GWR-fan

I do find it ironic that while these are intended to be and actually are generic coaches, the livery is being discussed as if the models are prototypical. I can understand the modeller's "need" to be as accurate as is possible, however, these are not scale models. I applaud Hattons for their bravery in releasing generic models as no doubt they knew that they would be in for some criticism, mostly of which is constructive.

I believe the word "bond" is significant in describing a glues success in joining two difficult to attach plastics. To me, bond implies intermollecular attachment giving a superior strength to the join. I really cannot see how a manufacturer can use the term when in all probability there is no chemical interactions at the join surface. I think a more appropriate term is "stick", as no doubt a join is made but it has no real strength and subject to failure when stress is applied to the join. When joining styrene type plastics a solvent is used to "weld" the pieces together. I used to use a plumbers priming liquid (about 60% acetone) to join ABS plastics when doing a lot of modification to LGB locomotives and rolling stock. This was far less expensive than using proprietary ABS glues such as from Plastruct, which are predominantly acetone anyway. Several years ago when building radio control fast electric boats with some made from ABS type plastics, I used an expensive West System epoxy glue that was also suitable for bonding polyethylene type plastics. To use on slippery plastics, the polyethylene surface needed to be sanded with a very coarse 80 plus grit paper and the plastic surfaces to be joined "burned" with a blow torch. This gave a superior bond but no doubt the process would be totally unsuited to model trains. The advertising with the product demonstrated a polyethylene kayak/canoe being sawn in half with a chainsaw, The surface was prepared and the epoxy applied. The canoe was then thrown from a bridge and having survived the fall was then used. If it takes so much trouble to join these slippery plastics then I fail to see how a glue as referenced could successfully "bond" a surface. Any join would be temporary and not subject to stress of any kind.

Viewing the image of the Mobil version on Rails website, it seems that Oxford maybe have a similar issue to Dapol wagons in that the NEM couplers droop. The Carless version shown does not seem to droop.

Playing the devil's advocate, Quote: "Condition is Good used. In all original packaging." The definition "good" in auction terms leaves a very wide margin, even allowing for the damage to the item and missing detail items, along with handling/playwear marks. Even an item described as "excellent" is still liable to have minor scratches and handling/playwear marks. Where the seller has faulted is not his misrepresentation of the item in his description, but his seeming dishonestly in refuting that the item imaged was not the item he sent. If I was listing an item such as a loco for sale I would provide numerous images showing various views of the loco plus the underside. The buyer in hindsight maybe should have requested additional images given the seeming lack of images supplied by the seller. As far as the detail items missing or damaged on the boiler forward of the cab, I have received new items with similar damage as these details are very fragile. I have also received the T9 with the front truck adrift. the retention is a poor design. The T9 is a beautiful model but alas is very fragile and prone to damage. I once received a Battle of Britain class loco, described as new, where the seller connived to image the loco so that the missing air deflector would not be evident. He then accused me of damaging the item as he stated that the item was sent intact. When challenged he stated that surplus replacement loco bodies were available in the UK for around $130.00 shipped. I objected that I should not have to buy a replacement body when the seller had been negligent in selling me a defective item. He then refunded most of the money I had paid, even though my claim was only for the cost of a replacement body.

Unfortunately, with eBay Australia to sell an item typically it has to be either a bargain price (half retail for a similar new replacement) or an item available no where else. This applies to both locomotives and rolling stock.

Well, I envy those who get promotional offers. I limit myself to the 40 listings each month free of listing insertion fees. In the end I pay close to 15% when you add the final value fee, the fee on postage, the GST on postage and the fees that PayPal charge, as all payments for several years now have been by PayPal. No one does direct debit into a bank account anymore. Over the last two weekends I have accumulated fees alone of almost $900.00 to eBay and PayPal. Last weekend I used up my 40 insertion free listings and thought that there would be no more this month, however, on last Thursday I was offered unlimited insertion free listings until Sunday night so worked overtime to get the new listings in. Most vanished yesterday, Sunday. As regards selling this year, it seems that the pandemic has had people in lockdown and spending online. This year I have sold literally hundreds of items and paid a fortune in fees, but having not seen a free promotion for several years now, I cannot hold my breath awaiting what will not come. Therefore I have to accept the high selling fees as inevitable. The last free promotion over one Christmas three years ago I saved $1500.00 in final value fees over a six week period. The last six months of the pandemic have been like a Christmas period every month. I find it hard to fathom that with so many unemployed and on Jobkeeper wages that there are still so many willing to outlay large sums of money on their hobby. One thing that I do is pay the fees immediately as they appear in my account. This way I am not burdened with a huge fee bill each billing period.

When a buyer defaults on payment then the buyer seems to care little that he has not fulfilled his part of the transaction. For the seller, well, this is a basic example of the procedure to get your fees repaid. Ideally, eBay would not take fees until the buyer pays, but of cause as soon as the sale takes place the fees are deducted. OK, buyer defaults. Seller invoices him or personal message requesting payment or buyer's intentions. EBay requires a minimum four full days to elapse before an unpaid dispute may be initiated. Dispute raised and now eBay requires a minimum four full days awaiting a payment before the case may be finalised. OK, eight days has now elapsed and hopefully the case is resolved with the buyer failing to pay and the seller awaiting his fees to be returned. No wait, eBay now want another seven to ten days minimum before fees are refunded. That is a minimum fifteen days until fees are returned and the item is able to be relisted for sale. What of the buyer, well, he gets to go on and defraud other sellers. EBay will only censure or deregister him after he has defaulted on many, many purchases. For the seller though, if he fails to complete a sale by say cancelling an item, he most likely loses his fees, has a black mark against his name and is penalised with possible higher selling fees on his future items.

A common ploy with a few suspect sellers downunder and actually located in Australia, not just stating their location as Australia, typically those who sell "shonky" goods from a country known for its cheap products, is to offer free postage on all sales. A big surprise on the buyer when they get a message from the post office that either no postage has been paid on the package or insufficient postage. EBay encourages all sellers to offer free postage so the unscrupulous use the eBay printed postage label but alas no actual postage has been paid.

I hope you raised an unpaid item dispute to get your fees back. I do not think that cancelling the sale gets you your fees returned and also puts a cancelled sale on your record. If a buyer does not pay then the unpaid strike and cancellation should be against him, not you. It is tiresome awaiting the four days since the sale and then the additional time given to the buyer to respond to the eBay message to pay up and then their decision to reimburse you the fees plus make the item available for resale. If a buyer has an outstanding unpaid dispute against him then there should be a penalty such as his privileges revoked plus say an additional one week penalty preventing him from ripping off other sellers. It might be simple lack of respect and etiquette for a buyer to not pay, but it places a burden on the seller as the item sold is unable to be relisted until eBay settles the unpaid dispute. I will be raising an unpaid dispute in a couple of hours for an unpaid item sold last week. The buyer seems to have been abducted away by aliens. Over the next week other disputes will be raised and every guilty party added to the blocked list. All it takes is a simple courtesy message explaining the situation. I am open to a delayed settlement if aware of the circumstances, but get annoyed when a buyer makes a purchase on a whim, possibly intoxicated and then sees in the light of day the reality of his actions. EDIT: An unpaid item dispute now raised and now I have to bide my time for another four days minimum before I can close the case. I will give the buyer a day or so just in case he develops a conscience and then put him where he belongs, on the blocked bidders' list. The guy who recently extorted me for damage to a loco three weeks after taking delivery, last year accused me of using his eBay details and falsely selling him an item. He had never purchased from me previously and denied even being in the model railway hobby and yet his eBay name contains the name "Stannier" and a BR cab loco number. He refuted the sale saying that neither him nor anyone else in his household had made the purchase and said that I must have falsely used his details to make a sale. I can only assume that alcohol may have been part of the purchase. I should have blocked him last year and saved myself the recent trouble and extorted compensation. Ironically, he resides in one of the most affluent suburbs in Sydney, where every home is in the many millions of dollars.

What I am finding more and more distasteful with eBay as a seller for many years is that eBay treats all sellers as if they are a business. I am constantly being bombarded with messages and links and invitations to eBay gatherings and being constantly told how to improve my sales by using eBay's optional selling aids and offering 3 day posting delivery times and including free postage on all my items. In Australia postage on a piece of rolling stock is $8.95. For a locomotive the cost is between $12.20 and $15.35. For multiple purchases over 1 kilogram, the cost is generally between $18.50 and $21.50. Now if I was to absorb those postage costs by offering "free postage" then any potential buyers would look elsewhere. I am tired of eBay rating my selling performance because sales in one month may not be meeting my power seller level and I am being remonstrated for not meeting eBay's projected sales targets. It seems to get promotional listing deals in Australia one now needs to sign up to eBay's "eBay plus" programme. It is almost three years since I was offered a free final listings fee offer. What of those of us who are selling their personal items as a hobby to fund other purchases? We are not businesses. I am not going to risk my record being sullied because the post office cannot deliver an item in three days and buyers mark you down because an item is a day late. Fortunately I am getting to the bottom of the barrel as regards items that I have for sale as I am finding that eBay and PayPal fees are eating heavily into sales. Of cause, the fees are lower than an auction house rates, but for most of us, eBay is supposed to be fun, but it is a long time since I had a laugh seeing close to 20% of a sale price being eaten by fees.

I have several non-paying bidders whom I am awaiting the required time limit to raise a dispute for non-payment and then add them to my blocked bidders' list. They buy and then go deathly quiet, not responding to an invoice or a message requesting if they no longer wish to purchase the item. Meanwhile, the items purchased cannot be resold until the non-payment dispute is finalised. Odd that when one checks the 100% positive feedback of each member, the feedback from sellers is always "awesome eBayer, ...fast payment, ....super quick payment,..... prompt payment". Makes you wonder if a seller's feedback can be relied upon as apart from reporting a buyer for a strictly limited number of reasons or not responding at all, are sellers simply being polite in their praise of buyers. I am reluctant to require instant payment as the only method of payment as I dislike the requirement to do so, both as a buyer and a seller, however, instant payment would solve the non-paying issues but it would adversely impact on those buyers who do the right thing. For the first six months of the pandemic I did not have a single case of non-payment and all paid within hours of making a purchase. however, of late there seems an upsurge in non-paying bidder/buyers.

All through the early months of the pandemic I have sold quite a few items and everybody paid up immediately, without a single default. Now I find that many "newbies" or people who have not used eBay for several years are buying stuff and while I have not set immediate payment as a specific demand, I do allow a couple of days for payment but am finding that people are stretching the friendship to the point I am wondering if they are going to default on payment. I used to set four days as the limit but have reduced the number of days I expect an item to be paid for. If a person has difficulty in making a payment on time then a simple courtesy would be to message me advising me of a delay, but apart from the purchase there is nothing from the buyer at all. Also it seems that apart from a few regular purchasers, the posting of feedback seems a thing of the past. I view receiving feedback as an acknowledgement of receipt of the item and confirmation that the item was received in the condition it was sent. After over fifteen years of immediately posting feedback after returning from the post office, I have decided that I will await receipt of feedback before I will reciprocate. I am seeing more and more buyers with a high feedback count who have never posted feedback on a purchase. When I encounter a new buyer having purchased one of my items or has messaged me, I find now that I visit their feedback page and check the "feedback left for others" section. I view this part of their feedback history as a character guide as to what I may expect from them. Apart from many who simply do not post feedback I am seeing those who I would call serial feedback abusers. Some have pages of posting repeat negative feedback on sellers, while others abuse neutral feedback by posting neutral feedback while giving a highly positive comment. You cannot post neutral feedback by accident, it is a deliberate act.

Correct, however, my initial statement as quoted was not in the first person, nor in the third person. Reading of the paragraph as initially quoted and causing the grammar police to be out on the streets in riot gear would have shown that I was referring to the past. The quote was taken out of context as a standalone single sentence statement and not part of the entire paragraph.

Other than the supposedly forty "free" listings each month with final value fees and GST on postage impost amounting to close to 15% of the sale price, downunder, I have not seen a promotion for over three years. Back then listings free of any fees were offered on a very sporadic basis for a very limited timeframe. If I was to exceed the forty listings limit then an additional fee of $1.65 for listings under $100.00 and for listings over $100.00 the fees increase, starting at almost $4.00. One then still has to add the almost 15% in additional fees when a sale is made. An auction listing starting at $0.99, or as I found a couple of weeks ago listing an item for $1.00 "Buy it Now", cost me $1.65 in listing fees. EBay fees would then need to be added, so that $1.00 sale would have cost me almost $2.00 in fees. Perhaps the fee structure may be different in the UK, however, for sales or auction listings downunder the final value fee is approximately 11 - 12%, plus 11 - 12% on the postage cost, plus 10% GST on the postage cost. Perhaps in the UK the VAT is not added to the actual postage cost. Our GST is a goods and services tax and postage is regarded as a "service" as would be say insurance if included. When a buyer uses a mobile phone app to make multiple purchases then I am charged the postage fee (around 12%) plus GST on the postage cost of each purchase. The buyer then requests that I combine purchases and refund the excess postage paid, ignoring that using the mobile phone has cost me several extra dollars in postage fees which eBay does not compensate me for when I refund the extra postage paid. I have never charged a handling fee to cover the additional fees and have to accept that those fees are just part of the sale structure.

My grammar is that the present tense for "lead" or "led" is "leads", as in a master leads his dog down the path.

I am well aware of the change in eBay policy regarding sellers and feedback. A seller can only post positive feedback, post no feedback or report the buyer for a limited number of reasons. My comment was taken out of context as it was past eBay policy and explained why eBay modified its policy on feedback to reassure the buyer that eBay was a safe platform for buyers. If you read all that I stated then it would be seen that I was referring to the early days of eBay when sellers were seen as the goldmine to be protected and exploited for all the fees that eBay could mine and so eBay protected its source of money very tightly.

I started buying on eBay in 2003 and selling starting in 2005. In 2003 PayPal was a fledgling company and many U.S. sellers would only accept Western Union money orders from international customers. I had several money orders "fail" to reach the seller, supposedly and so items paid for never materialised. Yes, there was a lot of risk and when trust was established with reputable sellers then I tended to specialise my purchases with them. I never dealt with low feedback sellers, preferring those with feedback around 1000 minimum and always thoroughly scrutinised the seller's feedback before purchasing. Ironically, it was those same high feedback sellers who were the root of the problem. Fear of retaliatory feedback from a seller often lead to a bidder either posting positive feedback on an unsatisfactory transaction or not posting feedback at all. This then disguised the seller's true feedback performance as 100% positive feedback did not guarantee that the seller was honest. Also back then many sellers would build up their feedback by selling items such as $0.99 baseball card packs. The seller received a single feedback for each $0.99 card pack sold and yet when I sold a $1000.00 locomotive it only gained me a single positive feedback. Thus a seller could build up a decent looking feedback history and then use this to fleece buyers when he listed grossly more expensive items. Buyers in the main would look at the feedback history block, see the 100% positive feedback and feel assured that they were dealing with an honest seller. Back in those days personal privacy concerns were unimportant and so a buyer or bidder could scrutinise the seller's feedback plus the feedback of other bidders on an auction listing, even having their eBay identity available and checking what the other bidders had purchased previously. I have seen both sides of the coin as regards how eBay has treated both buyers and sellers and do count myself lucky that in many thousands of transactions I have only partially refunded or compensated buyers on three occasions over many years of which only one I could consider a genuine case as the loco in question, a Lima class 67, had a reputation of the motor liberating itself intransit and causing damage to the loco body. In this case the buyer had actually already posted positive feedback on unpackaging the item before he realised that the loco had destroyed itself internally and was actually requesting my help rather than compensation. As he was a multiple repeat customer I chose to compensate him. My policy as a seller has always been that I would place myself in the position of the buyer and how as a buyer I would want to be treated. This has stood me in good stead so that is why I feel particularly aggrieved when I am presented with an apparently fraudulent claim. EBay is a necessary evil as there is no other platform that offers the exposure to such a large market with a relatively low, roughly 12 - 15% fee scale. I do restrict my sales to Australia only as I found that in general most overseas buyers were unwilling to pay the relatively high Australian postage rates. It cost me the same to have a loco posted by Hattons from the UK than it does to post the same loco to a suburb barely a few kilometres away from me and in general the UK delivery takes less time.

For those who have been using eBay for around twenty years, one would see that eBay has gone full circle in that in the past the seller was king and he called the shots. Sellers gained the system with threatening unreasonable conditions on buyers, threatening to post negative feedback if the buyer did not comply. If a buyer made a complaint about a seller, particularly a power seller, then eBay refused the claim by the buyer. EBay altered their rules to make the buying experience safer for the consumer. Unfortunately, there are those who see eBay as a cash cow. I used to purchase a lot of LGB items from the U.S. The size and weight of the items made it financially impractical to use airmail post and so surface mail was the method mostly utilised. At the time the surface transit time was over eight weeks and yet eBay only allowed six weeks to post feedback. Sellers knew this and forced buyers to post positive feedback prior shipping the item if surface mail was to be used. The result was that sellers gained the system and if a complaint was made for non-delivery then the seller would highlight the positive feedback received on the sale. I do not believe that the PayPal protection plan was available back then. I personally lost over $5000.00 usd in a four year period in the early 2000's to unscrupulous sellers. When a complaint was made eBay simply ignored my dispute. In the past eBay also totally deleted every transaction detail after 90 days had elapsed so that if a dispute was raised eBay would say that no data existed for that transaction. I was caught out several times by powersellers who failed to ship expensive items and then relisted those same items many months later. When I quoted specific eBay listing numbers, eBay's response was that the listing never existed. Sellers shot themselves in the foot in the past and eBay was justified in changing the rules to protect buyers, but in doing so left sellers out on a limb.

I can assure you that he may have done it once too often but not anymore with me. He has made my list of those who will not be given a second chance.

Given that the buyer is well aware that in general eBay will side with him in a dispute, it is not surprising that there are those who want to gain the system. My recent experience with a buyer claiming that an item was damaged three weeks after taking delivery of the locomotive, citing that he wanted to "keep the damage between us fellow modellers, rather than putting it in his feedback" to me was an extortion attempt. However, I have many other items to sell and did not wish my selling record to be soiled by an apparent scammer, so I paid him a handsome compensation to let it go away. In a normal world this is blackmail, but on eBay it seems that it is business as usual. Bidders and buyers perhaps need to look back to pre-internet days when for many their only access to secondhand goods was through their local model railway shop and prices were not inexpensive. Swap meets of cause were relatively common in the UK back then but not so common in the rest of the world.

EBay will not intervene and suspend a troublesome buyer who bids but does not pay unless he has failed to pay an insane number of times over a six month period. The seller is totally unaware of the bidder or buyer's past history due eBay's overly protective privacy rules. Similarly, as I have found lately with several low value purchases, if a seller fails to deliver and a dispute is raised then the seller will simply respond, repay the amount paid and miraculously any evidence of the transaction vanishes from your account. Sellers who sell mostly very inexpensive items take your payment and then rely on you not bothering to make a claim. Thus they pocket the money. If you claim then they pay up. The jilted buyer who is refunded is left unable to post feedback on the transaction as eBay deletes the purchase from your account. If the seller is a repeat offender then eBay does not ban him, they simply increase the fees that he has to pay for each sale.

I have reached a point where I am considering threatening permanently banning a buyer if they have not paid on time or at the very least contacted me either before the purchase or immediately after to arrange a suitable payment date. Most buyers pay within minutes of a purchase or request a combined invoice. However, there are those who game the system. The trouble is if you get too "heavy" in your rules then you get some one who just wants to be an idiot.

I had a buyer from the west coast of Australia who if he saw something I had listed would request that I hold onto it and as he was a pensioner would I please await his next pension day for payment. He always paid up on pension day but a check of his purchases in that month showed a regular twenty or more purchases each month and that he was paying everyone else on time as reflected in the feedback he received. I did not mind waiting for payment but felt that I was being used by him as he was OK paying others on time.

Lima actually did release a Commonwealth bogie on some of their RES GUV's. This is a direct pushfit to the underframe. Was the "Dining Car" and Roundel applied to an RBR?.

I can assure you that the non-corridor coach packaging on the OO scale coaches is totally inadequate, consisting of an ill fitting piece of thin cardboard inside a very flimsy outer packaging.