Trouble for Ebay sellers

[gbwatson96]

Recently, I tried to sell some concert tickets on Ebay. They needed to be sold fairly quick since they are time sensitive items.

Well, the high bidder wins the auction and I never hear a word from the guy. I contact Ebay to get his personal information and call the guy. Well, it's someone else phone number that does not know this guy at all. Check on the phone directory and the address the guy gives is even bogus. Meanwhile, I start getting a bunch of emails from other sellers asking me if I have heard from this guy. I tell both of them no. So, this guy bids on 3 sellers items and never pays.

I contact Ebay and let them know that the guys information is totally bogus. No response. I email them again that this guy gave bogus information on his profile and he needs to be taken off Ebay so he don't do this again to someone else. Ebay mails me back:
"Thank you for writing eBay in regard to the contact information of
stilljeff and to the refund of your Final Value Fee.

Thank you for your report. We're concerned about any possible violation
of eBay policy and are sincerely grateful to our members for help in
spotting problems.

We take these complaints very seriously and investigate every report we
receive. If we find that a violation has occurred, we will take
appropriate action.

Due to privacy concerns, we can't discuss one member's account with
another member, so we won't be able to share the results of our
investigation with you. I hope that this assures you that your account
history will also remain private.

Please note that I've forwarded your email to the team that specializes
in these types of situations. They'll be in touch with you about the
refund of your Final Value Fee.

It is my pleasure to assist you. Thank you for choosing eBay."

I go back on Ebay a week later and the same clown is still on Ebay as a registered user. No negative feedback because they took that away from sellers. Now you can bid irresponsibly on Ebay and get away with it. If I were to do the same, I would have my account suspended. All my emails with Ebay have basically ignored my concern about protecting sellers. The issue is always ignored and never address. It is obvious that Ebay does not care about protecting their sellers (where their revenue come from mainly). As a seller, I have no faith in Ebay screening users so that it will be a safe place to buy and sell. The burden of proof and foot work to correct non-paying bidders is solely on the seller. Translated into english: the seller is guilty until proven innocent.

I understand that sellers have abused feedback with buyers. It's probably a legit problem, but taking the ability to leave feedback from sellers is not the way and making them spend a week filing disputes, etc. For a sale of $5.00 on Ebay, this is hardly worth your time. My time is much more valuable. Sellers beware, Ebay policies just made it easier for dishonest people to abuse sellers on Ebay.

 

[itadakimasu]

that sucks. did you have other bidders you could have sent second chance offers to?

idk if i've ever had a dead-beat buyer.... one guy bought a computer from me and somehow deducted the shipping and i refused to ship it for free and had to cancel the transaction and that was hell... didn't want to be charged $20 in fees because some guy didn't want to pay shipping.

all my other transactions have been pretty good though.

 

[gbwatson96]

Fortunately, I was able to put it Buy It Now option out there and sold the tickets. I took less money because I did not want to get stuck with the ticket. Other sellers were not so lucky...


My problem lately has been zero feedback customers not paying for auctions they bid on. Way too many. The problem is that Ebay's new system for getting deadbeats off Ebay is all on the seller to make it happen. Seller has to file for final value credit (process takes about 2 weeks to go through at the least) and show that the item was not paid for. Then, once that is done a non-paying strike against the buyer is placed in their profile. The major problem I see here is that other sellers have followed the new Ebay process and there is nothing against this buyer, yet. It's been a month since the auction ended and buyer is still a registered user able to do this again. This whole time Ebay has known that the user's account information is totally bogus-none of his personal information is legit & you cannot find the guy. That is my beef here. Now, if I don't pay for something, I would be suspended immediately (with credible feedback-1 negative in 493).

How many other bogus buyers are bidding on Ebay? Just to run sellers through this whole big hassel and waste of time? I imagine there are several more than we think.

 

[itadakimasu]

there are alot of accounts being hijacked/renamed.

i bought a computer a few weeks ago, $100 + free shipping! what a deal, right?

until the seller sends me an email requesting payment to another email other then what is linked to their ebay...

first red flag.

I go back to look at the listing, seller has 0 feedback and also says phillipines for location. red flag 2 and 3...

ship a computer (15-20lbs) from phillipines to us for free? ... right.

needless to say he didn't email again even though i didn't pay. I checked again and he's got like 3 negatives for people paying and not receiving items.

 

[gbwatson96]

Well, I have had my account hijacked 2 times with Ebay myself. There are many scams coming from Asia and Russia these days, as well. The Philippines is no exception. BTW, it is excessively expensive to ship to and from the Philippines. The free shipping is a red flag for sure......


It's amazing how common that is. There are so many issues surrounding the safety of people of Ebay that I am loosing the faith quickly! The clown that did not pay for his item (the reason for the original post) is still on Ebay. Talked with one of the other sellers that was not paid for the auction, the seller followed Ebay's steps for final value credit and to get negative feedback placed on this user's profile. There is no negative feedback of any kind and he is still a registered user! This isn't just wrong and it's gross. I would like to see just how much they really bother checking people's profiles for bad information. Even when they get word that the information is bogus, they don't do anything about it and leave more sellers open for trouble.


I would not get on a soapbox for something like this, but here lately there this is happening far too much to me. Who else is this happening to? Am I that special that I get all the loosers bidding and not paying for items? That is my real curiosity: how many people get bogus buyers bidding on items and don't pay (or have bogus profiles)?