Pete's 1st Time eBay Experience

I am a thread necromancer. But I'm also an Admin, so I can resurrect as many threads as I want!

Over the past couple weeks, I've been doing a lot more eBay stuff. Still non-musical:

* Nvidia graphics card
* An overly large duffel bag
* A set of crystal (dishes 'n' stuff)

Of these, the set of crystal is the most bothersome. As mentioned earlier, I attempted and failed to sell a set of china. This time around, I decided to sell the crystal in "obvious" sets (e.g. all the wineglasses in one ad). I've been slowly taking pics, resizing pics in Photoshop or Gimp, then posting the ads. It's time consuming. It's also a request from family: my grandmother-in-law to mother-in-law to wife. I volunteered because I know how to use Google extremely well and was able to determine stuff like, "Fostoria crystal. Made in the 1950s. Here's a company that sells reproductions. Here's the exact measurements of each piece and what they're called. Hmmm. People in the 1950s actually had things called 'Mayonnaise bowls.' I don't mind a bit of mayo, but a bowlful seems a bit excessive."

eBay has a new feature since I last sold in 2012. In the US, at least. You can now ship to their "shipping center" and they'll then ship your product to a different country. The shipping that you, the seller, pays is only to the center. The shipping that the buyer pays for is from the center to his country. I think this is fantastic. If it works, that is. My graphics card sold to someone in the Czech republic. The PayPal hasn't cleared yet, but PayPal said, "Go ahead and ship! Everything looks good!" (I think that's a quote.)

Anyhow, the "fantastic" part is that the eBay seller doesn't have to worry about customs forms and how shipping X has to be in a box Y size -- and if it's Y+1 inch, it's an extra $3000 for shipping (I exaggerate, but not by much. Seriously. I dealt with this when shipping from the US to London). Additionally, this means that folks in other countries can get their hands on a larger selection of stuff that's more commonplace in the US, like US-made instruments.

So, I'm cautiously optimistic. My optimism has also been fueled by me buying a few things that were exactly or better than described. Like the keyboard I'm currently typing on or the nice Logitech G3 controller that's currently displaying the date and time or the St. Vincent album that's pumping through my JBL Creature speakers ....
 
I've bought four different horns on eBay, and in each case the horn was exactly as described by the seller, arrived on time and in good condition. I know that there is fraud to be found there, but in my buying (almost all was buying), things worked out just fine.

My favorite was an ashtray with the CGT logo and ship name Normandie on same. Excellent condition and very reasonable.
 
I have become addicted to buying and selling saxophones on Ebay. My first experience was selling a Conn 6M that I had fixed up. I still remember how exciting it was to see the bidding go crazy the last 30 seconds. It's kind of like the finish of a horserace where you have bet on one of the lead horses. Buying is fun too. I lost out on several instruments I really wanted until I learned how to "snipe". It kind of seems like cheating, but it alleviates having to sit at your computer at the end of every auction to try to top the highest bid.
 
Today's e-mail:

IMPORTANT: PASSWORD UPDATE

Dear eBay Member,

To help ensure customers' trust and security on eBay, I am asking all eBay users to change their passwords.

Here's why: Recently, our company discovered a cyberattack on our corporate information network. This attack compromised a database containing eBay user passwords.

What's important for you to know: We have no evidence that your financial information was accessed or compromised. And your password was encrypted.

What I ask of you:
Go to eBay and change your password. Changing your password may be inconvenient. I realize that. We are doing everything we can to protect your data and changing your password is an extra precautionary step, in addition to the other security measures we have in place.

If you have only visited eBay as a guest user, we do not have a password on file.

If you used the same eBay password on any other site, I encourage you to change your password on those sites too. And if you are a PayPal user, we have no evidence that this attack affected your PayPal account or any PayPal financial information, which is encrypted and stored on a separate secure network.

Here are other steps we are taking:
  • As always, we have strong protections in place for both buyers and sellers in the event of any unauthorized activity on your account.
  • We are applying additional security to protect our customers.
  • We are working with law enforcement and leading security experts to aggressively investigate the matter.

Here's what we know: This attack occurred between late February and early March and resulted in unauthorized access to a database of eBay users that includes customers' name, encrypted password, email address, physical address, phone number and date of birth.

However, the file did not contain financial information. And, after conducting extensive testing and analysis of our systems, we have no evidence that any customer financial or credit card information was involved. We also have no indication of a significant spike in fraudulent activity on our site.

We apologize for any inconvenience or concern that this situation may cause you. As a global marketplace, nothing is more important to eBay than the security and trust of our customers. We know our customers have high expectations of us, and we are committed to ensuring a safe and secure online experience for you on any connected device.
Click to expand...
This is also on the eBay homepage. It's legit.
 
The two instruments I bought through ebay were pretty much as I thought (just slightly worse), but I bought them to repair anyway so expected pretty lousy condition.

However, almost every instrument I saw that was bought through ebay (usually by people who bring them to me to repair) were in far worse condition than expected. Being an international buy it's problematic to return (it can be a pretty big hassle). In some cases the price was decent even considering the real condition, but that still doesn't justify it. Most recent is a sax completely repadded with white Roo pads and described that way too. Unfortunately the repad was such that it needs a repad and a lot more mechanical work... IME this is pretty typical...
 
Maybe we should have an eBay to English translator:

* Mint Condition: Needs total overhaul.
* Good, Working Condition: Three or four notes work fine. You can fake the rest, right?
* Light damage: You're going to have to remove the neck and slide in a new horn. Then replace the neck.

More seriously, most of the emails I've gotten over the years are from folks that have an older pro horn or a stencil. I always recommend that they don't do any repairs or even clean up the horn. Let the buyer do everything. He's probably got something specific in mind. If you spend $200 on a bad alto sax pad job, you're just wasting $.

Here's something else I don't understand: I'm selling a relatively well-known set of crystal. I can give you the direct link to a website that sells reproductions for $X. I'm selling for significantly under $X and these aren't reproductions. Logic: if it's cheaper than the reproduction, why not buy it instead of the reproduction? I also saw a lot of ads for the same make/model video card I was selling. Those prices were significantly higher than new prices on Amazon.com. I understand that research can be hard, but going to Amazon.com and typing in the make/model number to get a price isn't that hard.
 
My ongoing adventures.

Kewl: After selling a bit of the crystal stuff, I got a gift certificate from eBay for $25 off anything. That's a nice little touch.
Bad: I used the gift certificate to buy a keyboard I've had my eye on.

So, I Buy it Now the keyboard from an eBay'er with a lot of sales. (Yes, that's a bit hypocritical: I want people to buy from me, even though I haven't sold much, but I wouldn't buy from me because I haven't sold much.) Every time I've bought or sold something, I shoot the buyer or seller an e-mail to say, "Thanks." I tried to do it with this seller and got an eBay page that had options to choose before I could contact them. Interesting. I see that my PayPal cleared, so no worries.

I start checking My eBay, daily, to see what the tracking number is. I don't see any. I'm starting to get uneasy.

The day before the package is supposed to be at my house, I get an e-mail through PayPal: the seller just forgot to ship and "had a problem" with PayPal. Here's the tracking number, though. I e-mailed the address of the dealer provided in PayPal and said that I wasn't happy about the delay and that I hoped he shipped overnight/next day to retain me as a customer. Hey, problems happen, but if you're the seller, do something to fix it. No response. Nice.

The next day, I check UPS. There's a tracking number, but the package isn't at the shipping facility. I check the next day, at lunch. It's still not at the facility. I open a case with eBay. I almost immediately get an e-mail from the seller saying that there's a "two to three day handling time." Eh? It's now 11 days after the auction. I put that in the eBay case and the next day the package is actually at UPS ... shipping standard. *Sigh*

Yesterday, I get the long awaited package, 18 days after the auction ended. I pick up the package and can hear the keyboard lying loose in the box. I open the box and there's just some random styrofoam in the box. No keyboard part, thankfully. I pull out the keyboard and ... it's not the same one in the ad. And the PS/2 connector is frayed and some of the keys look chewed up. Admittedly, I kinda expected this, so I wasn't terribly disappointed.

Tonight or tomorrow I will actually test to see if the keyboard works, copy down some information, and contact eBay. They actually have a button in their "conflict resolution" for, "Received item. Item received is not what was in the auction."
 
Gandalfe said:
How many sales did this seller have and what was his reputation?
Click to expand...
237. 97.7%.

In April, the seller got a neutral comment because item didn't ship. In January, another neutral because the wrong item shipped. I got the combo of the two. I feel special.
 
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