Everything eBay! Scams, questions, etc...

[Jeff]

You could always open a new "free Checking" account at your bank to be your dedicated eBay deposit account, if you don't want your other info out there. Like a burner cellphone, but for banks!

I have a friend who does exactly this.  Opened a second 'free' checking account that he only uses for eBay, PayPal, Venmo, etc.  Then he can move money around between the two accounts as needed with his bank app.

[Nicklab]

I do this, too.  It’s a good firewall between my eBay business and my household finances. 

[I Am Sith]

Great idea guys, thanks!  I appreciate the responses.

[I Am Sith]

Welp, it was bound to happen.  Just got a frantic flurry of messages from a buyer talking about how they were deceived and sold defective product and are threatening action with ebay if I don't give them a refund.  The person haggled the hell out of me for every nickel before the sales, waited a week after they received the items to reach out to me, and threatened action unless I responded within minutes of receiving their messages.  Nothing that hasn't happened to many of you before, just sucks that it continues to go on...

[Rob]

I had this happen to me for the first time ever this week as well.  I sold a factory sealed set that came with figures and he accused me of having swapped the figures for a generic Princess Leia and then selling it to "scam his ten year old son".  Lots of over the top language, lots of accusations, lots of shouting.  It seemed performative to me, like he was building a case for eBay to side with him in the messages.  The only way he's not lying is if someone returned one to Hasbro, they didn't notice, then sent it to me, but I find the idea that he's lying much more plausible.

I called eBay and they told me to accept the return but then to call them back after it gets here and that they'd mark him down as having pulled this scam and not me.  Since he's obviously going to send me back an open item with the wrong pack-ins...

Having Top-Rated-Seller protection and a 25 year old account in good standing is apparently going to save me on this one.

[Dave]

Scammers could take your stuff and send you back a bag of dog **** and eBay would say you're forced to take the item back.  Maybe eBay will flag their account as a known a-hole, but its easy to set up a new eBay account so I'm not sure that is really a deterrent. 

It is odd that someone would bother to haggle before screwing you over because they'll get their money back either way. 

Its the sad reality that massively positive feedback, a 25 year account, etc. gets you nothing these days with eBay.

I think the reality is that if you're selling on eBay you just need to accept that you're going to get screwed every so often and should be really careful about selling really expensive stuff.  You're already paying 15% in fees to eBay, and then getting stuff stolen adds to that overhead which is frustrating as a seller.

Knock on wood but I've managed to escape mostly unscathed from this summer's Lego sales I've been doing on eBay (although I'm putting the really expensive stuff on Bricklink).  Only one customer returned their stuff in the same condition I got it.  He bitched that the box was damaged more than expected when the the description and photos clearly showed the damage.  Whatever, I just relisted it and sold it to someone else.

[McMetal]

Knock on wood but I've managed to escape mostly unscathed from this summer's Lego sales I've been doing on eBay (although I'm putting the really expensive stuff on Bricklink).  Only one customer returned their stuff in the same condition I got it.  He bitched that the box was damaged more than expected when the the description and photos clearly showed the damage.  Whatever, I just relisted it and sold it to someone else.

I just got finished with a really unpleasant selling experience with my UCS Tantive IV on eBay that has really left a bad taste in my mouth. I had a guy that was sending me a lot of emails even before I made the sale to him, and it continued afterwards as well. Just wanted all kinds of details about the shipping, etc. super high maintenance.

Wouldn’t you know there was an issue…FedEx damaged the box in transit, refused to deliver it, and then shipped it back to me. The LEGO box was totally trashed and long story short I ended up having to refund the guy $500 because of all the damage and then turn around and reship it via UPS out of my own pocket. What a nightmare.

The ironic postscript to this story is that I saw the package was delivered Monday but didn’t hear anything from him so I finally emailed him Wednesday night to make sure everything was alright and he was like oh I’ve been busy and haven’t even bother to open it. (!!) anyway he finally left me positive feedback last night so at least that part is done.

I filed a claim with FedEx for the shipping charge plus the amount I had to refund the buyer as a result of their negligence but I am not expecting to get all that money back. Apparently they cap their claims at $100 unless you spring for extra insurance which tbh I don’t even recall seeing an option for when checking out on eBay.

Always buy insurance for expensive items - lesson learned. Seems obvious but this has only ever happened to me once before in twenty plus years of selling stuff on eBay. @#$&* FedEx man. 

[Dave]

You've got a much bigger pair than I've got.      I won't list anything that expensive on eBay.  My threshold is about $350.

I've got my UCS Blockade Runner listed on Bricklink.  I don't think there are any scams anyone can pull on Bricklink so I figure once I ship it my hands are clean.  I always offer insurance at the buyers expense.

With eBay you're on the hook for everything and selling a $1700 set there would give me an ulcer.  Although I just had a guy buy 23 individual sets for that much so I guess you can always get screwed somehow if someone is trying to do so.

[Jeff]

Peter Mayhew Foundation, auctions a carded vintage Chewbacca item for charity, gets eBay scammed -

https://x.com/TheWookieeRoars/status/1841113224130756875

Ripping off a charity auction?  That's a new low...  special place in hell for that guy.

[Rob]

That's pretty gross, and really it's the one big issue with eBay maybe outside of the fees - it's easy to steal.  It's getting to the point where I think that any expensive items I'll be taking extra photos and recording myself sealing the box up. 

I got the disputed item returned to me yesterday, and the buyer returned the swapped figures instead of the ones it should have come with.  So I uploaded photos of the incorrect item that was sent at their request and ultimately eBay ate the cost, letting me keep my money and still refunding the seller his.  I was surprised they were willing to do that.

The guy was insanely rude through the whole thing, and I know 100% that I didn't swap figures to scam someone for a few bucks with my 24 year old account that has top-rated seller status.  The only possibilities are that he swapped the figures, or Hasbro sent me a return that someone else had swapped and no one caught it.  I can't prove anything one way or the other and he left me negative feedback that they won't remove despite having done everything the way I always do everything on that site. 

[Dave]

Brutal with the charity auction. I hope eBay feels like **** about their system that allows for this.

I just got an email to rate eBay's "buyer guarantee" process for my most recent sold item returned to me my a dumbass buyer.  I lit them up as much as possible about the totally one sided aspect of their guarantee.   

I really wish there were other alternatives to eBay where they might feel some competition and get back to their old model where people just worked it out.  If a seller wasn't reputable they would get a crappy rating and nobody would buy from them or anyone with no feedback.