Archive for the ‘Auction’ Category

Dear eBay Queen:

I bid and won a Topps Chrome Rookie Refractor Auto Baseball card on eBay for $4 plus shipping. My son (who’s 9 years old) asked me to buy it for him. I realize it’s not a high end Baseball card, but it was my son’s hard earned lawn mowing money none the less….
I’ve been waiting a 5 days for the card to arrive and according to the USPS shipping information on eBay the seller hadn’t even mailed the card yet!  I sent him this message:

“I checked the eBay shipping information and noticed that this item hasn’t been sent yet.  I’ve been burned by eBay sellers in the past, and I hope that we can make this a good transaction.  I bid on this, but my son has purchased it with his own money.  Please let me know what is going on with the baseball card, and when will it be sent out?”

THIS IS WHAT I GOT IN RESPONSE:

“I’ve been out of town all weekend in and out of hospital with my ailing grandfather, but he passed this morning so I will be able to send your precious little four dollar card out to you and not be one of those horrible baseball card purchase statistics because I wouldn’t be able to live with myself. As a matter of fact, you can expect a refund as well so you can see how little your insignificant purchase was worth to me right now. And for the record, I fully expect a bad feedback so you can understand how very little any of it means to me right now.”

I seriously doubt his “my grandfather died” story, and I don’t understand what his problem is.   I didn’t ask in a mean way at all!  As of today it’s been 12 days since I paid for the card, and as of yet, the card still hasn’t shipped, nor did I get a refund. I don’t want a refund, but if he wants to send it, I’ll take it!!

It’s funny that people who have some kind of bad experience in life feel that gives them the right to rip you off. If the guy’s Grandpa did die then I am sorry to hear that, but that does not give someone the right to steal, does it?  What do you think I should do next? What kind of feedback should I leave?

George

Dear George:

I try to take each person at their word until they show me something different.  The seller was TOTALLY inappropriate with you.  He should have done what he promised, and sent the package.

I would email the seller one more time to let them know you haven’t received the item.  Make sure the email is short and sweet, nothing inflammatory.  Once you do that I would file a dispute against the seller since you’ve not received the item.

In my own life as an eBay seller I have had emergencies come up, but I always send an email to the buyer to let them know what is going on.  This seller should have done that for you.  In this day and age most people have a smart phone that they can send emails from, and he should have done that at least.  I would wait to leave feedback until you have your money back or you receive the item.  Either way I would probably leave a neutral that says: “didn’t receive item” or “took a long time to ship card.”

Dear eBay Queen:

I was flagged for eBay’s duplicate listing policy.  I’m not sure what to do about it.  I have 8 sizes of pants that are all the same color and style. I’ve been using the same photo, title and description, just changing the sizing in the description. I don’t understand what I am doing wrong.  Can you help?

Kristin

Dear Kristin:

I think I can help you out.  I took a look at your listings, in order to insure that eBay won’t think you’re listing the same item over and over is make something different about the photo, title and description.  Your descriptions are definitely different; you just need to work on your photos and titles.

I noticed your pants listings don’t have the size listed in the title, which is SUPER important. Making that change in the title is all you need to do for the title. Another thing that would help you is to keep the same photo, make 8 copies but change the name of each photo. For example you could name them “blackpantssz4” and “blackpantssz6” etc.  That way the program that eBay uses to find duplicates will see that your photos are each named something different, and your titles have different sizes.

Good luck selling the pants!

Strange eBay item of the week: eBay item: What would you pay for a pair of shoes worn by Mike Tyson during his 1988 fight to Michael Spinks?  Someone paid quite a bit. Mike Tyson VS Michael Spinks Fight Worn Shoes SOLD $9000.00 http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&_trksid=p4340.l2557&hash=item43b056d325&item=290721288997

Suzie Eads is a nationally known eBay marketer and eBay trained Education Specialist. She lives in Rantoul, Kansas.

Dear eBay Queen:

I am so mad and frustrated right now that I could spit nails.  I sell new makeup that I either purchase on sale, or buy from a wholesaler. I’ve done pretty well with selling makeup until recently.  I’ve had a slew of buyers that think my makeup is for them to just “try out” and then send back!  My current problem is a buyer that after buying foundation from me, sent an email 20 days later saying she did not like it and it was broken.  I emailed her immediately after that email and said the following:

Thank you so much for letting me know there was a problem.  I am so sorry your foundation does not match your skin tone. When you say it was broken, do you mean the bottle is broken or maybe the brush applicator? As per my listing I do have a 14 day return policy, but I would like for you to be happy, so if you would like to send it back, I will be happy to refund your money, and not apply my return policy to this listing.

Here’s the letter I received in response to that, I left all the spelling errors in there for your reading pleasure.

Dear idioit;

Congradulation in successfully making me angry. What the hell has happened to customer service these days?  I have thrown away your make up as it was BROKEN.  Don’t you understand that? Some sellers will do anything to take advantage of a buyer! If it was B R O K E N why would I send it back to you? Can’t you just make an insurance claim or SOM THING? What is wrong with you? You need to refund my money immedatly or I will be leaving the feedback and it won’t be positive!

I contacted eBay and asked them what to do.  eBay’s customer service told me that since it was makeup and she used it, I did not have to refund her money.  I contacted the buyer back, and told her what eBay told me.  She then gave me a negative feedback.

Her feedback complaint read: “MakeUp tOo LiGhT Seller sTooPiD I tHrew AwAy Not a ReFunD GiVen” (yes, it looks just like this)

I called eBay back, and they told me it was not eligible for removal.  I don’t understand, how I followed what eBay told me to do, and they will not remove the negative! Why am I being punished?

Harriet, Gardner

Dear Harriet:

If your email wasn’t so true it would be funny. The buyer didn’t spell “idiot” or “stupid” right, which seems like irony to me, plus her statement “Congradulation in successfully making me angry.” Sounds like something The Hulk would say, “You don’t want to make the Hulk angry.”

Based upon her statement; “You need to refund my money immedatly or I will be leaving the feedback and it won’t be positive!” I believe that would be considered feedback extortion.  I would contact eBay again by phone, and point that out in her email to you.  They should remove the negative right away.

I am sorry that not only were you abused by your buyer, but in a way you were mislead by eBay’s Seller Support.  The CS representative should have told you that even by following their instructions you could still receive negative feedback, but you would not be in violation of any of eBay’s policies. This is one of the ridiculous things about eBay.  You can be COMPLETELY in the right and still receive a negative feedback.  I’m pretty sure your negative will be removed, but if for some reason it’s not, rest in the knowledge that this negative feedback only makes you look good, and the buyer look ridiculous.

Dear eBay Queen:

I am hoping to bid on a trailer today but I have become concerned because the seller has not responded to multiple emails I have sent him over the past few days. He has a zero rating, so maybe is new to eBay- but also maybe something’s wrong? What should I do?

Antonia

Dear Antonia:

If the seller isn’t responding to you, I would not purchase from them, especially on something as expensive as a trailer.  There is always the possibility that there was an emergency in the sellers family etc, but when it comes to large purchases if I can’t get a hold of the seller, I will not make the purchase.

Strange eBay item of the week: eBay item: 300690552662 Summer is coming and those herbs aren’t going to dry themselves! Check out this Antique 18^th Century Iron Utensil or Herb Rack great Curled Heart Design. SOLD $710.00 http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&_trksid=p4340.l2557&hash=item46028db756&item=300690552662

Suzie Eads is a nationally known eBay marketer and eBay trained Education Specialist. She lives in Rantoul, Kansas.

Dear eBay Queen:

Hurray! My ship has come in!! I got my “Ying-ling dba Alamo Auto Sports and Andy Scott V. eBay” class-action settlement check today……Guess how much it is? Wait for it…………45 cents!!!  I vaguely remember signing up for this class action lawsuit.  This was for people who sold on eBay in the Auto Parts & Accessories category between the years 2005 to 2009. Should I cash this check? I’ve been brainstorming what to do with it.

Maybe I’ll let my kids list the check and the letter it’s attached to as a collector’s item in 2032. eBay will be just a distant memory by then, and folks will be collecting eBayana. Surely by then people will be posting holographic images of the stuff in their homes, and shoppers will do a virtual walk through other people’s houses. They will just point at things they want to buy, and the sellers will get a message saying something has been claimed. Once the virtual payment is made, the item’s molecular structure will be disintegrated, encrypted, and uploaded to an orbiting satellite. Then the buyer will download it to their re-integration module in the garage. The whole transaction will take about 90 seconds.

Seriously, should I cash this check? Do you think it will be worth something later? Here’s one odd thing: the check is void after Dec. 22, 2011. I thought checks were supposed to be good for a year. I’m thinking I might keep it. Don’t you think it would be too embarrassing to cash it at the bank?

45Cent-aire

Dear 45 Cent:

It’s always good to have a sense of humor about this kind of thing.  I was not part of that class action suit, so I did not get one of these “high dollar checks.”  In this situation, I would probably hold on to the check.  It might be worth more later, and at the very least would be interesting conversation piece hanging in your office.

Dear eBay Queen:

I’ve been selling for a few years, and I have a couple of questions for you.

• Why do you suppose millions of people sell on eBay when they have to pay a seller fee if their item doesn’t sell, when anyone can sell their stuff on Amazon and will only pay a seller fee when their item does sell?
• Can you explain this promotion eBay has with 1 day shipping time and Free shipping?

Thanks!

Tony

Dear Tony:

Amazon and eBay are both great venues to list your items to sell through.  Some people might disagree, but I really feel they are best suited for different items.

• Amazon is best for: books, house wares, kitchen items, arts, crafts and sewing

You can sell almost anything on Amazon, but Amazon sometimes only uses approved sellers for Toys, Clothing and Electronics.  So if you aren’t one of their approved merchants, you won’t be able to sell those items there.  I purchased a large lot of medical scrubs, and tried to list them on Amazon.  I could not sell my scrubs there, because clothing is a category I must be approved for in order to list.

Amazon doesn’t have any fees to list.  Their fees are charged only when the item sells. The down side to this is sometimes items are listed for a penny because of the competition.

• eBay is known for their collectibles, but anything can be sold on eBay as long as it’s not a knock off or a live animal. (There are a few other things, but these are the main restrictions.)

eBay does have listing fees, but I have found it prevents many people from doing what some people do on Amazon by selling something for a penny.

Either venue can be a great outlet to sell. Try them both out, and see how you do.

eBay’s new promotion will save you 20% on your final values fees when you offer free expedited (not overnight) shipping and have one day handling time.  For more info go here: http://announcements.ebay.com/2011/11/starting-tomorrow-save-20-on-your-final-value-fees-for-free-expedited-shipping-with-1-day-handling/   The promotion runs from November 24^th through November 25^th.  If you are a Top Rated Seller, you will receive the 20% off for your selling status, along with the new promotion.  That’s 40% off your final value fees.

Strange eBay item of the week: eBay item: 250912558734 (enter this number in the eBay search box in the top right corner of the home page.   Have you ever looked at something and thought “what is that thing?”  I’m sure many people have looked at this and thought that.  EC&M SF 1870’s Central Pacific Railroad Telegraph Insulator SOLD $5,560.00 HERE

Suzie Eads is a nationally known eBay marketer and eBay trained Education Specialist. She lives in Rantoul. Do you have a question for the eBay Queen? Email: questions@asktheebayqueen.com