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Thread: Resurgence in car-boots and swap-meets

  1. #1

    Resurgence in car-boots and swap-meets

    I’m done with eBay. I've been a regular buyer and an occasional seller over the past 10 years but I've deleted it from my phone now.
    Bear in mind that everything I've sold is woodworking hand tools, simple mechanical objects where the condition is obvious. I always put up high res photos from all angles including a ruler for dimensions and describe the item.The buyer could have been in no doubt as to what they were bidding on. My photographs are clear and detailed, the buyer should be able to make judgements on quality and condition (and in one case whether the handles would fit their hands) before bidding.
    The last few sales I've done have all been nightmares. It seems to be regular practice now for buyers to bid excessively high to secure an item and then try to argue the price down by claiming faults or not as described. eBay always sides with the buyer. Stating "no returns" or "buyer pays return postage" on the listing means nothing for a private seller. The default eBay action on a buyer request for return is to ask the seller to pay for return postage.

    I've just lost all confidence in eBay as a place to conduct any business.
    Even as a buyer rather than seller, how can I trust that any auction is fair when another buyer can just put in excessive bids and then subsequently cancel the transaction without any penalty if they cannot argue down the price.
    There seems no point in taking the item back (but incurring fees plus two sets of postage charges) and offering a second chance to other bidders. As a matter of principle as a buyer I would never respond to a second chance offer since I would have no confidence that the price was fair and had not been jacked up artificially by the seller.

    Such a shame since eBay was once a good source for unusual items, I can see local car-boots and swap-meets getting a lot more business again.
    Last edited by jim hanna; 01-20-2019 at 7:33 AM.

  2. #2
    Quote Originally Posted by jim hanna View Post
    I’m done with eBay. I've been a regular buyer and an occasional seller over the past 10 years but I've deleted it from my phone now.
    Bear in mind that everything I've sold is woodworking hand tools, simple mechanical objects where the condition is obvious. I always put up high res photos from all angles including a ruler for dimensions and describe the item.The buyer could have been in no doubt as to what they were bidding on. My photographs are clear and detailed, the buyer should be able to make judgements on quality and condition (and in one case whether the handles would fit their hands) before bidding.
    The last few sales I've done have all been nightmares. It seems to be regular practice now for buyers to bid excessively high to secure an item and then try to argue the price down by claiming faults or not as described. eBay always sides with the buyer. Stating "no returns" or "buyer pays return postage" on the listing means nothing for a private seller. The default eBay action on a buyer request for return is to ask the seller to pay for return postage.

    I've just lost all confidence in eBay as a place to conduct any business.
    Even as a buyer rather than seller, how can I trust that any auction is fair when another buyer can just put in excessive bids and then subsequently cancel the transaction without any penalty if they cannot argue down the price.
    There seems no point in taking the item back (but incurring fees plus two sets of postage charges) and offering a second chance to other bidders. As a matter of principle as a buyer I would never respond to a second chance offer since I would have no confidence that the price was fair and had not been jacked up artificially by the seller.

    Such a shame since eBay was once a good source for unusual items, I can see local car-boots and swap-meets getting a lot more business again.
    Jim,

    As only a buyer I gave up on eBay long ago. Even with the best of knowledge and caution the "burn rate" was just too high. While I did deal with some good sellers, many were not honest or lacked knowledge of their goods. The old you get what you pay for doesn't apply to eBay.

    ken

  3. #3
    Their seller fees have gotten pretty expensive. I still sell various items on there from time to time if it’s something that actually has value. I’d rather use eBay than craigslist and get robbed.

    But it’s kind of turned into a ghetto flea market. I had a pair of headlights I took off my truck that were oem and functioned fine. My ad got lost in the sea of third party lights that look like they came from pep boys

  4. #4
    "I've just lost all confidence in eBay as a place to conduct any business.
    Even as a buyer rather than seller, how can I trust that any auction is fair when another buyer can just put in excessive bids and then subsequently cancel the transaction without any penalty if they cannot argue down the price.
    There seems no point in taking the item back (but incurring fees plus two sets of postage charges) and offering a second chance to other bidders. As a matter of principle as a buyer I would never respond to a second chance offer since I would have no confidence that the price was fair and had not been jacked up artificially by the seller."


    You ought to pass these thoughts on to ebay. Might or might not help, but they are valid and worth mentioning to the company.
    "All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing."

    “If you want to know what a man's like, take a good look at how he treats his inferiors, not his equals.”

  5. #5
    Join Date
    Mar 2015
    Location
    SE Michigan
    Posts
    3,222
    I just made a purchase on eBay and it was a good experience. I do, however, stick to “buy it now”/“best offer” listings. That way I can make what I beleive is a fair offer and the seller either takes it or not.

  6. Unfortunately over the last few years Ebay's model seems to have shifted to a more Amazon style experience with new goods and as a result has pushed out the smaller niche market sellers. Weather it is a result of Ebay chasing larger retails to utilize the service or retailers chasing Ebay to cash in on the Ebay user base is hard to say. It's evident in their marketing campaigns of recent years and the changes made to their interfaces.

  7. #7
    Join Date
    Jan 2017
    Location
    Marina del Rey, Ca
    Posts
    1,934
    Quote Originally Posted by jim hanna View Post
    ...It seems to be regular practice now for buyers to bid excessively high to secure an item and then try to argue the price down by claiming faults or not as described. eBay always sides with the buyer...
    Simply untrue.

    If you are having trouble with your sales, it might be helpful to avoid thinking that you've done everything right but eBay and the buyers are bad. Instead ask yourself: "How could I improve my listings to avoid these problems?" BTW I have over 1400 transactions at 100%.
    "Anything seems possible when you don't know what you're doing."

  8. #8
    I still use eBay to buy and sell. When selling, I don't know anywhere else where you can get your product exposed to such a large potential buyer group. It's a bit expensive to sell when you consider the Paypal fees and the eBay listing fees, but I'd probably get less for the item in other venues. I don't sell much on eBay - just a few times a year.

    When buying, I haven't had any real problems. I look for sellers with lots of previous sales and a high rating (high 90's to 100). If I have questions, I contact the seller.

    But eBay has changed. It used to be a national garage sale and now it's mostly new stuff. If I'm going to buy new things, I'll go to Amazon. I generally only buy used things on eBay.

    Mike
    Go into the world and do well. But more importantly, go into the world and do good.

  9. #9
    Join Date
    Jul 2014
    Location
    Edmond, Oklahoma
    Posts
    1,749
    Hi All,

    If I had a lot of choices and could go to flea markets in the north east, for example, I probably would not use Ebay if I could find things locally. I use it less now than I used to.

    However, to find some of the old planes, etc., that I am interested in, I can find them in no other location.

    I have changed my buying, however. I now only try to buy things that are absolutely complete, with no broken parts and none missing.

    I do this because in my opinion it looks like the price of parts of some woodworking tools has tripled or quadrupled in the last few years. Also it seems like there are only a tiny number of sellers selling parts to tools I am interested in. Further, there are often a large number of exactly the same part for sale, for example I saw about 30 listed of a common part for an old tool, so there was no shortage of them. Since there is no shortage for the parts listed, it would seem that the price of the parts should be reasonable. That said, all of the sellers, and a tiny number had virtually all of the parts that were listed, had them listed for almost exactly the same absurdly high price. Further, if my memory is correct, the price is about 4 to 6 times as high as it was just 5 years ago for this same part. These same small number of sellers have lots of parts listed for lots of these tools. I am not sure what gives, but I no longer buy a tool that needs parts unless the price is EXTREMELY low, and I have checked out the price of the parts.

    I will say this, however, it seems like in the past few months, those same folks have backed off a little in the price they are asking for the parts. Maybe they weren't selling many.

    Update 1/21/19: I looked on Ebay last night after writing the above. A while back when I looked at the part sellers prices, some did seem to be lower. However last night when I looked the prices may be SLIGHTLY lower, but some are even higher. When I can buy a complete tool, with a full set of iron, for only 4 or 5 times what they are all asking for a single small part, which in all reality is just another iron, and all of them list it for almost exactly the same money, there is something wrong there. I will say, though, that finally some of them are listing some irons, for example, at somewhat reasonable prices again. If an iron I am interested in is listed at a reasonable price I will be a buyer.

    Stew
    Last edited by Stew Denton; 01-21-2019 at 10:00 PM.

  10. #10
    Im 50/50 still on ebay. I saw a set of old storage drawers on Ebay, a buy it now/Make offer setup. They had been there since July 2018. I made a offer what they are probably worth, it was denied and no counter offer given. I guess the seller is holding out for their buy it now price. I could bid again, but I already gave the seller a chance to counter offer.

  11. #11
    ebay just started chargins sales tax for all sales in my state, even when buying from an individual. A $100 plane I was looking at is almost $130 with shipping and tax. The seller fees + paypal fees only really make sense for me when I'm selling something for whatever it will bring without concern over what that amount is.. aka garage sale. Anyway, I'm not buying as much on ebay as I did a couple years ago.

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