Word on the street – the seller’s side of the street perhaps, is that ebay is “one-sided” for buyers. At least one person told me that, who coincidentally sells more than he buys. I asked for details but was refused.
So word up, what is da STRAIGHT dope? Is ebay one sided against sellers (and for buyers)? What does that even mean?
Yes it’s very one-sided, as is Paypal which they own. My company sells about $30,000 worth of refurbished merchandize on ebay and does a few hundred thousand dollars worth of sales via Paypal on our online store. People can buy our products direct from the manufacturer if they want with either credit card or paypal, the minority select paypal but those that do really like it, so we offer it. The overwhelming majority of our sales are to distributors or larger retailers.
eBay and PayPal are both very biased toward awarding any disputes in favor of the buyer. I’m not sure how to put it except that the odds are stacked in favor of the buyer. For me, it’s a small part of my business and whenever they unfairly decide against me I consider it a cost of doing business. In my experience a lot of other people who sell on ebay as an individual, even if it’s a primary or major source of revenue for them, have a much harder time being detached about it and get upset. That’s why sellers, in my experience, seem to be quite angry about it.
But put it this way, when someone does a chargeback on a credit card purchase we either win the reversal or lose because it was an actual fraudulent charge and I don’t feel any personal grief. Unfortunate, but a cost of doing business and I don`t want some innocent person to be out the money either.
On the other hand, I can’t recall ever losing an ebay or paypal dispute and not feeling it was wrongly decided. I can only recall 1 or 2 credit card chargebacks I feel were wrongly decided.
There’s also the fact that if you’re the seller, you can’t leave negative feedback for the buyer. You either give positive or none at all. Well, technically you could click positive and then in the notes say something negative, but would only work if people bother to read the comments.
And even that will not work. If the seller gives a buyer positive feedback but includes a negative comment with it, ebay will delete the comment.
Yes, ebay has become very one-sided in favor of buyers.
Gives me a warm feeling, it does. 
I tend to disagree.
First of all if sellers didn’t abuse feedback and use it to hold people hostage this would’ve never happened. While you as an individual seller may not have did this most I found did.
Second if you have more than a couple of chargebacks a year, you really need to look at, your product description or what you’re selling. How come you have so many chargebacks? Could it be you’re describing something incorrectly to most people?
The problem is online sellers have to look at eBay as a business. In real life brick and m mortar stores (B&M) you have shrinkage. No one who had a B&M store would dare to think he’s gonna go through the entire year without any shrinkage but if it happens once online these sellers screen bloody murder.
At lot of online sellers refuse to accept YOU THE SELLER are responsible for the delivery and receipt of an item to my doorstep. If I don’t get it, you’re the one that must take the loss. That’s the law.
Too many sellers on eBay are on razor thin profit margins. If a bump of 1% in costs or fees is gonna put you in danger of losing your business you are selling a poor product.
Sure a seller can claim non-receipt but he can only do it once. Shrinkage, non-delivery and chargebacks are a cost of doing business. You must figure that in when you set your prices.
Of course if you do this, you sell less. So most sellers don’t do this and complain when they lose something.
I as a buyer probably got ripped off to the tune of $50.00 before paypal, after which I was never ripped off again.
In addition sellers were pulling things like, “It didn’t sell for enough so I’m not selling it.” If you complained the item suddenly became “lost” or “damaged” only to reappear in a week at a new auction.
Seller pulled too much on buyers. BUYERS is what drives eBAY not sellers.
And while I understand you as an individual seller may be exceptional, far too many sellers were abusing the system.
Yes, this happened. I think that I came up with a better solution…both buyers and sellers can leave feedback, but it’s not exposed until either both leave feedback, or one has opened up a dispute with eBay which then got settled one way or the other. Even just having the feedback not being revealed until both had left it would have ended just about all of the practice of hostage feedback.
I really hate PayPal, and I resent that most sellers don’t allow other options. PayPal is evil, and I usually won’t use it. I’ve quit browsing eBay for the most part. I used to check it about 3 times every 2 days, but now I go weeks and months without doing my favorite searches.
I haven’t sold on eBay for several months now, but one of the changes they enacted in the last year or so is that sellers are now not allowed to accept checks by mail as an alternative form of payment, which means that for most sellers, it’s PayPal or nothing. When I still had a few auctions up, I got some automated nastygrams from eBay informing me that I had language in the item descriptions that seemed to indicate that I would accept checks or money orders by mail, and that this language had to be removed, or the auctions would be cancelled.
This is but one of the many reasons I don’t sell on eBay anymore.
Are there more buyer or sellers using eBay? Answer that, and you’ll have your answer.
Technically you can accept other forms of payment, you’re just not allowed to list any of them in your auctions. If a buyer contacts you and wants to send you a money order or check you can accept payment that way.
But yeah, that pretty much does away with everything but paypal payments.
Well, that certainly explains why I don’t see language that indicates that checks are acceptable. This sucks, for both buyer and seller.
I only sell now and again, but before they stopped allowing other forms of payment I set my auctions to only allow for PayPal as a form of payment. I wanted payment quickly, and have to wait days or a week or so for a check or money order to come in the mail. Also, even though you can defraud someone on Paypal, it seemed safer to me than risking getting a fake check or money order.
But I do think it sucks that checks, cashier’s checks, and money orders are no longer an option for people who want them. That’s obviously a blatant move to increase business for PayPal.
Cite? :dubious: Especially this “law” you speak of? Hint: look at the Uniform Commercial Code, and at the INCOTERMS.
What really happens is that that big, large companies will often assume responsibility for ensuring that something gets to your door in the interests of customer satisfaction, but unless there are specific contract provisions stating otherwise, the seller’s responsibility ends at the point the merchandise is in the shipper’s possession. That’s the law.
I sell quite a bit on eBay as a hobby, flipping interesting thrift times and some electronics and the process is very buyer centric. As a seller that means (to me) you have to adjust your perspective to be in line with that reality. Beyond that it is very much a business and if you’re going to get emotional about disputes (and it’s very hard not to when being unfairly accused) you need to be doing something else.
I have near perfect feedback and on the very rare occasions someone has ever been unsatisfied I usually roll over and refund the item immediately even if it was “as is”. It didn’t mean I wasn’t pissed off when some jackass was making crap up, but you have to think of the big picture. The best way to prevent any buyer dissatisfaction is to be very, very complete in your description along with good photos etc.
I’ve stepped away from eBay for long stretches when I had enough of the grind, and the fees, because often at the end of the process there’s less money in it than you think (as a hobby) after you subtract your time and the various fees etc. On the other hand, to be perfectly honest, there is nothing even close in terms of reaching the number of buyers. Paypal fees are a PITA but overall they are an efficient service.
Since I’ve moved to using a postal scale and using USPS Priority with delivery confirmation and tracking and (most importantly) printing up my own shipping labels via the eBay applet, I have had zero issues with lost (or claimed unreceived) merchandise. The savings in printing up your own online labels vs taking them to PO clerk for processing are very substantial. Plus tracking and delivery conf. are free if you use online USPS Priority.
I’ve sold and bought on ebay; my rating is something like 150, but reality would peg it at more like 200 some if I was good about reminding people to rate me and such. So I’ve probably sold about 90 items and bought 110, roughly. I’ve had complaints (ALWAYS from new people who feel their item should be shipped the SAME day and should arrive in 2-3 days, despite the fact they paid for the cheapest shipping option), but only 2 negative feedback things in the several years (one was fair, one was not).
Once, someone complained they hadn’t received the item and demanded the tracking number. I clearly stated in the auction that tracking was an addition whatever, 50 cents or a buck, but that it was not included if they didn’t pay for it. I had the rating of 130 some at that point, they had a rating of 5. So I email back that they didn’t pay for tracking, and, moreover, the proper time hadn’t elapsed for the shipping method they’d paid for, so it still had several days to arrive before they could worry. They opened up a paypal (not an ebay) dispute, and paypal demanded the tracking number. I again explained they didn’t pay for tracking, and they automatically won. Unreal. I had the higher rating, I had dealt with the system for years. Bullshit. She eventually got the item too, bitch. IMO, everything went downhill when Meg Whitman left. She seems like a nutty California candidate, but goddamn was she a businesswoman.
I am loathe to sell on ebay anymore; I use Amazon for selling used books and Craigslist for everything else whenever possible. I still buy from ebay - but much less, and only things that are TRULY good deals, like cell phone and ipod chargers, cases, etc.
ETA: What? People still use checks? I give one check a month to my landlord and that’s it.
Wait…what’s this about? Why is Paypal evil? I’ve used it to buy a few things, and it seems to work well enough.