Author Topic: Ebay Blowing Off Steam (Read 1428 times)

huntducks · « **on:** June 17, 2011, 07:07:33 AM »

I'm really fed up with some of the ebay sellers I have bought my last things from any seller who says got this at an estate sale or I know nothing about reloading or only puts up one poor picture then you contact ask for more and there camera no longer works.

Bought a set of dies said like new RCBS W/shellholder 1 picture outside of box only what came was a lyman sizer and a CH seater that looked like it had been used as a decoy weight and the SH was wrong, seller said the box says RCBS I know nothing about reloading all sales final.

Bought a 4cav Lyman mold W/handels I will say the price was right $24 + ship there was 2 pictures both closed it was a WC mold but the handels were worth it the mold was rusted shut 3 days of soaking in kroils finely got it open but I had to drill out the screws to get the handels off estate sale seller knows nothing about casting.

Both got - FB's

We as reloaders need to quit supporting these junk sellers.

LONGTOM · « **Reply #1 on:** June 17, 2011, 07:52:59 AM »

Quote

1 picture outside of box only

Quote

all sales final.

Those two items would have turned me away.
(BUYER BEWARE)

Did you check his trade count and feedback?
I have well over 750 transactions on EBAY with 100% feedback.
I have only had 2 bad experiences total and one of those was not the sellers fault.
USPS damaged a rare Winchester mirror in shipping.
It was packed well but had a tire tread mark across the middle of the box.
The seller refunded my money with no hassle.
The other was on a antique pocket watch.
When it arrived one of the hands was broken along with a missing crystal and it didn't run.
Seller never would return my calls.
I think he knew what he was doing!
Price was cheap, and the gold case was worth what I paid.
I guess maybe I have been lucky.
Sorry about your bad experiences.

LONGTOM

huntducks · « **Reply #2 on:** June 17, 2011, 08:40:26 AM »

Longtom well over 1000 here both buying and selling I go back to Feb. 1997 with ebay when it was really fun.

One seller had like 10,000 FB and the auction was ending in like 2min after the auction closed and looking at their FB's they were avg. about 3 neg. a month but they keep there % up buy selling a ton, the other only had 11 FB's but now they have 1 Neg.

I like the old days when you had 3 neg. you where suspended 5 you where gone people took care of Bus. then + there was not all these ebay stores selling at 10-25% over retail.

In all the years I have had only 4-5 bad ones but all in the last year or so, just like I won't buy anything from China takes months to get and most of the time you never see it they do refund your money but that takes another month of emails.

necchi · « **Reply #3 on:** June 17, 2011, 12:39:57 PM »

I've been ebayin since 99, used PayPal for the last 6 years or so. Seller don't get the money till you leave feedback and they have the "dispute" section.
I've had to use "dispute" twice to get things settled proper. Like your RCBS box with Lyman an CH stuff inside, even if they say "sales final" it's a false representation.
The tune usually changes when you have the item and they don't get the money right away. They useually bargin a different price just to be rid of the item.

Nuthin wrong with ebay, you just need to be a smart consumer. If YOU get burned who's fault is it?

Ron/Pa. · « **Reply #4 on:** June 17, 2011, 04:41:18 PM »

Sold a Turkey Call to a Canadian fellow.Shipped it out and three weeks later He claimed He never received it. I refunded His Money and never dealt again with out of the U.S. Buyers....

OldSchoolRanger · « **Reply #5 on:** June 17, 2011, 07:05:25 PM »

Had one bad experience, what I believe was intentional on the part of the seller. He sold me an Aimpoint scope that turn out to be counterfeit. The pictures looked good, so did the actual scope, the problem began when I attempted to put a battery in. There was a corroded battery stuck inside the battery compartment. It was put in backwards. I managed to get the stuck battery out, and cleaned the contacts. It still didn't work, when I sent the seller an email, he told me the battery was suppose to go in backwards.

I borrowed the same model scope from a friend, and noticed a lot of differences. When I questioned the authenticity of the scope, the seller alleged that he purchased it from a gun show. I went to "dispute" and the seller offered to refund half the purchase price. I told him I did not purchase counterfeit items. Long story short, I won the dispute and got a full refund. Don't be afraid to "dispute' the sale, even "final sale" items, as necchi said.
Good luck!

LaOtto222 · « **Reply #6 on:** June 18, 2011, 03:19:00 AM »

I am a little old fashioned I guess. I do not mind buying new equipment on the internet from reputable dealers. When it comes to buying used, I like to have it in my hand and give it a good looking over before I buy. I have only bought 2 things through E-Bay. I bought my son a used lap top computer for his graduation in 2001. It was OK, the only issue was the battery did not hold a charge for very long. The seller said that batteries were only guaranteed to hold a charge, not how long they will last. So I had to buy a battery for it. There went the price savings. Being used it was quickly out dated and of little use after only a year or so. I felt I was lucky on that purchase and did not want to push my luck again. Fast forward to a month ago. At work we had an old piece of equipment that wraps skids with film on a roll. The controller was compromised when an operator twisted a knob around so far that the wires broke off and shorted things out inside. The controller was an Allen Bradley Slick 100. They have been out of production for many years. I turned to the internet to find a replacement. Found one on E-Bay for $200.00. I bought it out right. When I got it, it looked like it had been through the worst of the Vietnam war. It did work however. I had no choice but buy it through E-Bay, because I could not find one any where else. Again I felt I was lucky. I just will not do it unless I absolutely have to. I still feel it was a gamble both times I pulled the trigger on a purchase. Like I said, I like to have that "thing" in my hand when I purchase. Buying used always makes me feel why do they want to sell it? Do they just have no use for it any more or is it a piece of crap they are trying to unload on me? I will not use E-Bay, unless I absolutely have to.

Good Luck and Good Shooting

LONGTOM · « **Reply #7 on:** June 18, 2011, 05:28:43 AM »

Quote from: huntducks on June 17, 2011, 08:40:26 AM

Longtom well over 1000 here both buying and selling I go back to Feb. 1997 with ebay when it was really fun.

One seller had like 10,000 FB and the auction was ending in like 2min after the auction closed and looking at their FB's they were avg. about 3 neg. a month but they keep there % up buy selling a ton, the other only had 11 FB's but now they have 1 Neg.

I like the old days when you had 3 neg. you where suspended 5 you where gone people took care of Bus. then + there was not all these ebay stores selling at 10-25% over retail.

In all the years I have had only 4-5 bad ones but all in the last year or so, just like I won't buy anything from China takes months to get and most of the time you never see it they do refund your money but that takes another month of emails.

Not bad for that long.
People just don't honor their word anymore.
Like my Grandfather used to say ("A MAN'S WORD IS HIS BOND, IF HE WON'T HONOR HIS WORD THEN HE IS NOTHING")

LONGTOM

huntducks · « **Reply #8 on:** June 18, 2011, 07:51:58 AM »

I disputed the dies the seller maned up and refunded the price after I told him i'll send them back you pay shipping $5 and refund all my money guess he thought about it as he said he only paid $5 for them in the first place and said just keep them.

I just had a buyer 5-6 what ever weeks ago who did not want to pay, price of Silver at close of market on a friday it was $48.48 auction ended on Sunday and silver went down $10oz by Tuesday, he was extended for 100oz from me he tried to wiggle and buy his way out with a token offer ebay got involved as he owed others about 10 days later money was in pay pal account hey you want to play speculator and i'm going to make a killing find something else, oh by the time he paid it was down $14 oz. ouch.

Ladobe · « **Reply #9 on:** June 20, 2011, 11:09:17 AM »

I started using Ebay in early '97 and used it a lot the first years. Bought and sold a lot of firearms in those days as well as other related gear. Back then a person's word was good in all but one of my experiences on Ebay. It started changing for the worse though at least a decade ago, plus the policy changes, so I used it less and less until I almost never use it anymore to buy and never use it to sell. But like anywhere now days, dealing with what amounts to strangers anywhere on-line is a hard road with lots of disappointments - from sellers sometimes, but especially from buyers.

So I stopped using all the classifieds sites on-line except for about a dozen of the forum sites with classifieds like we have here years ago. But even they have changed and have more than their share of trolls now. I'm now down to just the classifieds forums here and at one other site because all the rest are more hassle than they are worth to me. IMO GBO is the best of all of them thanks to the great admin and mostly good folks who run on GBO. But like the other sites GBO has its trolls too, folks who ignore ad details and terms and want everything for far less than fair prices, plus free shipping/insurance. I refuse to deal with them to the point that I chose instead to destroy and trash a ton of stuff this last year - all kinds of outdoor gear, reloading supplies/tools, optics and even firearms just to avoid the hassles of selling them to anyone. It's mostly sad to see a lifetime of toys acquired go in the trash, but I'd rather do that than cater to the trolls. A fun one though was getting rid of about $1200 in reloading powder in a dry lake bed out on the desert. What a show. LOL

Anyway, as bad as Ebay is now days, if you want a real experience in futility, try the Craig's List.

YMMV

L.

GeneRector · « **Reply #10 on:** June 20, 2011, 11:40:41 AM »

Howdy! I've been buying and selling on Ebay for a few years. There is no such thing anymore as a "no returns" policy. You have 45 days to open a SNAD dispute with Ebay. SNAD is significantly not as described. There is lots of Buyer protection now on Ebay. Ebay and PayPal will rule in favor of the buyer in most cases. When a SNAD is filed, Ebay usually tells the seller to accept back the item and refund the buyer. If you are the seller, I suggest that you get delivery confirmation or DC on every package you send and signature confirmation if the package value is over $250.00. Ebay has really gone down hill though, it is not as fun as it once was. Always, Gene

Grumulkin · « **Reply #11 on:** June 20, 2011, 02:08:27 PM »

I put in a bid on a high dollar item ($1,400 as I recall) that I never received. I paid by PayPal almost immediately and shortly thereafter I received a message from the seller that he couldn't accept that much money into his PayPal account and would I please pay via wire transfer to another account. I refused. The whole thing ended up being a scam and if I had not followed the rules and paid via PayPal I would have been out of luck. As it was, I eventually got my money back but it took several irritating weeks.

I have also seen fake items listed for sale on eBay and have even reported them and the listings were not removed so I don't bother reporting them any longer since I don't think eBay cares that much as long as they get their money. Some items, such as the famous fake Leupold Mark 4 scopes from China might seem OK to the fairly clueless until they sent them into Leupold for the inevitable repair and got the the bad news perhaps several months after the purchase and long after the time to file a complaint had passed.

I have bought many items on eBay and thus far haven't lost any money on them but you have to know and follow the rules and you must be very familiar with the items you're purchasing or you could easily pay way to much money for something. Since eBay eliminated barrel sales and started requiring acceptance of PayPal for payment, my eBay activity has markedly declined. It also use to be that if you got negative feedback it was there forever. It was funny how some could have several thousand sales with little or no negative feedback while others would rack up negative feedback regularly. Now, negative feedback is dropped after a year so you have a lot more people with alleged "100%" positive feedback.

OldSchoolRanger · « **Reply #12 on:** June 20, 2011, 06:55:39 PM »

Quote from: huntducks on June 18, 2011, 07:51:58 AM

I disputed the dies the seller maned up and refunded the price after I told him i'll send them back you pay shipping $5 and refund all my money guess he thought about it as he said he only paid $5 for them in the first place and said just keep them.

I just had a buyer 5-6 what ever weeks ago who did not want to pay, price of Silver at close of market on a friday it was $48.48 auction ended on Sunday and silver went down $10oz by Tuesday, he was extended for 100oz from me he tried to wiggle and buy his way out with a token offer ebay got involved as he owed others about 10 days later money was in pay pal account hey you want to play speculator and i'm going to make a killing find something else, oh by the time he paid it was down $14 oz. ouch.

Glad it worked out for you!

huntducks · « **Reply #13 on:** June 20, 2011, 07:36:59 PM »

Grumulkin

Funny as I started reading your post first thing came to mind was the fake leupolds man there was a bunch scamed on that one.

When I first started in 97 it was great sold quite a few guns and bought some killer civil war stuff I would not touch the CW stuff now with a 10 foot pole I think most of it is fake.

A friend of my wife collects Roseville pottery a year or so back she got a real good deal on some great peices she had been collecting for 30 years and knew her stuff (so she thought)they were so good it fooled her and many other roseville collectors even a so called expert she was out big bucks.

Grumulkin · « **Reply #14 on:** June 21, 2011, 03:31:17 AM »

My wife bought some jewelry on eBay that was fake. I suspect most people wouldn't have known it but she did. The thing is, the seller had a return policy so it was easily returned but shipping wasn't included. Very tricky; since they have a return policy it's hard to say they ripped you off and the expense of proving the item was fake would of course be much more than shipping so we really had no recourse.

On the other hand, she got a killer deal on another piece of jewelry which made up for the shipping ripoff many times over. In fact, it was one of the first things I helped her buy on eBay. She knew how much it was worth and was pretty stunned by price she got it for. She fussed and fidgeted for the few days it took to get here thinking all the while her good fortune couldn't be true.

Speaking of fake Leupolds, there was a fake on eBay yesterday with the last bid I saw being over $500 so someone paid a lot of money for a scope I wouldn't put on my gun at any price. Apparently eBay had a new policy and one is allowed to change a description of an item even after bids have been placed. When I first saw the auction, the seller had listed the serial number as 8888SC, if I remember correctly which is one of the fake numbers. Before the auction ended, that piece of information had been deleted and there were various weasel statements such as he bought it at an auction and didn't know anything about it and that the sale was final with no return.

huntducks · « **Reply #15 on:** June 21, 2011, 09:32:25 AM »

I don't like it now that they hide the buyers ID in the past I would contact a buyer and ask them how something turned out or was holding up like the SS kitchen sink we bought at a ebay store, I contacted 3 buyers that bought like 60 days before all 3 said there sinks were great 5 years later and mine cleans up like new.

My son bought his wifes engagement ring on a ebay auction paid like $4000 for it took it to a local jeweler and had him appraise it as the store on ebay said it was worth $14,000 the jeweler gave him a written appraisal for $17,500.

wild willy · « **Reply #16 on:** June 22, 2011, 03:06:02 PM »

If I ask a seller a question and they don't answer I don't bid.I don't care how good of rating they have If I'am not worth answering then their not worth my bid

wncchester · « **Reply #17 on:** June 24, 2011, 04:46:56 PM »

Ebay sellers don't much concern me, if I don't know about or can't identify exactly what I'm interested in, and the general condition, I will never bid. But then I haven't bid at all in maybe the last 3-4 years; trying to buy used reloading tools, dies, etc, that frequently end up selling for more than retail even before adding shipping costs doesn't attact me! I have no bad thoughts about the dealers tho, it's the buyers who set their own prices.

SteveHawaii · « **Reply #18 on:** June 24, 2011, 05:07:12 PM »

I haven't bid on anything in years. I go for the "buy now" option. I only use Ebay if I can't get the product from a reputable online store or it's super expensive elsewhere. I always pay with PayPal and pay close attention to shipping costs. No problems since.

Ladobe · « **Reply #19 on:** June 24, 2011, 09:53:03 PM »

Steve brings up a point for Ebay... often long discontinued items can only be found someplace like it easier than any where else. Back when I used it I made some incredible buys on old items that were made far better than they are now days. I would never have found them without Ebay, and maybe not even if I visited every antique, thrift or pawn shop in the country.

Another good practice if you use Ebay is to call a seller before you bid on anything questionable, or on high dollar items. You can tell a lot more about a seller from his voice and demeanor on the phone than from pages of his written word. If he won't give you his phone number don't bid. My biggest purchase on Ebay was $11,000 (for a $24,000 item). Before I bid I asked the seller for his phone number, he gave it to me, I called and got all my questions answered satisfactorily, a bunch of pictures sent to me and arranged for a local friend there to go check the item out in person for me. So I felt very secure in bidding on the item after that first conversation and before my friend checked it out, and even more so from follow up calls to work out the shipping (which was another $1300). The seller went way out of his way for me all through the whole process and afterwards, and I'm sure that was because we established level ground between us on that first call I made to him as much as the fact that he is an honest man.

FWIW