Everything eBay! Scams, questions, etc...

[EdSolo]

USPS can be a pain.  Only experience was with an international shipment on a MR item.  Acrylic cover got damaged in transit.  USPS refused to do anything because buyer didn't take the item back to his post office to document the damage even though he had sent me the pictures which I then sent to USPS.  We had to go round and round with USPS for at least a month until they finally paid the insurance, which buyer had paid for to insure for purchase price.

I don't bother with ebay for selling any more.  I have found FB marketplace to be much easier.  I have sold everything from a few Hasbro figures up to more expensive MR items.  Haven't had any troubles.

At this point, it feels like you almost need to take a video of you packing the item in a box, sealing it, and putting the label on it for shipping.  At the very least, you have the the receipt that shows shipping zip code and weight of the package so he can't say you shipped an empty box.

[I Am Sith]

Happened again.  Buyer bought a lot of 9 items ($275), was delivered, and then the buyer opened a refund request saying they received an empty box.  Said the box had been tampered with.  I really ******* hate people that do stuff like this.  So glad I'm almost done selling everything I had up.  Not going to list anything again...

The saga continues...  After disputing the refund request and ebay issuing a resolution in my favor, the buyer immediately opened a disputed payment request stating that the items they received were not as described in the listing.  Again, they stated that they received a box that had been tampered with and was empty.  The curveball with this request is that he opened it with his financial institution and they are working with ebay on a 'fraud' investigation on behalf of the buyer.  So now I have to wait up to 8 weeks for this to be resolved and still might be on the hook to issue a refund because the buyer is either lying or he was the victim of theft after the items were delivered.  I don't really understand how ebay can allow this to continue when they already closed the first dispute.  Doesn't seem right that they continue to let this drag out.

[Nicklab]

I'm still waiting on one of my sales to get to my buyer.  It was an international order through eBay's Global shipping program.  Destination is Quebec, Canada, so not exactly that far away.  And yet it still has not been delivered to my buyer. 

Glad to see eBay has somewhat detailed tracking.  It got hung up in Customs for a few days, and then disappeared for 3 weeks.  Oh, and DHL is involved.  SMH...

[Dave]

Is the Canada post office still on strike?  I sold a couple Lego sets to a Canadian before Christmas and had to ship UPS because Canada post was on strike.  Had to ensure that it wasn’t one of those UPS options that involves final delivery by the post office.

[McMetal]

Any of you guys sell any loose Lego sets on eBay before?

I have a couple that are already assembled that I am getting ready to list and assume it is ok to ship them that way too? I’m not expected to break them down or anything am I?

Might be a stupid question but better safe than sorry I figure. Thanks!

[Dave]

Selling built is fine.

I've sold most of my Legos on eBay (and Bricklink), and when I sell loose/complete sets I actually assemble them to ensure all the parts are there, take photos, and then partially bust them up as necessary to fit in a package.  I've never had anyone complain that I sent them not completely busted up sets.

[Jedi Idej]

I've been hesitant to sell on eBay. 1) fees, 2) scammers.

I've purchased plenty, though.

On one instance I bought a vintage playset for a good price. Described as complete, clean, blah, blah, blah. His pics showed this. A few days later the seller canceled the auction, saying the item was dirty and in bad shape. I figured he came across another buyer who offered more.

Another time I received the wrong toy. I spoke with the seller, and after sending it back, he sent me the correct $40 ship and refunded my payment!

A third issue was when the seller mixed up addresses and sent me an item that was a few dollars. He tried contacting the other buyer to retrieve my item but the douche wouldn't respond. The seller immediately refunded my payment. I did feel bad he was out the $150 for the item I won.

Lots of good people, but the few bad apples spoil the process for me. Maybe one day...

[EdSolo]

I have never shipped a loose set assembled.  My worry is it would break apart during shipping and then the buyer would claim pieces are missing.  The only downside is during breaking down the set, if you run into those brittle dark red or brown pieces that break.  I just built a set this week that had no fewer than five dark red pieces break during assembly and disassembly.  Fortunately I had some other open sets with the same pieces that I could temporarily steal from as I ordered spare parts.

For my loose stuff, I do a full assemble and take a picture.  Then I take a picture of just the minifigs with the instruction books.  Lastly I take a picture of front and back of box.  I disassemble and put all minifigs in a small ziplock bag and then try to go through the instructions backwards to put all the bricks in ziplocks and label them 1 of 3, etc. depending on how big the set is.  If there are more than one book of instructions, I try to put the bricks from book 1 in one bag and from book 2 in another.  Doing a full breakdown makes it like you are shipping a sealed set if you have kept the box.  One thing I found out this week, is weight really doesn't matter for large boxes.  I had someone ask if I could ship bricks in one box and the actual box in another due to the large shipping cost because of having to use a large dimension box.  I notice when I changed the box weight, the price didn't change at all.  I went from 10 lbs down to 0.5 lbs and it was the same price.  I then tried raising the weight to 25 lbs. and it was still the same price.  It was all based on the box dimensions.

As for selling on ebay, I avoid it like the plague.  Way too many scammers.  I feel that you literally have to take a video of yourself packing up a box with your item and even then ebay/paypal will probably still rule in the scammers favor.  At this point, I have sold 134 sets, both loose and sealed.  I have done it all through FB marketplace.  I even sold a Cloud City set with the expensive Boba Fett mini figure that I had to ship.  I haven't had a single complaint about anything.  FB marketplace can be set to global, so I have had hits from all over the world for stuff.  I have sold and shipped MR items overseas from FB marketplace.  There are no fees, except for the normal fees from using Paypal.  It is really the way to go in my opinion.

[Nicklab]

OMFG, these F-ing people!


As a seller I have found that offering up a Best Offer option has helped me move some items.  But that does not seem to mean anything to the cavalcade of tire kickers and bottom feeders who think they can get a special deal by slipping into my DM's! 

"My offer got automatically declined!  What's the least you'll take?"

Or then there's the guy who wants a bundle deal (which I will entertain via DM's), who then asks what I want for that bundle.  To which I have to respond "You already know what my asking price is.  If you're interested please make an offer".

Do people not understand Negotiation 101?  I put a price out there, you make an offer.   It's really not that f***ing complicated.

[Dave]

I've really tightened up my "Best Offer" minimums due to all the garbage offers/DMs I received.  I used to offer up a much broader window to encourage some negotiation but you could see people just trying to find the bottom of your offer range and then getting pissy when you didn't accept it.

Most of the things I'm selling have a fairly well established market value and that is the way I price my stuff.  If you're trying to get a 50% discount because you'll PAY RIGHT NOW I'm really not that interested.  I don't need the money to pay rent and am willing to wait a little longer to get roughly fair market.

[Nicklab]

I've been doing the same thing with my Best Offers.  My asking prices are fairly well researched, and the BO's range between 10 - 20% off of that asking price.  The best tool I've found when dealing with some of the DM negotiators is reviewing their offer history.  If the offer history is just ridiculous, then I know pretty quickly who I'm dealing with.  And the "probing offers" to find the bottom of the BO range is telling, too, like you said.  When I see someone who has made 3 or more BO's that get automatically declined?  I may very well decline their offer that just hits the best offer threshold out of principle.

Oh, and don't get me started on the people who send the sob stories!  Once I see those?  I feel like the only way to deal with them is to just block them.

[McMetal]

Yep, I’ve dealt with that too and it can be super annoying. I think eBay has instituted a limit on the # of offers you can make on an item to help combat that, but it still happens.

Some lady messaged me Thursday evening asking me if I could get an item to her in WI in time for her husband’s birthday the following week. I told her I would pack it up right away and get it ready to ship out the following morning. She said she couldn’t pay me until the following day (red flag) but I got it ready anyway and of course never heard from her again. 

Oh, and some guy messaged me from Norway and asked me if I would help him sell his stuff on eBay because he saw I had some similar items listed. What? 

[EdSolo]

My favorite is when you list something, and then less than an hour later someone offers half the listed value and then says, "well, your listing did say $x or best offer".  They really don't like the response of half off is way too low, and I just listed it an hour ago.  A lot of times it is on a set that will sell easily, like AT-TE or Dropship or something that has a rare mini figure that commands a high price.

Generally, I am more apt to give a deal to someone buying multiple items.  Between bricklink and sold ebay items, my sets are priced pretty well.  I would say overall, I have probably received 90+% of my listing prices on average for everything I have sold.

[Rob]

Yeah I always set the minimum offer at like about half of the asking price.  It weeds out the ridiculous people while inviting people who are looking for a better deal to negotiate.  Usually the furthest I'll go is around 20% off of what I'm looking for, unless something has been sitting for a long long time - but once a month or so I lower asking prices anyway, so that 20% rule of thumb generally holds.

[Nicklab]

I've been trying to keep the best offers within 25% of my asking price.  But I've been more actively looking at the traffic my listings get, along with the number of watchers, and researching sold prices.  Even then, it's difficult making sense of why the same item can sell for a lot more in one listing compared to another when I look through the sold listings.