Apologising to eBay sellers

[SteveyDee68]

Okay. A slightly unusual topic. About an hour ago I logged into eBay and did a search (as is my wont) like many fellow RMWebbers.

 

I then slept for a bit.

 

Oh, okay. I admit it, not so much "slept" as "passed out".

 

I blame my friends for plying me with two bottles of red wine, 2/3rds of a bottle of Baileys and a neat rum.)

 

The point is, I have just sat up, almost stone cold sober (well, with the ability to type without spelling errors and grammatically correctly (thank you whichever AI assisted in THAT particular process) with the realisation that I have messaged many (oh, I mean MANY) sellers questioning their sanity at asking for the prices they have!

 

This wasn't random, I hasten to add. I didn't message 'Chancer2015' and say "£35 for a Hornby 0-4-0 are you a professional comedian?"

 

Oh no, my friends. First I did a search for "Freightliner"

 

Why? I have no idea!! I've bought some "modern image" locos and stock but am more inclined towards green diesels and end of steam for a dockside shunting layout at present!

 

So, I got my results in. I then responded via the "Ask seller a question" mechanism...

 

I humbly ask, in a cold sweat of terror of being forever banned from eBay in the future, how do I go about undoing the damage I may have done whilst under the influence of MANY and VARIED alcoholic beverages, of asking questions such as...

 

"Ha ha ha! Seriously?!"

 

"You do know that Hattons are releasing a model that makes your's look like Brio in comparison."

 

"Lima did a good body shell, but Bachmann beats it hands down. And Hattons will make it look like Hornby Dublo - three rail!"

 

"I can get a Bachman "Buy It Now" for less than your Lima starting price... Are you on drugs?"

 

Maybe I just said what we are all thinking, but an hour's worth of sobering up has made me realise that I may have alienated an awful lot of eBay sellers, even some that I've purchased from in the past (cringe - a certain outlet in Sh*ffi*ld springs to mind!).

 

Problem is, I was sooooo wasted that I don't fully remember who I contacted!!

 

Guess I may find out in due course .... oh curse alcohol and the availability of devices capable of transmitting our unfiltered thoughts!

 

I feel an urge to email Radio 2 asking forgiveness ...

[Il Grifone]

There should be a record in your eBay messages of your contacts and what you stated.

 

I would just send a grovelling apology stating the circumstances. I an sure most people have been in the same state and will understand.

 

Unfortunately AFAIK you can't unsend emails....

[kevinlms]

Could be much worse, at least you weren't out driving!

[AY Mod]

This would certainly explain the nature of some PM/email/Contact Us messages I get, especially overnight!

 

Some get ignored or binned whereas as some have resulted in me ensuring the user doesn't have continued access.

 

The style of some certainly indicate that the user shouldn't be left unsupervised whilst in possession of a keyboard.

[melmerby]

2 hours ago, Il Grifone said:

Unfortunately AFAIK you can't unsend emails....

I have a feeling that at least at one time you could as long as the recipient hadn't opened them.

When we had a guest house one e-mail "booking" was deleted by the sender but I had already opened it and it appeared as a strike through in the in-box.

I queried it with the sender and they said they had "deleted" it because they didn't want the booking after all.

I thought it was rather rude and a second e-mail expaining the circumstances would have been better.

[ejstubbs]

1 hour ago, Il Grifone said:

There should be a record in your eBay messages of your contacts and what you stated.

 

On a desktop machine, hover over "My eBay" and "Messages" is the bottom item on the drop-down list.  Go to the "Sent" folder and there will be a list of the messages you sent.  It's a bit like webmail except that you can't reply/reply all directly from the messages screen: you have to go each intended recipient's profile page and message them from there.  It'll be tedious.

 

More to the point, however - and easier - you should also have received a confirmatory e-mail from eBay for each message you sent.  In the e-mail there should be a link that takes you directly to the recipient's profile page, from where you can contact them with a suitably apologetic message.

 

Good luck, and next time: step away from the keyboard.

[kevinlms]

1 hour ago, melmerby said:

I have a feeling that at least at one time you could as long as the recipient hadn't opened them.

When we had a guest house one e-mail "booking" was deleted by the sender but I had already opened it and it appeared as a strike through in the in-box.

I queried it with the sender and they said they had "deleted" it because they didn't want the booking after all.

I thought it was rather rude and a second e-mail expaining the circumstances would have been better.

But the concept of not being able to 'unsend', has been around since Penny Black days. Once a letter is posted into the street box, that is supposed to be it.

NO ONE is authorised to retrieve it from the system.

[njee20]

As a seller I’d just ignore this, any seller who takes any action against you is over sensitive. 

 

Quick note to all saying “I’m so sorry, I was really drunk, best of luck with the sale.”, done.  

[Guest teacupteacup]

6 hours ago, SteveyDee68 said:

 

 

I blame my friends for plying me with two bottles of red wine, 2/3rds of a bottle of Baileys and a neat rum.)

 

 

If thats your friends I'd hate to meet your enemies

[Ian Simpson]

No need to apologise, in my opinion. If you're in business, you shouldn't be offended if you get some negative feedback. The smarter sellers might even take it as a hint to review their pricing policies, and so shift more items.

Instead of apologising, try seeing yourself as a public benefactor! (It always works for me.)

[melmerby]

23 minutes ago, kevinlms said:

But the concept of not being able to 'unsend', has been around since Penny Black days. Once a letter is posted into the street box, that is supposed to be it.

NO ONE is authorised to retrieve it from the system.

I've had a look around interthingy and it seems with certain e-mail systems you can withdraw/edit sent mails, as long as they haven't been opened by the sender.

 

[kevinlms]

2 minutes ago, melmerby said:

I've had a look around interthingy and it seems with certain e-mail systems you can withdraw/edit sent mails, as long as they haven't been opened by the sender.

 

An interesting concept. How is it possible to know if it's been 'read' or not?

Some people automatically send a reply back to say it's been read, which isn't actually true, as its impossible to know if its been read at all, let alone understood.

 

Any examples of ones which can be unsent?

[Ely_South]

8 minutes ago, melmerby said:

I've had a look around interthingy and it seems with certain e-mail systems you can withdraw/edit sent mails, as long as they haven't been opened by the sender.

 

If it's happened within a company (for instance; messages sent using Outlook/Exchange INSIDE a company), it's usually possible to recall a message without visible evidence, so long as it has not been opened (unless you have unforgiving administrators).

 

For email sent on to other mail servers (i.e. externally), recall without evidence would be unlikely. The best you'd achieve would be the user receiving both the message plus a 'recall request' and they'd then choose the outcome. In most instances, recall would simply fail.

 

I wouldn't worry. At least you were drunk. There'll be plenty of others that will have sent daft messages and not have that excuse... :-)

[kevinlms]

<I wouldn't worry. At least you were drunk. There'll be plenty of others that will have sent daft messages and not have that excuse... :-) >

 

Not me, I wasn't the OP.

 

Some people need a breathalyzer machine connected to their keyboard!

[melmerby]

50 minutes ago, kevinlms said:

An interesting concept. How is it possible to know if it's been 'read' or not?

Some people automatically send a reply back to say it's been read, which isn't actually true, as its impossible to know if its been read at all, let alone understood.

 

Then it's considered read as the receiving computer has acknowledged it.

I never do and only do it if requested to, sending a reply normally suffices

 

IIRC e-mails sit on servers and you don't get them until you open them. At this stage it seems you can stop or at least edit them.

It's a bit like the postie leaving a letter in a box out the front of your house*. You know there is a letter because you saw him put it in the box.

It's been delivered but until you go to the box to get it you haven't actually received it.

 

*In the US the flag is raised on outside boxes.

[ejstubbs]

2 hours ago, melmerby said:

IIRC e-mails sit on servers and you don't get them until you open them.

 

It depends on the mail system you are using, and more particularly what you are using to access your e-mails.  If you are using a web-based e-mail system whereby you read your e-mails in a browser then you never really do "get" the e-mail in the sense of a copy of it being delivered and stored on your computer - unless you specifically ask for a copy of the e-mail to be downloaded as a file.  Even then, your Inbox is still on the server and the e-mail is still in it until you delete it from there.

 

If you are using an IMAP (or old-skool SMTP) client such as Thunderbird, or Apple's Mail application on a Mac, then the client will download copies of e-mails from the server to the Inbox your computer in the background.  It will leave a copy of each e-mail in your Inbox on the server.  IMAP keeps server and client Inboxes in sync, so if you delete a message from the Inbox on your computer then IMAP will tell the server to delete it as well - but if you file an e-mail from your Inbox in to a mail folder held locally on your computer (ie not synced on the server) then it will be removed from your Inbox on the server.

 

Read receipts and message recall are not consistent within and between proprietary e-mail systems (e.g. Exchange) let alone e-mails sent and received between generic clients using open internet protocols.  Outside of a single organisation's email system it's rarely possible to make any authoritative statement about whether or not an e-mail sent from person A to person B can or cannot be invisibly recalled.  (The Exchange system in my company does not support "invisible" message recall - I assume this is a configuration setting that they have chosen to disable.)

[Tiptonian]

I would not give it a second thought as the vast majority of your comments were more than likely true! On another forum is a thread called "More ebay Nonsense". If every smirking rip-off merchant with a warped sense of humour was featured on there, it would be the longest thread in model railway forum history. You only did what I, and probably many others, often feel like doing.

 

Don't apologize. Your actions did not result in unwanted pregnancy or hurting life-long friends and no-one has died. From someone who has not been able to touch alcohol for over ten years, you have done nothing to deserve spoiling the enjoyment of wine, rum and baileys. In a twisted way, I envy you!!!

 

Go forth in peace with tranquil mind.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited February 26, 2019 by Tiptonian
Mis-spelling of 'peace' (piece). Senior moment and then some!

[Colin_McLeod]

Don't worry about the drunk messages.  Let's see what you actually ordered when the parcels begin to appear in a few days. 

[royaloak]

I wouldnt worry about it, you might get blocked by a couple of sellers, but I would expect most to either ignore the message or think it was some sort of joke.

 

What cannot be undone is your inability to control yourself after consuming much alcohol, and unless your friends physically held you down and forced the drinks down your throat then it is your fault for drinking it!

[JDW]

I probably shouldn't have laughed reading that, but, well, I did... 

 

Every time I see Gostude (or is it Cartmel?  One of the two) advertise a class 153 converted from a Dapol 155 for £124.50 I want to email them and say the same!  "You know you can get a new, better, modern Hornby one for less, right?"  

[DCB]

They may refuse your bids on their hideously over priced products if you get wasted and accidentally bid a fortune for some tat.   Basically I would consider that to be a result.   Some people might like an awful lash up of a model instead of a decent new one. Just look at all the people driving ******"s.

[The Johnster]

On 24/02/2019 at 11:05, kevinlms said:

But the concept of not being able to 'unsend', has been around since Penny Black days. Once a letter is posted into the street box, that is supposed to be it.

NO ONE is authorised to retrieve it from the system.

It is, while in the postal system, the property of Her Majesty The Queen, and it's unauthorised removal, or even wilful delay, is a very serious offence indeed.  And this applies to letters handed to postmen, over Post Office counters, or otherwise given into the care of the postal system.  This predates the stamp system and the Penny Black, and dates from the earliest days of Royal Mail under Charles 1.

[Sir TophamHatt]

On 24 February 2019 at 11:39, kevinlms said:

An interesting concept. How is it possible to know if it's been 'read' or not?

Some people automatically send a reply back to say it's been read, which isn't actually true, as its impossible to know if its been read at all, let alone understood.

 

Any examples of ones which can be unsent?

Outlook (the program).

But I think that really only works when internal email systems, rather than sending something to granny so to speak.

 

I believe Google is testing an "unsend" feature though.

[Steamport Southport]

Whatever happened to the "I was hacked", "it was my mates" or "somebody nicked my phone" excuses?  

 

But to be honest if you were as drunk as you are saying you were, then it probably just ended up as totally unreadable nonsense. Been there, done that!

 

Only to people I know in real life though.

 

 

 

Jason

[Chris116]

AOL used to allow you to unsend an unread email message to another AOL account but they dropped the facility in one of their upgrades along with being able to see if the message had been read. They claimed that them telling the sender that the message had been read was an invasion of the privacy of the recipient.