Am I going mad or what E BAY price

[Marty Mc]

Hi

 

Have a look at this price for the Devon Belle on ebay and that is also the price you will pay in their retail shop in Perth.

 

Ebay no

 

160389338902

 

Bargain eh + the postage.

 

He is getting his market price.

 

Support your local retailer no way not at those prices.

 

m

[Guest Belgian]

I had a strange e-bay experience recently. I put a Hornby Pullman up for sale. It was one of the Queen of Scots cars with a grey roof but with the roofboards removed (and it showed in the auction photos). It was also unboxed. Shortly after I listed it I got a bid of £45 or so for it - about twice the going rate. This became the winning bid and I sent it to the winner along with a second Pullman he had won for a rather more normal price of £22.

 

After a day or so he complained that the coaches had arrived damaged. I enquired as to what damage they showed and he said the roof was damaged by the roofboards. After a bit of correspondence I discovered that he wanted to take the roofboards off and that if he did this he thought he would damage the models. I pointed out that the roofboards were already off the Queen of Scots coach, but he then said he wanted to return them as they were damaged. Eventually he admitted they weren't damaged "yet", but I got so fed up that I refunded his money and resold them - for about half what he had bid!

 

Does anyone else think that "I am going to damage the xxxx I bought from you" is not a good reason to demand a refund?!!!

 

JE

['CHARD]

That's absolutely awesome! Refund my money or the rabbit gets it

 

The guy had no case whatsoever, by the sound of it he was strange to say the least. The problem is though, that as a seller the moment you attempt to rightly stand your ground, the PayPal/ Ebay machine kicks in and you're immediately at a disadvantage. The resolution centre - such as it is - is an automated system, and I have yet to be convinced that a human being ever intervenes. Therefore the contorted facts of your recent case would never be read or understood. The likely outcome would be that you'd be asked to offer a partial refund even though you did nothing wrong.

 

Last week a guy bought an item of rolling stock from me. Because he lived maybe 20 mins away by car (though he doesn't drive, it turned out) he said he wouldn't pay postage and would meet in person and pay for it then. Setting up a rendezvous is too much trouble to be honest, so I ended up dropping it off, and as an extra gesture of goodwill threw in a couple of low value items that had finished early with no interest. He looked at the items and seemed delighted - "I've been looking for one of these for ages," etc... and such was his delight he told me to keep the change (£2) from the note he proffered, for my trouble. Two days later I got a message complaining the item wasn't what he'd expected and he'd leave negative feedback unless I replied within some farcical timescale. I ended up telling him to keep the stuff and sending him a refund, just because as a seller it's too much trouble to do anything else. You will always get cheapskate chancers who want something for nothing, and who'll destroy your 100% seller rating at a stroke. Ebay is more weighted against decent private sellers than ever.

[Ohmisterporter]

That's absolutely awesome! Refund my money or the rabbit gets it. Ebay is more weighted against decent private sellers than ever.

 

And don't they know it! I had an experience in which I sold a Bachmann HO American loco and the buyer changed his mind about it after he'd received it. I got an email stating that he didn't like the way the tender and loco connected together, and the Bachy EZmate couplings didn't work with his Hornby stuff. Even though I had given a full description in the listing. He wanted his money back. I now had the dilema: should I stick to my guns, knowing my 100% feedback rating would go, or give in? I gave in. He got his money back, less postage because the next stage that I was afraid of is "the model is damaged". I didn't want a deliberately damaged model that I could not resell later.

As a buyer I appreciate the protection from eBay, but as a seller the balance has swung too far into the buyer's favour.

 

Geoff.

[John_Hughes]

I don't think the problems associated with bad customers are anything specifically to do with eBay; most of us who are in business long ago came to the conclusion that it's just good practice to give full refunds to complaining customers, regardless of how valid the complaint is.

 

It can certainly be annoying to have to do so when you know that you're 100% in the right and the complainant is 100% in the wrong, but it's better to bite the bullet and pay the money. It's one of the costs of doing business.