 recipies and baseball cards, leave comments like "A+++ great labtop!" wait a few months for the contents of those auctions to be removed by eBay, then ripoff unsuspecting users.

Re:Substantial Database?

[wheany]

Ebay is funny. Every positive feedback comment must be AAAAA+++++++++, or you don't really mean it.

And if you are selling something, and you want people to look at you stuff, you must add LOOK to the subject line. And if you really want people to look at your wares, you write LQQK or L@@K. LOOK, LQQK and L@@K are a guarentee of a quality product.

Re:Substantial Database?

[Dun Malg]

And if you are selling something, and you want people to look at you stuff, you must add LOOK to the subject line. And if you really want people to look at your wares, you write LQQK or L@@K. LOOK, LQQK and L@@K are a guarentee of a quality product.

Another important phrase for the description is "RARE!" or "VERY RARE!". Doesn't matter that it's only a valve cover retaining clip for an aircooled VW Bug or a used distributor cap for an early 70's GM V8, it still counts as "RARE!"

Re:Substantial Database?

[ScentCone]

it still counts as "RARE!"

I know, it's wretched. But that sort of dumbed-down, breathless cheesy salesmanship is also found at swapmeets, bad antique shops, and community newspaper classifieds. eBay has given those same people more reach, unfortunately. I agree that their scripts should simply prohibit "+++++++" type stuff, and go with something more like the slashdot moderation method (choose from a list of qualifiers, etc).

Re:Substantial Database?

[ScentCone]

A+++++++++ Awesam comment! Great point! Asset to Slashdot!! A_++++ super!

Heh. I suppose I had that coming. But you get my drift, right? Meaning, people who can't see through the noise on eBay, or can't see blatant scams for what they are, are probably also victims of lots of other offline hucksterism and manipulation, too. Definately, though, eBay grade inflation is almost as bad as it is at Harvard.

Re:Substantial Database?

[operagost]

Every positive feedback comment must be AAAAA+++++++++, or you don't really mean it.

Those are the fraudulent ones.

Re:Substantial Database?

[duffbeer703]

I understand your point -- but eBay as deliberately created an environment where shady hucksters can thrive, because those scumbags are core to eBay's business.

I've occasionally sold stuff on eBay. Back in 2000 I sold about $15,000 worth of suplussed equipment in one lot. I also sold a CD and a book. Because eBay hides sale details after 6 months or so, its really impossible to vet a sellers history.

Poke around on eBay, especially "hot" items like laptops and iPods. You'll find alot of sellers who establish seemingly legit accounts by trading low-value items back and forth between multiple accounts. Then they move into laptop computers or other high value, easily 'scammable' merchandise.

Its absurd that you can buy or sell a recipie for $0.50, and receive the same seller rating as someone who sells computers, cars or expensive clothing.

Re:Substantial Database?

[vacuum_tuber]

Every positive feedback comment must be AAAAA+++++++++, or you don't really mean it.

Those are the fraudulent ones.

No they aren't. It's part of the tacky eBay culture. There are much better ways to recognize the bad players than merely overstatement in feedback.

Factors taking hurting eBay

[Anonymous Coward]

1. Froogle.com can search eBay and other auction sites as well as online stores. This is leading traditional eBay sellers to list on other online auctions sites such as Overstock, Amazon and Yahoo to avoid the hefty eBay selling fees, yet still be seen.

2. Niche Sites - The rise of niche sites devoted to one type of merchandise: Astromart for telescopes, Timezone for watches, Amazon for books, AuctionArms for sporting goods ...

3. Death of the collectibles market and commodization of PC parts - The bread and butter of eBay has been it's collectible market, which has taken a hit in recent years due to the economy. PC parts were another money maker until they became dirt cheap thanks to commoditization.

Already eBay is starting to disappoint in earnings, a direct result of all these niche players.

Wow...

[midifarm]

A corporation that's willing to spend money on customer service. Either eBay is worried about future competition, potential lost customers or is, god forbid, starting to care about it's consumers. Either way I think we all benefit.

Peace

Greatly exagerrate + Missing word?

[Anonymous Coward]

First, there's a missing word in the news summary. Last sentence: "but it will end affecting a lot of people."

It will end what?!

---------

Second point: The complaints regarding customer service are rather exaggerated. Yeah, you get an auto-response when first submitting an inquiry/email. I had my account shut down for no apparent reason. I sent a email (not just a rant email, but a sensibly written email with my contact information, including phone #).

Within 48 hrs i received A PHONE CALL. That's right. Not an email, but a phone call from an Ebay customer service agent. He and I resolved the issue that had caused my account closure, and then right there while on the phone with me my account was reactivated. How's that for customer service? That happened in August 2004.

Re:Greatly exagerrate + Missing word?

[jkmartin]

I'm glad you had a good experience, my own experience was much less satisfying. The seller never shipped the items. You have to wait 30 days before you can complain to eBay. When I did file that complaint, I received a form letter telling me they would investigate and it would be another 30 days before I received an answer. 60 days from the sale is also the amount of time I had to have the bank reverse charges. Not having any faith in eBay I contacted the bank and got my money back. It was only then that I got an actual human response from eBay saying that I had violated their policies and my account might be suspended. I saved them the trouble by cancelling my account and my Paypal account and have never looked back. eBay's new and improved customer service is a step in the right direction. It won't get me back though.

T'is good to have...

[zijus]

... the ability to talk to real human. Though I don't trust ebay/PayPal to solve my problems for me. That is why... I don't use PayPale.
I have got just a few transactions, but some with rather big money + international shipment & payment. No way I go for that if I don't have individual bank account details. It does not solve the problem. But if something goes wrong I know where to start. Ebay is out of the loop. And the end seller (thieve) knows I'll be able to track things down.

This is a hassely solution in order to initiate a payment, but it's more peaceful. Your choice: less hassle in general => big hassle when it goes wrong or a bit of hassle every time and less chance of the big shite to come up. (Oops also: no credit card number in the wild... That's a big peace of mind.)

Z.

If they really want to prevent fraud...

[DestinyBWL]

...how about they eliminate e-mail from the "ebay process" all together. I mean seriously, create a "Private Message System" that will allow both buyers and sellers to communicate, and allow ebay to communicate with its customers at the same time. Set it up so that you can choose to receive e-mail notification when you recieve a message so that you can still check your e-mail for new stuff, but keep the messages ON ebay itself. This way you can know when ebay messages are official or not. Obviously the primary exception to this would be password loss.

Re:If they really want to prevent fraud...

[TOWebstress]

Because then users would be forced to log in to eBay in order to see these messages, whilst an e-mail in the mailbox is a tacit invitation to come back and check something out.

Re:If they really want to prevent fraud...

[spacefrog]

Uggggggh had to decide whether to mod you up, or reply to you. If any mods are reading this, poke some points at the parent.

Excellent point, and this could also create a secure, ebay-accessable log of all of the chatter between buyer and seller for a specific item.

This could be very useful in making sense of 'he said, she said' situations, and having something more solid to use in court (be it civil or criminal).

Re:If they really want to prevent fraud...

[DestinyBWL]

It's the same flexibility though. EBay could set it so that ALL messages that actually come from EBay sends and e-mail to the user letting them know they have a message. Not only is it an "invitation to return" it actually forces the user to login to EBay.

Re:If they really want to prevent fraud...

[DestinyBWL]

Correct me if I am wrong, but I believe they already have a PM type system in place, but I think it is used for advertisement messages of some sort. I'm sure it could easily be modified into an actual PM system that users could use between themselves, and if a user decided to use it to "spam" other users, EBay could see this very easily and remove that user and the spam in question, etc. I just think that it would be better for the average joe user if EBay made it VERY clear to them that EBay will *not* e-mail them asking them questions, but will only e-mail them to notify them when they have a message from EBay waiting for them.

Re:If they really want to prevent fraud...

[spacefrog]

Agreed 100%

They do have a messaging system for publicly asking and answering pre-sales questions, but afaik, they have nothing for doing private messaging.

Even sending out a notice that 'you have a new message in the eBay message center' as email could be vulnerable to phishing. Perhaps, big RED letters everywhere reminding people that they *never* send clickable links in the notices would help some.

Yes, but will it change anything?

[AtariDatacenter]

When I report a powerseller with a 99% feedback rating, will you listen?

Even if this powerseller takes VHS quality fan tapes that have been very poorly burned to DVD-R and sells them for $25+? Even if it violates the over-the-air recording policy, dvd-r policy, and copyright policy?

Even if I point out the many many feedbacks which agree with my point of view? Even if I include the email where he sells additional items outside of eBay?

Will you be there eBay? Will you listen? Or will you continue to go after more petty things like arcade collectors selling real bootleg pac-man PCBs from the period?

Re:Yes, but will it change anything?

[Anonymous Coward]

Document how you informed eBay. It might be best to do it in writing. If they still don't act, write the feds and let them know that eBay has been informed. If they feds listen they'll have what they need to nail eBay.

Re:Yes, but will it change anything?

[Audigy]

Find the copyright owner (the movie studio for example) and report the seller to them. Inform the movie studio about eBay's VERO program, and the seller will be zapped in no time.

eBay states clearly in their policies that they won't cancel suspected infringing items unless the copyright owner contacts them.

Re:Yes, but will it change anything?

[Anonymous Coward]

Posted Anon cos I modded a post here.

Sadly your point is very true, no matter how much you do their job for them, they still don't do it.

However I did have some joy out of them, there was some bastard spamming a newsgroup with something he was selling. I reported it to "spam email" cos the help system is terrible and I couldn't find one for "newsgroup spam". I included full newsgroup headers and a link to the google groups entry. They sent an automated back asking for email headers.
I replied and told them how shit the help system was and if there was a newsgroup referring form then please point me to it, otherwise tell me what I'm supposed to do. They replied again (a stock response but a human one) telling me to enclose email headers.
I wrote back a third time and told them if they didn't intend to do something then I would openly advertise to as many people as I could that ebay is perfectly happy with newsgroup spamming and that may lead to many more complaints. They wrote back and told me they'd closed the offenders account and thank you for my assistance. I checked, and indeed the seller was no longer a reg'd user. You can beat them, you just have to find a sore spot and keep nagging.

Re:Yes, but will it change anything?

[dmarx]

I would hope they go after neither, and concentrate their efforts on fraudsters. Big companies don't need protection as much as consumers do.

Catch-22?

[No Such Agency]

They write back that they won't do anything until 3 cases have been confirmed against the seller.

"I'm sorry, we won't investigate until we have three confirmed cases of fraud against a seller. Three buyers complaining, with evidence, is insufficient confirmation. Confirmation requires an investigation."

Why not offer buyers protection?

[shic]

I've only ever been an e-bay customer... I've never wanted to list anything for sale - and I've only ever bought stuff I couldn't get hold of elsewhere. For example I bought a Dell laptop 802.11g mini-PCI card (Not sold from dell.co.uk, and costs $50 in the USA - but they won't ship to the UK.) I paid 50 euros to get one shipped from Belgium. I was hesitant (concerned about the possibility of fraud) but considered it worth the risk. Recently I've bought a citizen watch from a US seller ($130) because with a budget of £250 I can't find anything comparable for sale in the UK [and I've been looking for a _decade_!] I'm now waiting anxiously - hoping it will arrive in the post sometime soon.
I don't doubt that most of the vendors are honest, but at the moment the risk is disproportionately high for the buyers. Buyers are forced trade off the risk of fraud with the benefit of the (usually fairly cheap) often hard-to-find goods. If there had been a reputable company who would handle the trade (essentially eliminate the risk) when I bought the watch I'd have gladly paid. When I was a teenager I used to buy and sell computer 'junk' - the only protection was that buyer and seller had each others' address and phone number. For small trades this was sufficient - there was always the threat of a "visit" - as sales were only "national"... now when buying from those in different continents buyers like myself want better assurances... and within reason I think I for one would pay for this.

Re:Why not offer buyers protection?

[einar2]

This is why I really like payment by bank transfer. Most civilized countries require you to show an ID before you are allowed to open a bank account (even in Switzerland, thanks, no need to joke). Having a bank account number is as good as having seen the ID of your business partner.

Re:Why not offer buyers protection?

[shic]

Having a bank account number is as good as having seen the ID of your business partner.

Unfortunately, particularly for international trades, knowing the identity of the person who has defrauded me would bring little advantage. As I mentioned earlier - it gave some degree of protection for relatively local transactions - due to the risk for a fraudulent vendor to get angry visits from disgruntled buyers... this is not a credible inter-continental threat.

Hehe...

[Jugalator]

Imagine if this was in the 70-80's and you heard that in the future people would go "is this for real!?" when reading this:

Our users will get a real e-mail response to their questions you'll hear from a human being who will try to help you with your problem or question right off the bat.

I don't think you'd believe the 21st century would be as cool after hearing something like that back then. :-)

Problems with eBay or sellers/buyers?

[se7en11]

Why would someone have a problem with eBay? Every problem I've ever had or heard of was from either from the buyer doing something wrong/unfair or the seller doing the same.

Why do we need to contact eBay? Just host the autions and monitor the users.

Re:Problems with eBay or sellers/buyers?

[eseiat]

Certainly no one else could have experienced different error experiences than you have. Yes, all people experience exactly what happens to you. Is it hard balancing the orbits of all the planets around you?

All you have to do is read some of the comments here to realize that some people have other problems on EBay that require support from EBay CS.

Re:Problems with eBay or sellers/buyers?

[PartialInfinity]

eBay has the responsibility of maintaining a fair and level trading field between buyer and seller. eBay is in a position to implement sanctions if someone is not playing by the rules. By not enforcing its own written policies, eBay removes all feelings of trust from the process of buying and selling.

Re:Problems with eBay or sellers/buyers?

[se7en11]

What do I know though? Just over 1,500 feedback w/ just under 3,000 transactions.

Re:Problems with eBay or sellers/buyers?

[shlashdot]

let's say you are selling a $1000 item, and someone who signed up yesterday bids on the item, turns out to be a fraud, and disappears. No problem really, that's between me and them and I can smell them a mile away, **except ebay sends you a bill for the "final value fee"**. Do I have time to go through the automated approach to getting that back? No.

Re:Problems with eBay or sellers/buyers?

[eseiat]

Considering thousands of transactions happen every hour of the day on EBay, your experience is still very limited and should not be used to denounce other people's legitimate problems on the site.

Re:Problems with eBay or sellers/buyers?

[se7en11]

Point taken.

I have to Agree - PayPal need serious help

[cybrthng]

I find it amazing that you can sell something according to the Terms of Service on EBay and a buyer can renig on such contracts through PayPal and get there money back.

I will NEVER sell tickets on Ebay again due to being burned in such a fashion where the person purchased tickets for a specific date, got the tickets but didn't open them and sent them back and did a refund request on PayPal. PayPal asked for the shipping tracking and saw it was returned to sender so they reversed the charges and gave the money back to the buyer.

For someone who did 15k in paypal billing that year to get ignored and to have no one able to answer my calls and emails was pretty upsetting to say the least. To have an "All sales are final" sale get reversed because of a cheating buyer was upsetting but to freeze my account and hold my money until I authorized an illigitimate refund was icing on the cake.

Paypal purposely won't accept visa or mastercard payments on reversed charges because they know they couldn't win a disputed or cancelled charge with Visa/Mastercard - Remember that when you let them suck money out unprotected via an EFT/Bank draft.

oh, and the insurance up to 500 only protects the buyer..

Seller beware.. ebay and paypal aren't out to help you.

Re:I have to Agree - PayPal need serious help

[Rorschach1]

I'll second that. PayPal's fraud policy is bogus. Ship an empty box or envelope, and you've fulfilled your obligation as a seller, as far as they're concerned.

And that's not just my interpretation - I finally got a human on the line who told me exactly that. System Modz / Console Corner LLC ripped me off that way, and by the accounts I've seen from other customers it's part of the guy's regular mode of business. Take a big order, only ship part of it, and ignore all further emails.

Re:I have to Agree - PayPal need serious help

[NitroWolf]

Never let them take the funds from your bank account. I always Paypal from my American Express. If there's a problem... Call Amex, Amex drops the hammer on Paypal and it's done.

Amex never questions me, and has always been helpful. There's a lot of things wrong with Amex, but customer protection from BS like this isn't one of them, and that's why I put up with a lot of thier inane crap.

I especially love the little blurb Paypal puts up everytime I use my American Express as my funding source, something along the lines of: "Paypal offers buyer protection up to $1000. There's no need to use a credit card, blah blah blah. Are you sure you want to switch your funding source to American Express?"

Haha, yeah, I've been on the receiving end of your "buyer protection." Paypal does exactly squat. Ship someone an empty box and you've fulfilled your obligation as far as Paypal is concerned. Buy protection my ass... thanks, I'll keep using American Express that offers REAL buyer protection.

Re:I have to Agree - PayPal need serious help

[peg0cjs]

Just when eBay was buying PayPal, the two actually had conflicting fraud policies. PayPal wouldn't do anything after 30 days, eBay wouldn't do anything until 30 days had passed. And each of their answers were: "Deal with PayPal/eBay first, then come to us."

I even had the PayPal rep tell me that essentially, there's nothing they can do if the seller never ships anything and I should contact the police. I'm sure the police give a rat's ass about the $150 I got ripped off from some loser thousands of miles away! If it weren't for my CC fraud policy, I would have been out the entire purchase. Of course, the seller was listed as a "TRUSTED SOURCE" on PayPal, which means diddly squat.

May PayPal & eBay both rot in hell...

Re:I have to Agree - PayPal need serious help

[Rorschach1]

"May PayPal & eBay both rot in hell..."

It's the rip-off artists I want to see rot in hell. PayPal and eBay both provide useful services. Yeah, their fees could be lower and their customer service could be better. They've just got a lot of scum out there to deal with.

I made several thousand USD in PayPal sales through my own website last year. Yeah, I paid 2.9%. But I didn't have to pay monthly fees for a merchant account, and I was able to integrate their payment notifications with my own order tracking database. And being a legitimate, responsible seller, I've had no problems with customer complaints or returns. 2.9% is an acceptable price to pay for their service.

Re:I have to Agree - PayPal need serious help

[peg0cjs]

I have no problem with the fees they charge. As you said, 2.9% is acceptable (and actually quite in line with what you would pay for a merchant account elsewhere anyways). What I have a problem with is them standing up and saying: "We certify this buyer/seller as being trustworthy, please do business with them." Then when it turns out that person is a thief they pull the ole duck & cover caveat emptor crap.

If they say nothing about the reliability of a vendor, then I agree (somewhat) with buyer beware, but they are still providing the forum for this transaction, and are in fact acting as the middle-man for the whole transaction now that they have acquired PP. They bear some responsibility for fraud protection because they are the clearing house, but they are intent to dodge that to the extreme. That's what I have a problem with.

Re:I have to Agree - PayPal need serious help

[feepness]

I especially love the little blurb Paypal puts up everytime I use my American Express as my funding source, something along the lines of: "Paypal offers buyer protection up to $1000. There's no need to use a credit card, blah blah blah. Are you sure you want to switch your funding source to American Express?"

I also chuckle because I get cashback on my credit card (it adds up!) and nothing of course if PayPal withdraws from the checking account. If PayPal charges my VISA _they_ pay a fee to VISA (probably pretty low). If they take it directly from the checking account, no fee so their margin is higher.

Re:I have to Agree - PayPal need serious help

[durdur]

This is actually good advice for buyers.

As a seller, though, I didn't accept Paypal from a credit card - because a seller is on the hook if there is a chargeback due to fraud. Now, though, Paypal tells me accepting credit cards is no longer optional. And this is good for me how?

Customer Service?

[xRelisH]

giving our CS reps the flexibility and tools they need to really take care of you

eBay has Customer Service? I thought everything that I sent them regarding disputes and such were forwarded to a black hole...

Re:PayPal Spoof - Use the SafetyBar

[Anonymous Coward]

If you use Outlook or Outlook Express, PayPal offers a free, community-based tool (via Cloudmark) that will zap 99% of the spoof/fraud emails that you receive. You can download it from here: http://www.paypal.com/safetybar/

Not the case here...

[ackthpt]

We bitch more about PayPal then Ebay. How about you fix Paypal first.

Maybe you do, but I've only run the basic PayPal account and haven't held much in the way of high expectations and haven't been disappointed much.

Ebay on the other hand was like talking to the damn wall. You got an echo and that was it. Volunteers in the chatrooms rarely could do anything to make a situation right. As a buyer and seller I've found eBay to be distancing themselves from their customers more and more each year and not happy about it at all. It sucks when ebay is about the only place you can turn for some things and they've got some kinds of Sirius Cybernetics 'Share and Enjoy' approach to everything.

To be fair, most internet businesses started out with good cutomer service, before removing all phone numbers and actual email addresses. It's lovely to get nowhere online, get a phone number somewhere to call them and have a recorded voice suggest you visit their web page (which was so useless that you turned to the phone.)

strangely...

[way2trivial]

in UK, cc processors can claim the costs of CC use- in the US that's forbidden..

why the difference? a newspaper ad is a FLAT listing with a FLAT price.. and it's fixed expenses. you want an online classified ad for a fixed fee? they exist in plenty..

auction houses take more work than classifieds.. and auction houses take a CUT

lastly, ebay charges a flat fee for automobiles.

Outsourced

[dan14807]

I bet that all of those customer service reps on the phone and typing email are all based in India. Could ebay afford to do this without outsourcing it?

Re:Outsourced

[Anonymous Coward]

Well Ebay has outsourced at least one call center that I know of. Its going into Vernon British Columbia Canada. I think its set to open up this spring.

Canada the new India...

I want to work for eBay.

[Audigy]

I wouldn't mind being paid $10 an hour just to go through listings picking out the fradulent ones... tracking suspected fraudulent sellers and stuff.

They should be hiring people to do that instead of relying on their customer base to report infringing stuff.

Buyers vs. Customers

[SeanDuggan]

The problem here is that IIRC, eBay doesn't position themselves as being an intermediary. They position themselves as the medium. (I'm probably mangling the vocabulary here. I'll explain) GamesTradingZone essentially acted as an intermediary, much the same of as a newspaper's classified ads. All they're in the business for is presenting the ad. In contrast, eBay involves themselves in the tracking of the sellers and buyers and handles the transations (to the point of having bought up PayPal, the company which was most popular for shuttling payments around).

Re:Buyers vs. Customers

[magarity]

I've never had the impression that eBay was selling some used item and just using a random person somewhere in the world as a drop shipper. That would be the only case in which you should expect them to make amends for said random person somewhere cheating a buyer. Things like tracking shippers and sellers are tools for you to use in judging whether or not to bid $10million for the Faberge egg from newbie(0) or powerseller(54,321).

The only thing Ebay is good for ...

[Anonymous Coward]

... is to sell the crap you no longer need. For everything else, you can get a better price on Froogle, PriceWatch or Pricegrabber AND (very important!) you do NOT have to use PayPal (read PayPal User Agreement to learn what right you give up when you use your CC with PayPal).

they reinvented the wheel, a square one

[gelfling]

Between the process of becoming a 'vendor' on eBay and the borderline criminality of PayPal I really fail to see what is wonderful about eBay. Why even have PayPal for instance? We've been muddling along well enough with credit card purchases w/o introducing another intermediary that really does nothing except insert itself and take a fee. And if eBay's basic approach is Caveat Emptor then why bother to beef up customer support at all?

I have to say that everything I've ever sold successfully was through a local newsgroup where I could easily correspond with the person, meet them face to face and save everyone shipping costs. I really don't see why one would have to far away to sell what is, for the most part, your junk. eBay is the world's lawn sale, no more no less.

The solution for Ebay

[Anonymous Coward]

Having had a couple of close encounters with fraud on Ebay with high priced items, I am glad to see that I may not have spent my time to fill out their surveys to convey my disappointments how they handled fraud.

Ebay is actually in a perfect position to eliminate fraud. All they have to do is to get all trades through PayPal (which they own, anyway), using an escrow system.

Payment from buyers would go to PayPal escrow, seller receives notification about transfered funds, seller can then ship the item, knowing that the money is there. After buyer receives the item, buyer acknowleges it to PayPal and seller can access money.

Plain and simple. Very little room to screw buyers, who are currently in the biggest danger, since sellers always want the money first.

It could cut down on PayPal "insured trade" cases two, since PayPal receives and keeps the money during the whole process.

I hope these business process ideas can be bases of patents. I wanna be rich :) ::random.nick idea::

Re:Outsourced... that explains it

[Anonymous Coward]

That would explain why when I email them, they totally misunderstand what I am talking about. That, and send a human-chosen form letter.

All that work and it still looks ancient when

[Dralt]

compared to the Apple desktop.

Learn to live with it

[Anonymous Coward]

I do feel sorry for the parent, as I have been stung before on ebay and am currently being screwed over by another seller. The truth is that I have changed my habits to better protect myself. I can not rely on ebay to help, so I plan that they will not. I use a good visa card and I know that (should I need to) I can rely on them to invoke a charge-back. I use ebay to buy various items, it has its risks and I dislike the system for the opportunities to get burned, but I live and learn. Luckily for me everything bad has been minimal. Would I let my parents use ebay? No, never. I tell them to give me a list of stuff they want and I would get it. Do I think ebay permit crappy sellers to continue conning other? Yes. I have had good experiences, and they have been from really great sellers. It is just that ebay sits on the side, takes the money and shrugs its shoulders when others get screwed.

Re:Learn to live with it

[strelitsa]

I use a good visa card and I know that (should I need to) I can rely on them to invoke a charge-back.

Then you are smarter than me. I failed to notice that my former bank would not do chargebacks on credit card transactions. I found the relevant codicil in 2-point agate type in the middle of my cardholder agreement. As a result, I ate a $40 charge when I won a merchant's auction and paid for but never received the merchandise. The merchant pleaded empty pockets but merely cancelled their name and popped up under another one. And EBay's claim submission mechanism is useless unless you pay a nonrefundable $20 (half the transaction cost in this case) to "validate" the claim.

That was my only bad EBay experience. I have a new bank too - one that pursues and honors chargebacks.

I'm pessimistic

[Control-Z]

First of all, I hear a lot of grumbling from eBay sellers that their fees have went up so much. People are exploring other auction sites like ePier.

Secondly, eBay can't even keep the "Make Money Fast" or "Make free money taking surveys" auctions off their site. Assuming they want to. All in all, I get the impression that the volume of auctions have them overwhelmed already.

Re:PayPal Spoof - Use the SafetyBar

[dtobias]

And you really expect SlashDotters to be using Outhouse or Outhouse Excess instead of a decent mail program?

This is like...

[EmagGeek]

asking the rats to jump back onto the sinking ship..

Ebay fees were already really high... now they're really going to hurt folks who try to use ebay to make a living - using the same mentality that Ma Bells use to charge 5x as much for a business line than for a residential one: "You're using it to make money, so therefore we deserve a big cut of your profits"

Re:This is like...

[Madoc Owain]

Not disagreeing with you about the EBay fees, but I do want to set you straight about the telco residential line vs. business line, circa 1996. Until the phone network is completely packet-switched from F2 (generally the box closest to the customer) to the CO (telco central office switch) there's always going to be this situation:

There aren't enough lines for everyone.

The phone network was set up on the premise that if most of the lines will not be used most of the time, why build a dedicated line for each home? Instead, you have switches (seen those old operator switchboards? Same general principle here) that allow a few users at a time access to the phone network. For residential users, this was not a problem, except for holidays and national disasters (Mother's Day and Kennedy assasination are oft-quoted events). There was about a 50-to-one ratio of homes to lines in most areas.

Businesses on the other hand were using their phones A LOT, for much longer than the average user. So where residential might be 50-to-one, business lines' ratio would be more like 10-to-one. They're using more services, and the telco has to dedicate that much more equipment and bandwidth to a business. That's where your 5x pricing for a business line comes in to play.

Residential phone lines were money-losers but the Bells were forced to offer service at low rates and to EVERYONE. There's no incentive in an open market for the Bells to provide service to John Farmer in Outer Elbonia, the cost to run service there and maintain the lines is more than the revenue.

Now, the Bells' basic phone line charges were constrained by the regulatory commissions of their operating states, but the ADD-ONS to your service were not. Why do you think those operators would try to sell you caller ID every time you called to report your phone line out or had a question on your bill? Because it costs the telcos VERY little to offer that service, and they're allowed to make all the profit they want on them.

Again, that was circa 1996, when I worked for what is now SBC. Nowadays, the telcos industry is in disarray and you can see this in the Bells' mergers and acquisitions of cellular phone companies. My best crystal ball for these changes went away with Boardwatch Magazine (a most excellent magazine, originator of the famous "BillGatus of Borg" pic).

Re:This is like...

[EmagGeek]

Not to disagree with your logic, I am just going on what I was told by a Bellsouth rep who called me after I got my business license down in Georgia... they rudely told me that since I had a business license I had to buy a business line and pay extra, and when I asked why, their response was to tell me that because I used the line to make money, they deserve a cut. That's right from BellSouth's mouth.

Although what you're saying is probably more correct, the assumption that a business uses a phone more than a resident is not always true.

Ebay rule of thumb

[Anonymous Coward]

Ebay Rule of thumb: For any items that are sold by regular online etailers, find them with pricegrabber or some similar service. You're better off buying from them and you will likely have a better experience. If you want old stamps and random collectors items, then use Ebay and only pay with a credit card that you can challenge the payment with.

I think people use Ebay until they get burned. All of the savings of hassling with ebay for a dozen auctions are lost when a single transaction goes awry. You get burned by the other party, slam them in feedback, they slam you, you report the fraud, ebay does nothing. The heartache and hassle aren't worth it.

A lot of people have noticed this and started writing articles about it.

Where is the e-mail support coming from?

[Anonymous Coward]

India? Or some other off-shore e-mail house? Or here in the US?

Report this Phish..

[Anonymous Coward]

Report it to http://www.reportphish.org/

Intermediate Positioning

[SeanDuggan]

I'll have to reread their policy when I'm not somewhere that filters out any URL with "ebay" in it, but when I first signed up, they advertised themselves as being more of an intermediary. Yes, they made amends for cheated buyers because they'd in turn take legal action with the fraudulent seller. Because they hold that middle position, they can charge a percentage fee for the transaction rather than just charging to put up a listing. They're not a newspaper classifieds service. They're an auction house.

policy?

[Lord_Dweomer]

"We will only use auto responses to acknowledge receipt of spam or policy violation reports."

Um....is it just me, or is the only real reason people WANT to talk to a real person occur when there has been a policy violation?

Agreed, Ebay is in BIG trouble

[Ars-Fartsica]

Ebay had one good thing going - US auctions, and they have saturated and milked it for it all its worth. The only place they can go now is new markets and/or increased fees. Their new initiatives are getting mixed results - people have been burned by their terrible service for so long that many are put off by dealing with Ebay or PayPal in a new capacity. Their idea of raising fees is going over like a lead zeppelin.

Analysts have become accustomed to Ebay blowing out quarterly numbers regularly, but after the last earning's report it is obvious that this trend is over. All it takes is one prominent free auction site to really bury Ebay. The same "network effects" gravity that made people think the only useful auction site was Ebay can just as easily accelerate the departure to a new service.

By the end of 2006 Ebay will be trading in the $40s.

Why I use eBay...

[Fringe]

I agree with the concerns about the odds stacked against the buyer. And the seller. I've had a few bad deals on eBay, but they did get resolved. So why the effort?

I'm not mainstream. The musicial instrument I play is hard to find, but there's a good selection on eBay over a typical month. I listen to albums not generally for sale in the U.S. or even via Amazon, and enjoy off-beat movies. I don't use eBay a lot, but it's very handy when I do. And while there have been some issues, the damage is largely under control. The ability to find an item at all is more valuable than eliminating the risk, because even if the items were available locally, their lack of mass appeal would result in much much higher prices.

I used to work in CS at eBay

[Anonymous Coward]

The CS reps were never limited by policy to only using canned responses; they could always compose their own. The reason customers always got canned responses is because CS reps were graded (and retained/fired) based on how many "cases" they handled per hour.

You simply can't take the time to use a computerized database to investigate a customer's issue, then compose and reply with a nice, professional, readable response if you know that you have to process 15-20 cases an hour or get fired/talked to. When you only have 2-3 minutes per case, a list of "no-no" words and phrases from marketing, a slow database, and an even slower email system, you just guess what the customer's issue was, then pull a file that responds to the issue you guessed they had. No time to even think about the customer on the other end... you're trying to keep your job and your paycheck!

So you quickly become very familiar with their database of prewritten responses, many of which weren't even written by writers, but rather by staffers and those who did employee training. It was a mess, and it's come back to bite them in the ass with all the spoofing that has simply incorporated many of those same canned phrases and paragraphs that users had become accustomed to receiving.

I think shortly after I left (maybe a year and a half ago now), they outsourced a lot of the CS to Canada and India, which probably helped to some extent.

PayPal alternatives

[alexo]

In Canada, there are several alternative money transfer methods that you could use instead of PayPal. They have their limitations but they work.

Try:
- INTERAC Email Money Transfer
- HyperWallet

They may be others as well.

Spellchecking (sig)

[Anonymous Coward]

If you're using Firefox or Mozilla, you can get an extension that will check the spelling in a text entry box. All you have to do is right-click, select "Check Spelling" and you're good to go.

Not quite on topic, so this is an AC post.

Yay for cheap email typists in India...

[Anonymous Coward]

...being paid $1.00 per 100 emails they reply to...

Here's yer EBAY TEL. NUMBERS!

[Anonymous Coward]

Took me a while to track them after one buyer scammed me, the first question they asked me was how dis you get the number (in case you didnt notice they LITERALLY buried it inder a ton of other useless junk on their site.
1-800-322-9266
1-888-749-3229
--------------
An d i got this off a site:
Their toll free number is (888) 221-1161 - personally verified by experience of the admin of this site.

Their NEW regular telephone number is: (650) 864-8000 - (verify)

An automated phone number is 402-935-7733 (verified by admin)

Another regular telephone number is: (402)935-2050 - (verify)

One of their fax numbers is: (402)537-5765 - (unverified, but probably good)

Another fax number is: (650)251-1101 - (verified via whois search)

The entire block of phone numbers from (402)935-2100 to (402)935-2299 seems to be all PayPal's.

Official Financial Related E-Mail is Dangerous

[CodeBuster]

The use of email to exchange non-public information is an extremely bad idea. The suits at eBay have either not listened to their IT people or not thought this through or both. The phishers and scam artists will definitely try to take advantage of this new policy and the risk to consumers will increase. The email system was designed for informal communications and thus includes no built-in mechanisms for encryption or authentication. This means that nobody should discuss anything that they wouldn't normally discuss in a public forum where other people can overhear the conversation. It seems clear that communications between people and their financial service providers are most decidedly NOT public and must therefore be conducted using a medium which ensures some reasonable degree of privacy, security, and nonrepudiation. Unfortunately, email is not such a medium and cannot be used for confidential communications unless both parties can agree to use some sort of external cryptography solution on top of the email in which case it is no longer standard email. If eBay intends to have discussions involving non-public information with customers using email then they will be targeted by social engineers and their customers will get burned.

In effect they are an auctioneer and a bank.

[chris_sawtell]

PayPal looks like, and provides services, just like a bank.
So in effect it is a bank irrespective of what it claims to be, or not be.
eBay is exactly the same. It is an auction house.

The question then is: Why are these two entities not subject to the legislation which covers their activities?

Does this need a legeslative change? If so it's time for the People to start agitating for it.

Sign their email

[vanyel]

I sent in a suggestion that they digitally sign their email. Most modern email clients support X.509/SMIME and there's no excuse for all financial institutions in particular to not be signing their email so users can easily detect phishing. Not that there aren't still social engineering options even then, but they're harder and traceable (as long as the CA's keep doing their job properly).

Just outsource the call centers to India!

[aquarian]

ggg

gBay

[Vivski]

I'm just waiting for Google to acquire eBay and make it free.

Re:gBay

[Anonymous Coward]

There are dozens of free auctions out there and they are not used because ebay has the buyers and sellers in volume. Google buy them and make it free? You must be joking! Which investor is going to approve of a multi billion $ deal to be covered by advertising when it already has a great profit stream? The only way things could change is with a firefox/dmoz type auction where real users are involved with how the site runs.

customer service $$ = stockholder profits

[spyware scams_suck]

It is funny how they're making a big deal of this. Good customer service is just Marketing 101 -- check any marketing textbook.

Contrast eBay with Google, whose customer service has always been exemplary. Whenever I have an AdSense question, I just shoot them an email. I get back an automated response saying they've gotten my email and then later -- a couple of days at most -- I get back a response from a human. If I'm not satisfied I just mail back to the person who sent my response... haven't had any problems I couldn't deal with that way. That's the way it should be.

ebay is one of the biggest companies that does NOT spend even a reasonable percentage on customer service, let alone fraud. All those "expenses"=stockholder profits.

ebay was never known for their customer service. They foist all those duties on their free "discussion forum seller volunteers" so again, their expenses are 0 to nil. ebay couldn't care less about good customer service unless it makes them $$$. the only reason ebay's saying anything about it is because lots of the sellers complain that there's no 1-800 number for their problems and meanwhile, their fees are getting raised every year and they're getting double, triple, quadruple billed "accidentally" by ebay. what do i think of what ebay says? it's a load of BS. once the public relation steam clears, they'll make semi-valid excuses that "too many people are taking advantage and calling for no good reason and they can't handle the calls" and THEREFORE, they'll go back to their old deliberately negligent ways of "we're just a venue. if you have problems, just email us and we'll send you back an automated message."

This is a BS damage control announcement; no more

[saskboy]

Fees are going up for eBay stores, more than 3%, on February 18th, and eBay's stock value has dropped by more than $30 in just three weeks. Sellers are preparing to leave eBay in droves. This really was the last straw for many of them.

Will eBay changes stop fencing?

[Question27406]

As we all know, eBay is the world's largest, and most profitable, fence for stolen goods. Their EULA shields them from prosecution, and they make money from the sales of stolen merchandise!

I, personally, have found items stolen from me being auctioned on eBay by the thieves. Proven by matching VIN's, even! But will eBay offer ME any assistance in retrieving my stolen property? All I get is an autoresponder telling me to discuss it with my local law enforcement agency.

Meanwhile, eBay continues to profit, and felons continue to sell their ill-gotten wares on eBay.

And I'm not even going to touch the sniping issue!

eBay is fatally flawed; their demise, and the incarceration of their principals, cannot happen too soon, IMHO.

-?